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At a continental level, the N.A.F.T.A. is ultimately aimed at allowing the free movement of labour and its products across national boundaries. Ongoing restriction of this movement is supposed to allow the public and private sectors to adjust to a continental market, before starting the free movement of workers across borders. While this seems like a logical process, it can equally be argued that these restrictions, once again, benefit only the largest corporate interests within all three nations, while dooming smaller companies and individual workers to a type of regional labour bondage, which in turn legislates an ever deepening pit of poverty for the vast majority, and a non-competitive profiteering environment for the elite minority. At times it seems the true objective of the N.A.F.T.A.'s implementation schedule, is to make sure huge corporations get all the cream out of the free trade environment, before smaller entrepreneurs can get a look-in.

Canadian Association of Labour Lawyers
Sheila Greckol, Jeffrey Sack, Claude Melançon

http://www.naalc.org/english/review_annex5_can.shtml