We have accumulated over $10 trillion in goods trade deficits since NAFTA. Our lived experience tells us the 99% are getting burned by our trade policy, while global companies are doing great.
Barack Obama is cool and personable -- no-drama Obama. Then suddenly, he scolds critics of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, his NAFTA-style trade deal. He accuses them of being "wrong," unable to look at the facts, fighting the last war and confusing this new improved trade deal with NAFTA.
The Trans Pacific Partnership critics are right. They are looking straight at the facts. The critics know exactly what a good trade policy would look like, and it's nothing like NAFTA or TPP.
So what's wrong with TPP?
Will TPP create jobs? No. Economic models predict a tiny increase in GDP from TPP. Globally, tariffs are already low. That deal is done. In the past, these same models have been wildly optimistic, so when they predict "no gain," that says a lot.
We can't walk away from trade. We are told that 95 percent of the consumers in the world are outside the US. That's a big scary number. On the other hand, that number for Belgium is 99.8 percent, and Belgium is still OK.
Is TPP a secret? President Obama says TPP is not a secret. Any member of Congress can look at it. .... as long as they don't take notes -- no pictures, no copies and they can't discuss what they see. However, if Senator Elizabeth Warren tells her constituents about TPP's language protecting corporations, she would be violating national security secrecy laws! Ridiculous.
Exports go up. Exports go up. Of course, imports go up faster.
What have we learned from NAFTA? The labor and environmental standards are so ineffective that a country as violent as Colombia can get a trade deal with favorable access to our country, while hundreds of labor activists are killed for speaking up for workers. Our US Trade Representative is struggling to decide if murders are a violation of the labor protections in previous agreements.
Will TPP set higher new standards? Not the way we might hope. Hundreds of corporate lobbyists are actively involved in the negotiating process. TPP will produce very favorable terms for global investors and global companies.
Barack Obama is cool and personable -- no-drama Obama. Then suddenly, he scolds critics of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, his NAFTA-style trade deal. He accuses them of being "wrong," unable to look at the facts, fighting the last war and confusing this new improved trade deal with NAFTA.
The Trans Pacific Partnership critics are right. They are looking straight at the facts. The critics know exactly what a good trade policy would look like, and it's nothing like NAFTA or TPP.
So what's wrong with TPP?
Will TPP create jobs? No. Economic models predict a tiny increase in GDP from TPP. Globally, tariffs are already low. That deal is done. In the past, these same models have been wildly optimistic, so when they predict "no gain," that says a lot.
We can't walk away from trade. We are told that 95 percent of the consumers in the world are outside the US. That's a big scary number. On the other hand, that number for Belgium is 99.8 percent, and Belgium is still OK.
Is TPP a secret? President Obama says TPP is not a secret. Any member of Congress can look at it. .... as long as they don't take notes -- no pictures, no copies and they can't discuss what they see. However, if Senator Elizabeth Warren tells her constituents about TPP's language protecting corporations, she would be violating national security secrecy laws! Ridiculous.
Exports go up. Exports go up. Of course, imports go up faster.
What have we learned from NAFTA? The labor and environmental standards are so ineffective that a country as violent as Colombia can get a trade deal with favorable access to our country, while hundreds of labor activists are killed for speaking up for workers. Our US Trade Representative is struggling to decide if murders are a violation of the labor protections in previous agreements.
Will TPP set higher new standards? Not the way we might hope. Hundreds of corporate lobbyists are actively involved in the negotiating process. TPP will produce very favorable terms for global investors and global companies.
We have accumulated over $10 trillion in goods trade deficits since NAFTA. Our lived experience tells us the 99% are getting burned by our trade policy, while global companies are doing great.
The full article is available here
