Posted on 05/24/2005 7:08:18 AM PDT by 1rudeboy
It really matters where the jobs that Americans lose go. That's what CAFTA is about. It's not about destroying textile jobs in the Carolinas. They're history, anyway--if not this year, then in five years. CAFTA is about keeping work in our hemisphere that would otherwise go to China.
The Central American Free Trade Agreement would cut tariffs on commerce among the United States, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala. The Dominican Republic, which is in the Caribbean, also wants to join.
Though President Bush is battling hard for the accord, some observers declare it all but dead. The generally pro-trade New Democrat Coalition has just jumped ship. But new Democrats should think again and back CAFTA. So should old Democrats.
Organized labor doesn't want to hear this defeatist talk about managing losses. That's understandable. But while labor has been dealt a bad hand, it still must play the cards. That means choosing the least bad of bad options.
Some labor critics point to NAFTA as a reason to shoot down CAFTA. The 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement covered the United States, Canada and Mexico. Foes of these accords note, for example, that there were 127,000 textile and apparel jobs in South Carolina before NAFTA. Now there are 48,000.
The truth is, the United States was bleeding these kinds of factory jobs decades before NAFTA. And it's unclear how large a part NAFTA has played in the years since.
Many of these jobs were not sucked down to Mexico but over to China and other Asian countries. And of the lost jobs that can be traced to Mexico, how many would have simply gone to China instead, had it not been for NAFTA? Even Mexico has seen factories move to China.
Labor-intensive industries in America continue to fight a hopeless war against competitors paying pennies-an-hour wages. The futility of it all can be seen in the following numbers, provided by A.T. Kearney, a consulting firm:
It costs $135 to make 12 pairs of cotton trousers in the United States. It costs $57 to make the trousers in China and ship them here. It costs $69 to do so in other parts of the world.
In this business, the United States is clearly out of the running. But many low-wage countries are still contenders with China--especially if they can ship their products here tariff-free.
Americans would be better off if their imports came from Managua, rather than Guangdong. After all, our Latin neighbors are more likely to buy the things we have to sell. That's why farmers producing beef, pork and corn are all for these treaties. So are U.S. companies that make machinery, especially for construction.
Then there are foreign-policy considerations. CAFTA partners would include very poor countries with fragile democracies. More trade with the United States could stabilize them--and reduce the pressures on their people to come here illegally. And if the workers make more money, they'll be able to buy more American goods.
Some Democrats argue that these poor countries compete by exploiting their workers. Rep. Sander Levin, D-Mich., for example, opposes the accord because, he says, "the basic rights of working people in Central America are systematically repressed."
He has it backward. Economic desperation creates the conditions for oppression. Workers are strongest where jobs are plentiful. CAFTA could empower workers and lift them from grinding poverty.
Rather than protect jobs that will eventually leave America, labor and its Democratic allies should protect the people who lose them. Trade Adjustment Assistance is a federal program that offers financial help and training for Americans who lose jobs because of imports.
Democrats complain that the program is underfunded, and they are right. So why not make more money for Trade Adjustment Assistance a bargaining chip to win support for CAFTA?
There's no exit door out of this global economy. Parts of the American economy will do well in it; other parts will not. Free trade in the Americas is about joining with our neighbors in a common defense against China's growing power. Those are the true stakes, and fighting futile battles will only distract us from what matters.
Then Ronald Reagan was a protectionist because he did exactly that to save American jobs. Protectionism was in the GOP platform up until 1972 and as a policy served this country very well for 200 years, creating an unrivaled economic powerhouse.
We've got to keep those rubber plantation jobs in Maine from moving overseas, too. I'm not sure we should use government money for that, though, because apparently that's fascist.
Now you see why I keep asking these ass clowns to show me the numbers. If one of these guys living in their Mom's basement gets the numbers wrong they might bounce a check, if we get the numbers wrong people will lose money.
It's like talking to very young, slow children. LOL!
I've got news for you. We're still an unrivaled economic powerhouse and we're bigger than ever before.
Proof please. Show me the tariff rates when Reagan was elected and the rates after he left office.
Links please.
Don't forget the North Dakota banana farmers. Save them from those evil Central Americans.
I heard that some of those Central Americans speak spanish.
So now you're admitting American jobs may be lost in order to prop up Central American countries.
First of all that theory hasn't worked in Mexico with NAFTA but even if it did, why should Americans have to sacrifice their livelihoods and standard of living for such a cause?
Why can't these countries make it on their own like the US did, why do we have to build them up at our expense?
Many of us are tired of being the sugar daddy for the world and that's why you're going to continue to see opposition to these trade agreements.
Its not a suggestion but fact.
So why would the federal government relocate a silver mine to Central America?
If you're unaware by now that Reagan slapped tariffs on Japan to save Harley Davidson and other American companies then posting a link probably won't do any good.
Um, the quote I agreed with was that the Central American workers could provide competition to the Chinese. Please do read the quotes you post.
Again, for the hundredth time, please address the fact that American companies are free to relocate to any country they want, with or without a free trade agreement.
Please tell us why you keep bringing up this false argument against trade agreements.
Please tell us how removing tariffs on American exports is a bad thing and will cost us jobs.
Please try to make a coherent argument against CAFTA instead of straw man arguments.
Wrong.
Trade agreements like NAFTA, CAFTA, and FTAA are insidious attempts to destroy American sovereignity and end our great republic.
Its a ply by the globalists, so don't fall for their horse manure.
Figures. Can't even trust these foreigners to speak English.
No, we're not a fascist government. I'm really beginning to wonder why you're posting on a conservative website. We can read that crap elsewhere.
First, you don't "relocate" a mine.
Let's see your link again where the feds are paying for the study. And that it's because of CAFTA.
Um the bold in the quote was that manufacturers would find .90 cent labor quite appealing. That's even lower than in Mexico.
You can deny all you want American companies will be relocating there for both the cheap labor and the ability to flood the US market with those goods without fear of tariffs all you want, but most of us know better.
I'll be waiting for you to post your proof.
Ooooh, insidious. Let me guess, someone gave you a word of the day calendar?
We've had NAFTA since 1994. Is our sovereignty gone yet?
Who's talking about tariff rates, protectionism can mean more than just that. It's the willingness to take those measures that punish competitors for dumping on the American market like China is doing today. You seem to think that behavior is ok. Most of us don't, just as RR didn't.
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