Posted on 04/10/2005 1:24:41 PM PDT by Crackingham
The politicians can dicker over whether free trade is good for America. On the shaded front porch of David's Catfish House, there is no debate.
"Free trade did a number on Atmore. We need more of those deals like a dog needs fleas," said Atmore native Alfred J. Johnson. "They can talk all they want about the positives. We know different down here."
With the Senate set to begin hearings Tuesday on a complex, 2,600-page trade agreement with Central America, old questions over how to protect U.S. laborers are threatening to derail the pact. In places like Atmore, the last big free trade pact, the North American Free Trade Agreement, has been blamed for everything from job losses and bankruptcies to potholes and drug crime. NAFTA, in short, is a dirty word.
"It would be hard for me to go to Atmore or any other small town in my district and hold up NAFTA as a model agreement," said U.S. Rep. Jo Bonner, R-Mobile. "They've seen a harsher side of free trade."
The new accord, the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement, commonly called CAFTA, would eliminate tariffs and other trade barriers between the United States and six Central American countries. CAFTA proponents, led by the Bush administration and an array of American industries, tout its potential economic benefits, saying they expect it to add thousands of jobs and boost demand for U.S. goods and services.
"It should be a no-brainer," said John Engler, president of the National Association of Manufacturers and former Michigan governor. "It is difficult to understand why there is any opposition to CAFTA."
Indeed, few economists dispute the advantages that can come with free trade, particularly for consumers: cheaper prices, wider selection and a greater emphasis on innovation. Easing the flow of goods between countries also creates job prospects for thousands of workers -- a benefit primarily enjoyed by foreign laborers, and coming at the expense of blue-collar Americans. In the low-wage, low-skill corners of the Alabama economy, global trade has introduced a world of job-hungry competitors.
"We can demonstrate that the economic gains from free trade exceed the losses, but try explaining that to someone who's just been laid off," said Keivan Deravi, an economics professor at Auburn University Montgomery. "You can make the case that what's bad for him is good for the rest of the nation. But you can't expect him to be happy about it."
The hitch for CAFTA proponents is that free trade's gains tend to be slow-developing and spread widely across the economy, while its losses are often immediate and acute. The trade deal has met opposition from U.S. sugar, shrimp and textile industries, who foresee a flood of cheap imports from CAFTA countries. Some legislators oppose the deal because of what they say are weak labor rights and environmental standards in Central America.
"We acknowledge that there are concerns, but we can't let fear win out over opportunity," said Chris Padilla, an assistant United States trade representative who helped negotiate the CAFTA deal. "The opponents of free trade are very vocal and very organized. And they are very wrong."
There's an added twist in Alabama, where the proposal could widen the rift between the state's economically strong urban areas and its down-at-the-heels rural communities. CAFTA generally is met with open arms in big cities -- Mobile sees potential customers for its port, Birmingham for its banks and Montgomery for its newly opened Hyundai auto assembly plant. But there's deep skepticism in small-town Alabama, where many residents are still stinging from job losses that they tie directly to NAFTA.
Atmore, in southwest Escambia County along the border with Florida, lost its largest employer three years ago, when Vanity Fair Corp. shuttered an apparel plant and moved the work to Mexico. The plant employed more than 500 workers in a town with a population of about 8,000.
Atmore's story was far from unique: a 2003 study by the nonprofit Economic Policy Institute found that NAFTA caused a net loss of nearly 900,000 American jobs in the 10 years after it passed. Alabama lost more than 15,000 jobs, according the study. Those findings have been disputed by some, but there's no mistaking the bitterness that many people in rural Alabama feel toward free trade. Less than a year after the Vanity Fair plant's door swung shut, Atmore lost its largest retailer -- and its primary source of sales tax revenue -- when Kmart Corp. closed a local Big K department store.
"Places like Atmore got left in the dust," said John Watkins, a local city councilman. "NAFTA almost devastated us, took away nearly everything we had. What good are cheap products when you don't have an income? What have we gotten in exchange for what we gave up?"
It is a DEMAGOGIC TRICK and takes away from the force of your argument which is weak enough anyway.
======
Oh, do I smell a liberal...liberals always accuse their competition of exactly what they do...tell me that 10 million illegal invaders in this country is a "weak argument"...get real.
No wonder why CAFTA's drafters need to keep it in the background and out of the public debate. There isn't a single rational argument that can be advanced in favor of it.
======
Well stated. It is only of benefit to those that are drafting it -- that is it's real purpose.
"Free" refers to rational legitimate commercial intercourse
among people. It is the opposite of protecting favored businesses, the politically powerful or industries that cannot compete but need the police power of the state to help them. Simple enough.
Now you "explain to us all" why you want to interfere with legitimate business and how you would do it.
If we buy goods produced in other countries that were once produced by an American worker that worker is out of a job.This has been the case in many sectors of the economy over the years.The claim that we pay less for these goods as a consumer is usually not the case.If this goes through take a look at the prices of sugar,shrimp and textiles and see how much you're saving.The prices would be less if the corporations passed it on but they don't.This country was built on a system that protected American workers and industry from cheap foreign slave labor for 200 years.Today the corporations have so much influence over the government that they are allowed to put their profit over the good of the country.Americans sent all their saving to China and they took on a record amount of debt to send there as well and in return for all their money and future earnings they got nothing but junk.I call that wealth transfer.
The politicians, of both political parties. And that makes it all the more interesting to see "conservatives" come on this board and exult about how this is supposedly going to reduce government involvement in the economic sphere. As if something that Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter enthusiastically support would ever do something like that.
You have become silly and disingenuous. You want the gummint to set prices? OK. I'll let you. Then you will find out what the "political class" is.
Protectionism increases the power of the state.
Oh I asked a legitmate question. Now you have decided that mocking in the only responsce. I can only presume that you have no defense for your argument.
Please note that you are the one who keeps talking about protectionism. I point out that the "free trade" system destroys individual sovereignty and takes power from the sovereign citizen which is granted to us by the constitution. It makes me wonder if you are an American citizen and if you ever studied US civics?
I guess it has to come out eventually. I was born in China of Mexican parents who raised me as a Hindu and I studied at Berkley and Harvard after my initial training in the Mossad and IDF. Please don't laugh at me because I'm transgendered. Have pity.
Buh bye.
Why do you support the theft of American sovereignty and promote the "foreign entanglements" our forefathers warned us against which has come to haunt Americans in the form of the WTO and "free trade"?
Ohh yeah, They are evil.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.