Professor Krugman calculates* that if trade had been in balance for those two decades, the share of manufacturing would still have fallen from 24.9 per cent to 19.2 per cent of GDP. Consumers would have to pay higher prices - but are cheap CD players more important than preserving jobs at home and halting the decline in workers' wages? Only a turbo-charged yuppie would dare answer yes.The trouble with this plain common sense is that there is not much evidence for it For one thing, the timing does not work. Factory closures have cut a painful swathe through all the industrialised economies.The protectionist response, to slow the tide of globalisation by imposing bans or punitive tariffs on cheap imports of manufactures, is on the face of it quite attractive. The high-technology sector had not created as many attractive jobs as had been destroyed in traditional industries, leaving low-paid work such as retailing and waitressing the only alternative for many Americans. Globalisation has helped only a small elite."Turbo-charged capitalism rewards agility as much as competence, penalising ordinary working stiffs who cannot smartly jump to something better when their jobs are eliminated,'' Mr Luttwak charges.These arguments clearly touch a nerve, and not just in the US. The populist case was eloquently made by US researcher Edward Luttwak in the Independent recently (6 May). He argued that free trade had helped America's computer industry become hugely successful, but at the cost of more than a million jobs in older manufacturing industries. Exposing all of manufacturing to cheap Third World competition was too high a price to pay for making Microsoft successful, he suggested.

Or at least so say the increasingly vocal latter-day Luddites, most no doubt tapping out their polemics on their lap-top computers. ''Globalisation'' - that ill-defined mix of free trade, new technology and deregulation - is enriching the few at the expense of the many. There is an increasingly modish view that the broad trends in the world economy are turning out to be bad for most of us. With other small company funds, such as Pilot and Beacon, Rutherford is now the biggest single investor in the AIM and Ofex markets.. But in the event the shares went to UBS with instructions to place them in the market.Rutherford Asset Management, controlled by Sir Peter Michael, has acquired CW Asset Management, manager of Eaglet Investment Trust The cost is around pounds 500,000. The Swiss made clear their intention to sell their 40 per cent interest in January.

They had hoped to sell to another group, thereby triggering a takeover bid.There was talk of a 360p a share deal. UBS placed 17 per cent of the capital at 133p with 14 institutions. The shares came from a Schroders venture capital fund, the pub company's original backer.Newcomer PGA European Tour Courses, a golf group created out of the Union property operation, returned at 10p but shaded to 9p in heavy trading with Seaq putting volume at 32 million.TAKING STOCKUBS has placed the 23.6 million shares in Eurodis Electron unloaded by Swiss group, Elektrowatt They were yesterday spread among 50 institutions at 220p The shares rose 4p to 230p. Celltech rose 38p to 637p following indications it could have two drugs on the market next year.De La Rue rose 12p to 743p; an associate has been awarded the contract for the automation of benefit payments and post offices.Caldwell Investments, the textile group, gained 2p to 48p and Tadpole Technology, following lower losses, rose 6p to 59p.Century Inns, which came to market at 120p in December, was firm at 138p. Inchcape appears to be the rumoured predator.Smith & Nephew's strong run ended with a 4p fall to 205.5p. Societe Generale Strauss Turnbull suggested the health group's shares had reached "more appropriate levels". Asda, in heavy trading, rose a further 0.75p to 118.5p.Appleyard, the garage chain, shaded to 105p despite busy trading, with a 3.5 million agency cross going through at 99p.

Perpetual, on old take-over candidate, jumped 100p to 2,458p on another set of sparkling results.Amstrad's latest setback - at Dancall, its telecom subsidiary - left the shares 32.5p lower at 173.5p. Courtaulds, up 16p to 427p was lifted by a Barclays de Zoete Wedd buy note and Tesco was helped by Merrill support, up 2p at 288p. The only banking development was a recommended switch from undervalued to hold by ABN Amro Hoare Govett which helped produce a few gains. National Power dropped 7p to 520p and PG 10p to 537p.BT managed to resist the trend, gaining 7.5p to 334.5p. Figures are due today and there are hopes that they will be accompanied by details of a share buy-back. Cable and Wireless greeted the appointment of its long- awaited chief executive, Richard Brown from CompuServe, with a 5p fall to 464p.The much-rumoured bank deal failed to materialise although there is a growing conviction further action in banking, or at least the financial sector, is about to re-emerge.