Recently McCain has been praising eBay as a tool for creating jobs. Apparently, he believes that eBay proves the ability of Americans to compete in a global economy without excessive tax or tariffs (essentially the base of Republican economic policy). The talk of eBay should end there, but McCain takes it further and instead of just proving a point with eBay, McCain appears to be using eBay as a base for his economic model. And this is coming less than a month after the bizarre “dehydrated babies” speech.

As any good economist will tell you, eBay cannot be the base of an economic model. Suggesting this suggests that Americans no longer have the capability to manufacture products of their own. As economist Betsey Stevenson said, “In terms of jobs, there’s no net increase in GDP that comes from trading stuff that’s already made.” America simply cannot sustain itself if the economy is based on (re)distribution as opposed to production.

Now, McCain didn’t get it all wrong. He was going strong when he used eBay as only an example. McCain is trying to reject the idea that he is pro-corporation and against small business by demonstrating how entrepreneurs are able to be successful using eBay, as opposed to a more traditional storefront. eBay is indeed a model of American 21st century ingenuity, but not a valid model for an economy.

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