While major advances in standards of living are evident among virtually all nations that have opened their borders to increased competition, the adjustment trauma resulting from technological advances as well as globalization has also distressed those who once thrived in industries that were once at the cutting edge of technology but that have become increasingly noncompetitive.
Economists will say that workers should move from the steel districts of western Pennsylvania to Silicon Valley or its equivalent. And eventually they, or more likely their children, will move. But the adjustment process is wrenching to an existing workforce made redundant largely through no fault of their own.