1. You don't have to cut them off. You can restrict market share (like Reagan did) and you can impose tariffs (like Trump) what you cannot do without decreasing the buying power of your people is to have them in a wage spiral against people who live in shanty towns and squalor.
2. It isn't money off my back. I do well. It is the acknowledgement that there is a certain level of balance that is desirable to maintain the stability of a nation. We are tilted too far. I also disagree with those who are on a similar political side of the aisle to me who claim that the only way one can be "conservative" is free trade, low taxes, and high deficits in perpetuity.
They keep saying "this works" and I look around and ask how? People are not getting married, having children, buying houses, buying cars, etc. and that issue is increasing as we go younger in population. Where did the workers go and why the shortage? People stopped having kids. Why? Well if you listen to them they say they can't afford them. Mom and Dad have to both work to provide the current middle class standard of living that Dad used to provide. Our higher standard of living is mostly based on cheap consumer electronic bull shit from China.
And yes, the things I mentioned are personal choices but damn if the whole pull yourself up by your boot straps argument (one I wholeheartedly believe in) is a harder sell when economic mobility has decreased for the past 40+ years and is lower than in other developed nations.
Ariel Gelrud Shiro, Christopher Pulliam and Ember Smith expand on their findings in our new report on intergenerational wealth mobility in the United States by examining when opportunities for wealth occur during working years, and when those opportunities decline.
www.google.com
I was on the free trade yay bandwagon and I do believe that fair trade is a good thing. However, I look at the data and I have a hard time arguing that what we are doing now is doing this country favors. It has been awesome for the countries you listed but I am an unabashed nationalist. **** China. I will pay a few extra dollars when I have to replace my goods or I can buy one less outfit here and there. I have more shit than I know what to do with. Having a functional country again where people can do an honest days work for an honest days wages is preferable to enriching Xi and his asshole friends.