I'd like to thank you for your patience. I waited until I had time to respond to your post appropriately. the link above is saddening but certainly not simply driven by NAFTA. there's no assurance that Ohio wouldn't be losing jobs to other states Ohio, with its entrenched unions, simply hasn't been competitive even within the US (which is and always has been a free trade zone). You could argue that if each state had its own set of tariffs and protections, then Ohio wouldn't be losing jobs to other states. but Ohio wouldn't have those jobs to lose without free trade. You can't have it both ways. Lastly, Food stamps is proof that people are on food stamps. the cost of food is through the roof, but that has little to do with trade.
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I think these people would beg to differ with your assertion that NAFTA is "fair."
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I've never stated that life is fair nor have I ever said that trade benefits all people equally. Some people get new jobs, others lose jobs. It's important to make the process of moving from one career to another as easy as possible. Sometimes it can be a blessing in disguise. I was just reading about a guy who had a manufacturing job he but he took a paycut for office work but said he was much happier because he didn't mind going to work anymore.
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The large sucking sound that Perot warned about is now in complete overdrive and we can thank this administration along with the previous one...
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you showed that people in OH used food stamps, some jobs moved to mexico, and that we might be entering a recession...you haven't linked all three to NAFTA. China has had a hand in keeping employment in manufacturing down. their currency manipulation has allowed the federal government and consumers to live beyond their means.
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Originally Posted by Mars
NAFTA is essentially a race to the bottom for blue collar wage earners. White collars are not immune either..they get undercut by H-1B Visa workers trying to secure a green card...
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H1B isn't free trade but immigration so it's off topic. ..although there seems to be a lot of tech jobs and all of my friends in tech jobs get paid pretty well.
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...Monterrey doesn't represent all of Mexico as you know. Think Chiapas and the south... Although it is true that there is a higher standard of living in Monterrey compared to the rest of Mexico (apart from Mexico City) ... it is still teetering on subsistance wage earning and job security is pretty much nonexistent...
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So, how was the poverty pre-NAFTA? How were the job protections? Mexico has a lot of problems that won't be solved by trade alone nor were they caused by it.
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Mexico has the highest per capita income in Latin America, but severe inequalities still exist between socioeconomic groups and areas of the country. Mexico’s educational issues include:Poor educational quality: Mexico, with a GNI per capita of $7,310, ranked 113th out of 131 countres for hte quality of its math and science educational system. Vietnam, (GNI per capita of $620) ranked 79th (World Economic Forum).Literacy: Over 75% of Mexican 15-year-olds tested were incapable of performing even moderately difficult reading tasks (OECD).High drop-out rates: In 2005, only 21% of Mexican adults between the ages of 25 and 64 had obtained a high school degree, versus 88% in the U.S. (OECD
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http://www.worldfund.org/index.php?q....htmlAccording to Monterrey they have advantages otherthan geography
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According to the Nuevo León Undersecretary of Industry and Commerce David Chávez, one of the key factors of the area's steadily rising per-capita income is the state's high education standards...and while that makes the state's workforce more expensive in general, it...promotes the arrival of more high-tech industries ... "I don't want to suggest that other sectors are not welcome, its just that these sectors have the best capacity for these levels of education and pay the best wages, which, in turn, helps to increase the general economy of the state...according to state statistics, 63 percent of its total budget is channeled into schools and colleges.
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http://www.mexconnect.com/mex_/trave...reyreport.html
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/...5652545.column
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Originally Posted by Mars
We're following the same path as many free trade economies if they continue to kill the dollar the way they are . American's standard of living will keep going down at this rate and we'll be in a similar predicament before too long especially if the recession is a prolonged one...
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The dollar devaluation isn't necessarily being driven by "free trade." I'm not sure that unfree countries like Argentina are evidence of the strong currencies in planned economies. the Fed's easy credit policies as both government and consumer addiction to debt have more or less forced it. the alternative of living within our means isn't politically popular.
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The city of Monterrey is also becoming massively overpopulated and... polluted because so many subsistance farmers ...can't compete with US agribusiness which dumps US taxpayer subsidized corn and other agricultural staples in the mexican market.
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If that's true, that's not free trade, that's government subsidies putting poor Mexican farmers out of business. However, the same process happened in the US and is happening in China without the corn price argument. young people moved off family farms in great numbers for better paying jobs and personal independence. It's likely the same process is happening in Monterrey and that the "overpopulation" is a result of the relative success of Monterrey.
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If they don't secure work, they get involved in drugs. Indeed, I'm sure most people would get involved in an underground economy if they were desperate and had no other means to eat!
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It's also as a result of making drugs illegal, which has made it much more profitable.
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...Moreover, part of free trade and globalization is the ability of transnational corporations to "freely" leave once wages rise because of "populist" pressures.
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that's only one interpretation of course. the US' manufacturing peak post WWII could be driven by lack of competition. Europe and Japan were smoldering runs, Argentina and Spain had fascists, and russia and China had fallen under the pall of communism. The world began to change and the US failed to adapt to it. Additionally, much of the growth since the Depression (when the US became socialist) has been driven by debt...whether it be government and consumer debt or lowering reserve requirements or subsidizing mortgages so people could buy homes with less and less money. It's possible that the socialist utopia that the FDR fables talk about never existed. And the transnational argument overlooks the improved standards of living in former hotbeds of cheap labor like SK and Japan.
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They just move to another Free trade zone in Colombia or your parent's country for example and the low wage game goes.
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actually, people from unfree trade countries like bolivia are pouring into chile where job growth and wages are pretty good.
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Meanwhile the people who depended upon the company for "stability" in their lives kicks them to the curb for the next cheap wage market ...
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which is a good argument to move away form pensions which lessens people's dependence on corporations.
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... try telling that to somebody who used to work for GM making 40 dollars an hour but now because he/she has to "compete" with the rest of the free market world his/her choice is to move from Detroit to good ole Alabama and work for 10 bucks an hour
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that's assuming they were adding $40/hour in value...an assumption that can't be made of course. perhaps they should have negotiated $20/hr. the cost of living in detroit can't be that high.
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Originally Posted by Mars
Even if he or she gets the job they will probably still have to be supplemented with food stamps due to rising food inflation and energy costs.
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you have no proof that the person will make $10/hr and you are assuming they will need food stamps. the cost of food is going up both because of the devaluation and because of environmental policies
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The Walmart business model is part of what you consider free and fair trade.
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As is the Apple business model.
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Americans are getting all bent out of shape because what the rest of the world has been experiencing for decades ,particularly in latin America thanks to the IMF and "Free" trade, is now hitting home.
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You are correct. Argentina borrowed billions of dollars and misspent them, often distributing through the corrupt provincial system and buying votes with short term spending sprees (after government officials took their cut). when the bill came due on the debt, they couldn't pay it because they hadn't invested in productive assets. they've continued their century long decline and their decidedly unfree trade practices have resulted in rising crime and food shortages.
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for the "illegal" immigrant situation in this country that is more the result of unfair trade practices driven by NAFTA and CAFTA as well as a foreign policy that supports puppets such as Calderon and Uribe because
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this is simply a rant. Mexico was unfair long before NAFTA, which is why my grandfather immigrated here more than 70 years ago.
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Calderon is providing us with much needed Mexican oil
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you mean for free?
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...to kill political opponents and squash populist movements under the guise of a "war on drugs."
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so the FARC is an innocent populist movement? colombia made up the drug war?