That, too, is actually pretty simple to understand. Economist Joseph Schumpeter introduced the idea that economic growth is a process he called “creative destruction;” economic growth is driven by innovation and radical, disruptive change, and in the wake of that change comes a string of winners and losers.

There is no doubt that as the market expands from a national to a global scale, some Americans have felt the bite of competition from abroad, leading to huge personal disruptions. But those disruptions are no different than what happened when the car displaced the horse and wagon and the personal computer displaced the old mainframe.

Should we have abandoned automobiles and enforced the use of outdated technology to ensure the jobs of those whose expertise was suddenly outmoded? Of course not. The people employed in these outdated industries moved on to more productive activities elsewhere in the economy—making us all wealthier than we otherwise would be if we had protected their jobs.

Even the big bad wolf of free trade, outsourcing, is wildly overstated as a threat to the American economy. While the “Big 3” automakers, for instance, have hemorrhaged jobs, Mercedes Benz, Toyota, and a host of foreign automakers have moved their manufacturing facilities to the United States because our workers are cheaper and more productive than their counterparts abroad. Many “foreign” cars have more American parts and labor than do typical “American” cars.

If free trade were truly the disaster that many portray it as, the employment and productivity statistics certainly don’t reflect it. Unemployment is at 4.7%, productivity jumped in the last quarter jumped by an astounding 4.9%. That translates into two facts: jobs are still relatively plentiful, and increased productivity means both higher profits and lower prices overall.

Millions of American jobs and consumers depend upon free trade for their prosperity. Our focus should not be on erecting barriers to goods and services from other countries—which raise our standard of living—but on breaking down trade barriers in other countries—whose protectionist practices harm their own economies.

It’s pretty simple, really: The bigger the market, the higher the division of labor; the higher the division of labor, the more productive each individual becomes; the higher productivity is, the wealthier we all can become.

To me, that sounds like a pretty good deal for us all.