The US is manufacturing more than ever and is the second largest manufacturer in the world after China. The US middle class has actually "eroded" upwards -- our wealthiest population cohort has tripled in the last thirty years.
And yeah, engineering a market economy is hard (read: impossible). That's why it's largely a fool's errand to try to do it comprehensively.
And for what it’s worth, your screw argument belies a poor understanding, especially given your example of a jet. Aerospace parts are notoriously expensive because we want to track and manage the entire supply chain. That’s why an airplane screw can cost $1k, when naive people assume you can just pick up an equivalent part at Home Depot.
Regarding fixing the infrastructure, I like that idea too, but the government is pretty incompetent and full of grifters so I don’t really think that’s an efficient way to get money to poor uneducated people - most of the money will go to consultants and non-profit directors and so on.
Is this based on actual data or just vibes from your interactions with the DMV, IRS, etc.?
Michael Lewis writes well about this. His perspective is that the govt often shoulders the hard problems that lack a clear path to profitability for private industry. He’s studied govt extensively and seems to have the opposite view.
Seems to me your logic actually applies to the argument of not doing that, and letting the free market figure it out.
And I think you’ll need to elaborate more on your point about the middle class. Depending on how you measure it, people can move from middle class into upper class, but also into lower classes. Your post acts as if class mobility is only in one direction. A bifurcated distribution supports the point that the middle class is eroding.
American lobbying has to date successfully prevented Canada from building up its refinery capacity. Now that Trump doesn't seem to like this arrangement, Canada will likely simply stary refining its own crude.
This will definitely reduce the US trade deficit but may not be good overall for the American economy.
The blanket generalization that all trade deficits are subsidies is flat out wrong. You need to look into the details to determine whether a given trade arrangement is beneficial for the US or not.