Marah shook her head and turned the handle of her cup back towards herself. "Do you know the Republic of Aebien? You should know it. After a civil war, the people manage to remove the government, but things are not looking good for the country. Much has been destroyed. The economy is in ruins. The budget is hard to manage. The old government took out large loans to solve the problems. In other words, to finance some nonsensical grandiose buildings so that they don't have to live in squalor like the people they should have been representing. Social services, education and health are being cut. Interest payments are the new biggest cost in the budget. Necessary investments in structures and the economy can no longer be made. Government revenue continues to decline. Public institutions are underfunded and are being privatized. Investors in rich countries are rubbing their hands together. We are buying hospitals, schools, roads, forests, even drinking water. The water from the well you built behind your house now belongs to us. If you want to drink it, you pay for it. The forests are being burnt down to make farmland. The ancient cities are being torn down because they are standing on raw materials. All this costs almost nothing. The money that's earned doesn't stay in the country and never comes back. The money that Aebien earns from selling it goes to the creditors and never comes back either. The country is running itself into the ground. The debt will never be paid off. BYCH notices the decline in economic power and cynically notes that the Republic of Aebia has not been able to recover economically despite large-scale investment by foreign entrepreneurs. The credit rating falls. Interest rates rise. Everything is sold at junk prices. The new government is seen as autocratic. There is hardly any social spending, but high taxes and a large military. Nevertheless, the cartels and drug plantations are left alone. Why do you think that is? The country is being sanctioned more strongly. The schools have not been paid for a long time. The children still come, but they no longer have a book in their hands, but a sewing machine. Three quarters of all countries in the world are heavily indebted. Interest payments are always a major cost item in the budget. Despite this, almost nobody reduces debt. They only ever issue new bonds when they need money again. However, for most countries, interest payments are a normal expense. Debt is not a problem as long as nobody wants the money. So why tighten your belt? If you achieve economic growth, then of course you could start to reduce the debt, but you could also invest more to generate even more growth, and while you're at it, you can also take on additional debt, because with the new growth, the proportion of interest in the budget has fallen anyway. If you now take on new debt so that the proportion is the same again, you won't even notice it. At the same time, you may even get better conditions. So why not take on new debt? A country with a stable government would have to act very foolishly to ever end up like the little Aebien. After all, it's a child's play to achieve economic growth when you own an entire slave state, isn't it, Mr. Entrepreneur? While I think it's generous of you to hand you child laborers a piece of metal so they can trade it at the nearest store for the food that their parents harvested, don't you think it would be better to leave the country? Probably not. On their own, the monkeys would most likely be too dumb to pick a banana."

"We are not responsible for Aebien's fate. As you know, we as the free banks are only the leading umbrella organization of an association of several world banks. Aebien never had a loan from us directly because they never met the minimum requirements. Even today, we can only specify the parameters that the various world banks apply to a borrower and how they conduct their negotiations within a limited framework, which you are certainly aware of. You can't hold us morally responsible for this. Apart from that, the government was never forced to take out a loan. That was always a free decision."

"I don't want to put a rope around your neck. Aebien was just unlucky that Delxawe needed a puppet government in their country to protect the borders of their colony. Aebien was just unlucky that these puppets were very wasteful. Even though we all like to pretend, the world is not a community of solidarity. If you fall down, you get trampled on so that someone else can stand higher. You sent the puppets to your subsidiary bank because you realized that they couldn't handle money. What had they signed up to, 6%? It's understandable that the new government wasn't happy with this. But when they were with you, you refused any cooperation or mediation. I also know that Mr. Sternschreiber personally owned several of these factory schools for a while. By now, I guess he just gets the profits. - Nice vest, by the way, boy."

"Are you seriously accusing us of that? Maybe you should check your own files first. Nobody owns more in Aebien than companies from Baele. I've heard that several of your public companies also operate there. What about them?"

"Yes, but unlike you, I don't claim that free trade is the solution to all problems."

"Free trade is certainly not the solution to all problems, but it is a step in the right direction. Now that foreign companies have discovered Aebien for themselves, poverty in the country has fallen sharply. There are no more famines. The cities are flourishing. Free trade helps the poorest the most. If goods are cheaper, poor citizens of rich countries can also afford more goods."

"You pretend as if the manufacturers will pass on their low production prices in the end, thereby triggering a price war and increasing prosperity. The reality, however, is that these companies only pass on the low production costs to the extent that they can undercut domestic production. Companies with domestic production are no longer competitive and are moving their own production abroad. Employees here are laid off or paid less. The workers in Aebien are also poorly paid. All affordable products on the market are of low quality because they are not made by skilled workers but by children. This is the result of your free trade. What is the advantage for the consumer? Who benefits at all? The cheap products harm the domestic market. The production waste goes to developing countries and because it is waste, it is cheaper there than their domestic products. The income of all countries is lower. All countries lose their independence."

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Meanwhile, the boy had finished his cup. He clinked it on the plate to draw attention to himself.

"If you close yourself off, the low competitive pressure on your companies will also hinder innovation."

"Boy, that's missing the point. How exactly do you imagine that cheap clothing and brittle steel could lead to more innovation?"

"More competition in the market always leads to better products."

"But it's not about trade between equal partners, it's about free trade."

"Surely all parties benefit from free trade? Nobody would trade anything if they were making a loss. Free trade is fair trade."

"If I let you produce goods that I can produce myself but that you cannot produce without me, then my margin is higher. If I buy intermediate products from you that I can produce myself and turn them into end products that you can't produce either, then my margin is also higher. If I have more money, my margin is higher. If I have a stronger army, my margin is higher. If I have more allies, my margin is higher. My margin is always higher because I have power and you don't. It's like I force you to sign an employment contract and you're happy to be employed, but as your employer I decide how much you earn."

Mr. Jens shook his head vehemently and apparently did not agree with these statements.

"It may be that the situation can be described in this way for a few products, but this is the exception rather than the rule and as an employee you always have the opportunity to negotiate a fair wage for yourself. That is not impossible. Governments could also demand this if they felt that their citizens were being exploited."

"If they want a higher wage, then you simply threaten to move production to a neighboring country, then that little suggestion is a thing of the past. With agricultural products, for example, they would otherwise lose the plant variety, the seeds, the pesticides, the fertilizer, the machinery and the land. They cannot afford that. The land and some of the machinery could be expropriated as long as they paid a hefty compensation. After all, they were forced to sign contracts for this. The rest of the machinery and the fertilizer could perhaps be raised themselves if they had enough money. The rest would be difficult. If they want to use a different plant variety and different pesticides, then they have to deal with the now resistant pests. Thanks to foreign support, they have also reached a population that they can no longer feed with natural plants. If they continue to use the plant varieties, they are again violating international agreements that have been imposed on them. In the event of a violation, sanctions and more follow. Countries are forced into agreements. Farmers are threatened. Influence is exerted on legislation. Heavy penalties are imposed. If the wind blows unfavorably, the farmer next door suddenly has a contract too. Hundreds of tons of food are confiscated and destroyed every year, even though the citizens of these countries are starving to death, and then the big companies claim that free trade will combat world hunger."

"That also applies to large countries that import plant varieties and pesticides. You have to coordinate with your neighboring countries if you want to have more negotiating power."

"You think that's possible?" Marah chuckled somewhat. "Most governments don't give a damn about their citizens. But supposing a government of a trading partner planned to introduce a minimum wage for its citizens on its own, then I'd lose my cheap goods. In the future, more money would stay abroad. That would destroy my trade balance. We could easily take over production again ourselves, but we'd have to adapt first and in the meantime my citizens would like to have something to eat. It wouldn't make sense either. After all, we moved production abroad so that we could take care of high-quality goods ourselves. In other words, this fucking shithole country's decision to introduce a minimum wage hurts my balance of trade, hurts domestic businesses, lowers profits, raises the cost of living for my citizens and lowers their happiness. It would cost me billions a year. Why should I accept that? I would not and you know that."

"In the end, none of this changes anything, because as long as the production of the end product is more complex, the higher margin is justified anyway."

"Yes, but even if it doesn't change anything, it doesn't matter, because the real motive isn't even that I earn more than the others. Protectionism or free trade is not a question of morality. It is a question of economic interests. Protectionism is something you do if you want to have a strong economy. Free trade is something that is offered to small countries so that they never become competitors. If I was really afraid of competition, I wouldn't let it arise in the first place. People tell lies like this, that free trade is for the benefit of everyone so that they have an excuse to exploit them. If you show me a country that succeeded with free trade, I'll show you a successful country, because it seems that you don't know what that is. But of course you are right about one thing. Baele would not need protectionism to the this extent. However, we don't need to exploit small countries either. So it's a dilemma. Either get cheap goods and produce more high-quality goods ourselves and make higher profits in international trade or sit on our high horse. It's difficult, but I think I'd rather stay on my high horse and shake my head dismissively."

.../ End Part