Our beloved president has recently left our broad stripes and bright stars to visit Asia, at the expense of some $200 million per day.
According to a speech given by President Barack Obama, the goal of the trip is to increase exports to the U.S., thereby increasing jobs here in the homeland.
However, the provisions necessary to facilitate the president’s trip have been expensive, if not outright excessive. India has assigned some 9,000 police officers to the task, while the U.S. has put some 3,000 of its own officers to get everything in order for the big day.
I’m not a military official, so I would feel unqualified to make a call about what provisions were appropriate and which weren’t. However, I think somewhere in between the helicopters, numerous ships watching the coastline and high-tech security, there were at least a couple dollars to be cut.
But hey, this is coming from a guy who can’t print his own money.
Most of the publicity surrounding the trip has been negative because of the price tag, but we should instead focus on finding out if we would not have gotten these contracts and export deals had he not gone in the first place.
Economically, there’s a possibility the trip is working. Obama may very well be strengthening bonds with foreign economic key-points on the far-Eastern front, sealing deals for us with venture capital groups and entrepreneurs, growing the economy here at home and becoming the proverbial Superman for the unemployed.
On the other hand, maybe he’s blowing more cash than every person who ever reads this article will have in their lifetimes combined. Unfortunately, there’s no way to know for sure.
The focus on this trip thus far has been misguided. It shouldn’t be a campaign on how India can help us. It needs to be a campaign on what we can learn from India.
For years now, India has been one of the world’s fastest emerging economies, along with China and Brazil, at a growth rate nearly four times that of the U.S. by gross domestic product. In general, we expect smaller economies to grow faster than larger, more established countries. It’s a little like giving a hobo $10 and doubling his income versus trying to give Michael Jordan free sneakers.
India has a tendency to be much more open to international trade than the U.S. For example, we have a habit of having obnoxiously difficult immigration laws, even for the highly educated and productive. Without getting into international business and immigration laws, we have certain taxes and fees that raise the cost of bringing in essential, high-tech jobs here. C’mon, America.
Our deep-rooted fear of globalization has to be addressed. Our view now sits somewhere between an amorphous “bad” thing we hear about on the news and “that thing that’s going to take all our jobs.”
One thing needs to be clarified: We can absolutely lose work to foreign markets, but we can often save, not destroy, American work as well.
For example, forcing companies to exclusively use American goods may drive prices up, leaving the company no choice but massive layoffs. We need to be more open to specialization and cost-cutting techniques.
India as a whole has a lower education level than we do in the U.S., but they have a unique source of innovation frequently called jugaad, which is Indian jargon for creative thinking on a small scale.
They have a unique appreciation for innovation that we’ve lost here. I do miss it so.
Finally, India’s famous information technology industry was started by a drive that reminds me of the New Deal. People stuck between a rock and a hard place are given the opportunity for something greater. They strive. India started with small schools for these fields, and as more people moved to opportunity, more schools opened, creating a cycle of education acting largely outside government planning, yet having forceable impact internationally.
We need that drive here. We need that passion. We need it now more than ever.
As Obama passes through the Far East, reflecting on Jakarta, a place where he spent four years of his life, I hope he remembers how America was born — a childlike embrace for the foreign and a wild, passionate desire to succeed.
That, and not foreign exports, is why this trip is so important.
Devin Graham is a 21-year-old business management senior from Prairieville. Follow him on Twitter @TDR_dgraham.
 
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Contact Devin Graham at [email protected]