To the Editor:

When I listen to the pundits describe our financial situation, I never hear any of these brilliant prognosticators mention we are growing poorer by the minute. They say our economy is improving.

Nor do they describe the scenario that got us here.

We are growing poorer because we no longer create enough wealth to sustain our standard of living. It’s as simple as that.

The wealth that once poured from our factories has dried up. Workers are either on the dole or working slave wages in service industries. Where are the factories that once produced textiles, apparel, shoes, electronics and furniture? They are scattered all over the developing world.

Pundits assure us high-paying jobs are just around the corner. How far away is that corner? What are the jobs and how many of them are lurking there? No one knows. What they offer is feel-good speculation.

For the historically challenged, especially those who govern us, every great industrial nation has become wealthy by protecting its wealth-producing domestic industries. Britain, the United States and Japan are the most obvious examples.

Why try the idiocy and uncertainty of trade deals that have proven disastrous?

NAFTA is a prime example. The current trade negotiations called the Trans Pacific Partnership will be even more destructive.

The American worker has been sold down the river. All the glib nonsense about jobs of the future is nothing more than a cat fight over the crumbs left over from a nation growing poorer.

Herschel Sternlieb
Brunswick