While their productivity will be the same, the Chinese labor cost will be one-tenth of the U.S. cost. But give the American worker a giant mechanical shovel and, at the world's highest wage, he will produce the world's cheapest coal. With advanced technology, workers will produce the lowest-cost coal wheat, jet aircraft and countless other goods. And so, we import lace and ball gloves and petroleum, and we export jet planes and wheat and chemicals. Moreover, contrary to popular belief, imports don't cause unemployment, nor do immigration or automation.
Unemployment exists only when money wages are arbitrarily raised or held above the market price.
For example, when the stock market crashed in 1929, it precipitated a deflation and concomitant lowering of all prices. The result was that twenty-five to thirty percent of the workforce was Unemployed. The situation was not ameliorated until 1941 when the government printed massive amounts of money to support the war effort, and instead of trying to support wages, the government took the opposite position and introduced controls to hold wages down. Unemployment soon disappeared and industry expanded. Protectionism is the age-old road to reduced exports, increased unemployment, lower standards of living, war, and so many other problems associated with government intervention in economic activity.