free Trade does not work....and there is no evidence it does. Period
Let me submit exhibit one: The United States of America. Long the largest free trade zone in the world. We’re also the wealthiest in the world.
Again. No proof Free Trade works. Prove it with facts...
Ok. North Korea. "Free trade" haven, or not?
1. Where do you shop?
2. Are you a retired Cook County Democrat?
You were right. Free trade is so great that it affects markets where “free trade” doesn’t even exist:
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/05/01/us-shale-gas-boom-undermining-putins-gazprom/
The Russian energy firm Gazprom is increasingly off its stride in Europe, its largest export market. Bulgaria has managed to negotiate a 20 percent price cut in its new ten-year contract with the gas giant, an unprecedented reversal of fortune from only a short time ago. Gazprom had cut off gas to the Ukraine in 2006 and 2009 during contract negotiations, which left Bulgaria freezing for several days as they were on the same pipeline. Bulgarians are probably relishing their success now with no small amount of schadenfreude.
The cause of the turnaround, the Wall Street Journal reports, should come as no surprise: the shale gas boom in the United States. The US has begun exporting gas to Europe, and has also ramped up coal exports by more than 250 percent since 2005. The net result has been to knock Gazprom back on its heels. The WSJ reports that the negotiations with Bulgaria were heated, with Gazprom’s negotiators shouting in frustration on several occasions. . . . Putin’s hardball tactics in his near-abroad when Russia was energy top dog were instrumental in confirming him as an authoritarian bully in the minds of many Westerners. These tactics also inadvertently made Russia more vulnerable to shifts in the global energy market, with many of its main customers desperately seeking out alternative suppliers so that they would never find themselves backed into a corner again.