NAFTA, CAFTA Not Working

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2006/09/12/nafta-cafta-not-working/

NAFTA, CAFTA Not Working

They are the twin pillars of recent U.S. trade policy—NAFTA and DR-CAFTA. And neither of them is working.

After 12 years, NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) has not brought prosperity to working people in Mexico, Canada and United States, as promised.

And like NAFTA and other bad U.S. trade agreements, DR-CAFTA (Dominican Republic—Central American Free Trade Agreement) does not contain enforceable workers’ rights or environmental protections. The agreement, which went into effect in January, is already failing after just eight months, according to a report released Tuesday.

In testimony submitted Sept. 11 to the Senate Finance Subcommittee on International Trade for NAFTA hearings, AFL-CIO Policy Director Thea Lee noted that “rather than encouraging sustainable and equitable growth, NAFTA has contributed to the loss of jobs and incomes of workers, while enriching the very few.”

NAFTA’s main outcome has been to strengthen the clout and bargaining power of multinational corporations, to limit the scope of governments to regulate in the public interest and to force workers into more direct competition with each other, while assuring them fewer rights and protections. The increased capital mobility afforded by NAFTA has hurt workers, the environment and communities in all three NAFTA countries.

Since 1994, the U.S. combined trade deficit with Mexico and Canada has ballooned from $9 billion to $127 billion, Lee says. The Department of Labor has certified that well over half a million U.S. workers lost their jobs due to NAFTA, and the nonprofit Economic Policy Institute (EPI) estimates the skyrocketing NAFTA trade deficit contributed to the loss of more than 1 million jobs and job opportunities.

Mexican workers haven’t fared any better. Real wages in Mexico are actually lower today than before NAFTA went into effect in 1994, and the number of people in poverty grew from 62 million to 69 million through 2003, Lee says.

FULL article at link above.

[Mojambo]

1. A more cynical person might say they are working as designed. nt

[skids]

3. That's not cynical it's "stating the obvious"

By now, if a person does not realize that "globalism" as a movement is a farce, seeking not its stated objectives but rather seeking to exploit the mechanisms of change to bypass worker protections for the further enrichment of the already empowered, said person should be hit off the head by a flying "Vonage" box.

[nosmokes]

4. damn. you stole my post.

din't think i was t*that* cynical...;)

[anitar1]

5. Yeah, ain't globalism wonderful ? You aren't alone.

I knew from the beginning that it was a farce.

[The2ndWheel]

9. The funny thing

is that this process has been going on for thousands of years. Ever since the first expanding community went to war with its neighbor because it was running out of land and resources for an ever growing population.

At this point, even if we could, we wouldn't stop it voluntarily. Too many people would die. No, this whole thing will do one of two things; continue endless growth, or collapse like every other system/organization/empire/civilization does.

[alvarezadams]

6. It doesn't take cynicism at all

That WAS the objective. To the point of government policy analysts and the Pentagon taking into consideration the increasing distance between the haves and have-nots and planning for the contingency of expected violence.

When Friedman and the Chicago Boys dismantled the Chilean economy they had a laboratory test-tube sterile environment to test their theories. They saw, first hand, what neoliberalism in its most extreme form brings. Far from repudiating it they continue to export it at every opportunity, knowing full well that violence and terror will be the inevitable results. And being Straussians,they lie and manipulate - but not well enough as the leaks of policy ananlysts and Pentagon planners has shown. Scratch the surface and the house of cards is laid bare.

Add some progressive-sounding rhetoric to the same philosophy and we have the DLC.

[1932]

11. They're working to make the rich richer and the poor poorer

[ulysses]

13. ding!

:thumbsup:

[citizen snips]

21. They are working for the rich

but not for the working class.

[madrchsod]

2. no shit

i work every fucking night putting together parts from mexico,india,korea,and china to make a living. all those parts should be made in america but they ain`t. it really depresses me to think how many millions of my fellow brothers and sisters lost their jobs because of this shit....

[Little Star]

7. This subject needs more day light!!!!! K&R

When Big Dog was selling this whole NAFTA thing it scared the crap out of me. That is the one thing I hold against him. Why would any president sell out the american people like that? Globalization is a killer for working people every where!!!!

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

8. "That sucking sound you hear..."

________________ Last Laugh ________________

[Uncle Joe]

22. I believe Perot already had his own personal NAFTA monopoly,

and did not want the rest of the nation to horn in on his business and if the sucking sound you hear is jobs all heading south to Mexico, how come we have so many Mexicans sneaking across the border headed north?

[Elwood P Dowd]

23. Because the jobs in Mexico pay about $1.00 an hour

They have zero benefits and zero worker protections.

[Uncle Joe]

24. Well that needs to be corrected, along with environmental

safeguards.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

26. There was job flight to Mexico.

But it was just a layover flight to Indonesia and China.


Mexicans are coming north because some jobs can't be exported. Namely, the service industries and agriculture.

It's a bad deal for everybody.

[Elwood P Dowd]

27. Bad deal for everybody is correct

Bad for US workers because entry level pay in service, agriculture, and construction work will remain low because of an abundant supply or workers willing to work for $6.00 an hour or less.

Bad for Mexican workers because their jobs in Mexico will flee to Asia if they ever demand much more than $1.00 or so an hour.

But it's good for republican employers in the US and Mexico. They have plenty of slaves willing to work for peanuts. The race to the bottom is continues.

[Tyo]

10. From a corporate point of view....

I'd think that the idea would be for everyone to get richer so we could buy more of their stuff. How does taking our jobs and sending them overseas make us "better" consumers or benefit the corporations in the long run? Aren't they slowly impoverishing the very people they are marketing their products to? Sorry, there is probably a really obvious answer to this but economics was never my thing.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

12. The answer is that greed can make people stupid

especially if they're thinking only in term of short-term profits instead of long-term growth.

Firing 1000 American workers and replacing them with 1000 sweatshop workers in a foreign country with no labor protections or environmental laws makes your company more profitable in the short term.

[Tyo]

16. That's what I was afraid of n/t

[CrispyQ]

19. There was a time when they said that capitalism was built on the

back of labor but now they say that capitalism is built on new markets. If they destroy the American market by outsourcing our jobs, the multinationals will simply move into the new markets that now have our jobs & a growing economy.

USA
We export some of the best paying jobs in the world!

[Elwood P Dowd]

14. Remember that NAFTA/CAFTA are not really Free Trade agreements

They are outsourcing/investment scams. David Ricardo would never embrace those agreements as "Free Trade".

[Lydia Leftcoast]

17. Yes, during the Asian currency crisis of 1997, caused by outsiders

speculating in Asian currencies, Malaysia moved to stop the crisis by putting controls on foreign exchange.

All the "experts" cried doom and gloom and predicted that the Malaysian economy would go into a tailspin.

But guess what. Malaysia was the FIRST country to recover.

[Radical Activist]

15. This was my biggest problem with Gore in 2000

He needs to change his stance if I'm going to support him over other good candidates.

[robcon]

18. NAFTA has been a spectacular success.

There is no reason why CAFTA won't be the same. Increased wages, higher productivity, improved competition. We should continue to expand free trade, IMO.

[Elwood P Dowd]

20. Why do you keep posting these lies?

When you look at every promise made about NAFTA, the exact opposite has happened. It's not even a free trade agreement.

[tbyg52]

25. Huh?

In the first place, what actual evidence is there for your statements? (Real question.)
Second, any "free" trade agreement that doesn't take into account the wide disparity in wages between countries can hardly be free, just on the face of it. The jobs will migrate to the lowest paying countries, which is what is happening.

[GETPLANING]

28. What people are missing is America's illegal immigration problem

is a direct result of NAFTA. Mexican and Central American workers who were already at subsistence wages are now out of work. Where can they go to survive? North!