By Laura Carlsen
The courtesy call between President-elect Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon turned out to be a little more revealing than anticipated. The statement from incoming White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs gave a pretty clear, if vague, picture of where Obama plans to take the bilateral relationship. On renegotiating NAFTA, he stood his ground as Calderon lobbied heavily not to re-open the North American Free Trade Agreement.
From ZNet; read the whole story...
The opinions, views, thoughts, and ramblings of editors of PoliticalAffairs.net – and other stuff worth reading or viewing.
Showing posts with label NAFTA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NAFTA. Show all posts
Friday, January 16, 2009
Friday, June 6, 2008
Tell Congress: Support the TRADE Act
From Change to Win:
The time has come for a new trade and globalization model - one that ensures economic security here at home while offering opportunities for sustainable development in countries around the world.
The TRADE Act is a new bill just introduced in Congress that would make this a reality by moving from the broken, discredited "free" trade model to a more equitable fair trade system. It would articulate the outcomes that any future trade deals will be expected to produce, and require that existing trade deals be renegotiated to remove their inequities.
Tell your Members of Congress to support the TRADE Act by signing on as co-sponsors today!
The time has come for a new trade and globalization model - one that ensures economic security here at home while offering opportunities for sustainable development in countries around the world.
The TRADE Act is a new bill just introduced in Congress that would make this a reality by moving from the broken, discredited "free" trade model to a more equitable fair trade system. It would articulate the outcomes that any future trade deals will be expected to produce, and require that existing trade deals be renegotiated to remove their inequities.
Tell your Members of Congress to support the TRADE Act by signing on as co-sponsors today!
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Tell Congress No Colombia Free Trade Agreement
Colombia's government has thwarted workers' right to organizeand bargain collectively-by weakening labor protections,refusing to register legitimate unions and failing to enforce the law against anti-union discrimination. The Colombia FTA extends NAFTA and CAFTA, so-called "free trade" agreements that have already undermined workers rights and environmental protections for U.S., Canadian, Mexican, and Central American workers.
U.S. and Colombian workers need agreements that guarantee the right to organize and improve living and working conditions for all workers. This agreement does none of that. Join Jobs with Justice in demanding fair trade and an end to the global race to the bottom.
You can take action on this alert either via email (please see directions below) or via the web at:
http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/colombia_fta08/5n8ib297nxemb6 ?
U.S. and Colombian workers need agreements that guarantee the right to organize and improve living and working conditions for all workers. This agreement does none of that. Join Jobs with Justice in demanding fair trade and an end to the global race to the bottom.
You can take action on this alert either via email (please see directions below) or via the web at:
http://www.unionvoice.org
Thursday, March 6, 2008
NAFTA-gate – Some clarification please!
By Joel Wendland
A Canadian news report this week revealed that Hillary Clinton's campaign called Canadian diplomats to warn them that her own campaign posturing about NAFTA was to be "taken with a grain of salt."
In the days before the March 4th primary, Hillary Clinton scored some points with Ohio voters, who understand that NAFTA has decimated their manufacturing economy, when an illegally leaked Canadian government memo appeared to indicate that Barack Obama's pledge to revisit NAFTA was not sincere.
What didn't make it into Clinton campaign memos or much of the media punditry that swiftly followed was that memo also described Obama's commitment to renegotiating the trade agreement on the issue of jobs and the environment and making them "core principles" of the agreement, something labor and environmental activists failed to win under the Clinton administration in the 1990s.
A report in the Washington Post, Mar. 4, quoted the Canadian memo as saying, that Obama is "in favour of strengthening/clarifying language on labour mobility and environment and trying to establish these as more 'core' principles of the agreement."
Yesterday, Mar. 5, the Canadian-based Globe and Mail, reporting on the Canadian government's internal investigation of the illegal leak of the memo, revealed that, according to Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Chief of Staff Ian Brodie, the Clinton campaign called Canadian diplomats to ease their worries about their own denunciations of NAFTA:
Quoting The Globe and Mail:
In other words, while ranting and raving about perceived misstatements by an Obama campaign adviser, the Clinton campaign had done the very thing she had denounced.
So let's get some clarification. On one of the most crucial issues facing working families – how trade affects jobs – we are getting a muddy picture. We need clear outlines on how job growth will be promoted, what kinds of policies will rebuild the manufacturing sector with good unions jobs?
The question of jobs and the economy are so important, now is not the time to play games. NAFTA is no joke, and working families are coming to understand that because the agreement failed to include real protections for jobs and the environment back when the Clinton administration pushed so strongly for its passage, it helped move jobs out of the country by making exports to the US cheap.
We know that the John McCain alternative is to accept job losses and to push more corporate loopholes and tax breaks that will move more jobs out of the economy. McCain told Ohio voters during a campaign stop there that they are just going to have to get used to it. "Have people lost jobs?" he said. "Yes, they have, and they're gonna lose jobs."
So to the Democratic candidates: no more games.
A Canadian news report this week revealed that Hillary Clinton's campaign called Canadian diplomats to warn them that her own campaign posturing about NAFTA was to be "taken with a grain of salt."
In the days before the March 4th primary, Hillary Clinton scored some points with Ohio voters, who understand that NAFTA has decimated their manufacturing economy, when an illegally leaked Canadian government memo appeared to indicate that Barack Obama's pledge to revisit NAFTA was not sincere.
What didn't make it into Clinton campaign memos or much of the media punditry that swiftly followed was that memo also described Obama's commitment to renegotiating the trade agreement on the issue of jobs and the environment and making them "core principles" of the agreement, something labor and environmental activists failed to win under the Clinton administration in the 1990s.
A report in the Washington Post, Mar. 4, quoted the Canadian memo as saying, that Obama is "in favour of strengthening/clarifying language on labour mobility and environment and trying to establish these as more 'core' principles of the agreement."
Yesterday, Mar. 5, the Canadian-based Globe and Mail, reporting on the Canadian government's internal investigation of the illegal leak of the memo, revealed that, according to Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Chief of Staff Ian Brodie, the Clinton campaign called Canadian diplomats to ease their worries about their own denunciations of NAFTA:
Quoting The Globe and Mail:
Mr. Brodie, apparently seeking to play down the potential impact on Canada, told the reporters the threat was not serious, and that someone from Ms. Clinton's campaign had even contacted Canadian diplomats to tell them not to worry because the NAFTA threats were mostly political posturing.
The Canadian Press cited an unnamed source last night as saying that several people overheard the remark.
The news agency quoted that source as saying that Mr. Brodie said that someone from Ms. Clinton's campaign called and was "telling the embassy to take it with a grain of salt."
In other words, while ranting and raving about perceived misstatements by an Obama campaign adviser, the Clinton campaign had done the very thing she had denounced.
So let's get some clarification. On one of the most crucial issues facing working families – how trade affects jobs – we are getting a muddy picture. We need clear outlines on how job growth will be promoted, what kinds of policies will rebuild the manufacturing sector with good unions jobs?
The question of jobs and the economy are so important, now is not the time to play games. NAFTA is no joke, and working families are coming to understand that because the agreement failed to include real protections for jobs and the environment back when the Clinton administration pushed so strongly for its passage, it helped move jobs out of the country by making exports to the US cheap.
We know that the John McCain alternative is to accept job losses and to push more corporate loopholes and tax breaks that will move more jobs out of the economy. McCain told Ohio voters during a campaign stop there that they are just going to have to get used to it. "Have people lost jobs?" he said. "Yes, they have, and they're gonna lose jobs."
So to the Democratic candidates: no more games.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Winds of Change Blow Strong in a Rustbelt City
By Tim Wheeler
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio—Wade through a foot of snow to a voter’s door here and it doesn’t take long for the subject to turn to NAFTA’s carpet-bomb destruction of jobs in the Mahonning Valley.
The 30-year plague of plant closings is issue number one on voters’ minds as we plod from door to door getting out the vote for the March 4 Ohio primary. Both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have brought busloads of canvassers to go door to door here and both are facing those searching questions.
“I think NAFTA is horrible,” said Dorinda Anderson, who lost her union job at Delphi Packard that manufactures components for GM cars including the nearby Lordstown plant.
Delphi is still open, she said, but with only about 600 workers after a downsizing in which she lost her job. She had been a Clinton supporter until she heard Barack Obama speak at an overflow rally at Youngstown State University a few days ago. She was an instant convert to his message of hope and change.
She was working as a volunteer receptionist at Obama headquarters, the Greater Mill Creek Community Center when I spoke with her. “NAFTA is the reason we have lost so many jobs here in Ohio,” Anderson continued. “The steel mills have closed down. Everything is leaving, jobs are leaving, people are leaving. They don’t even give us any advance notice. Just recently we lost another 3,000 jobs at Delphi. Now its down to about 500 or 600 workers.”
If John McCain is elected in November, “we will have a third term of George W. Bush. It will be more of the same. I thought it was horrible that Bush was asked about $4 a gallon gas and he answered, ‘What! Nobody told me.’ Bush is a lame duck living in a bubble.”
To be accurate, the economic crisis here predates NAFTA enacted in 1994. Youngstown Sheet & Tube closed down it’s Campbell Steel works in 1978 destroying thousands of jobs.
But NAFTA, sold by President Bill Clinton as an antidote that would create millions of new jobs in fact destroyed three million manufacturing jobs. Hillary Clinton has a heavy burden to explain Bill Clinton’s role in signing NAFTA even if she now criticizes it, Anderson said.
The shutdowns and layoffs continue at a dizzying pace and the ruination is obvious in the thousands of empty and abandoned homes we plod past as we go door to door. Youngstown once had a population of 160,000. Now it is 60,000.
Willy Williams, a former Lordstown auto worker who likewise lost his job in a GM downsizing, is also campaigning for Obama. An active United Auto Worker retiree, he scoffed at Bush’s claim that the U.S. is going through a temporary “slow down,” not a recession.
“Its been a recession here for a long, long time,” Williams said. “But if we do the right thing, get the right President in there, I think we can bring it together, bring us out of the economic crisis we are in. Obama is the man.”
Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich) warmed up the crowd of volunteers at Obama headquarters. “Ohio is going to go Obama, March 4,” Conyers said. “He is the ‘come-from-behind’ candidate. He has a ground operation all over the state of volunteers like you. We can change America and move in a new direction.”
That night, an Obama rally turned into a “Town Meeting” at New Bethel Baptist Church. It was sponsored by the Change to Win labor federation. Attendance was swelled by Teamster union members, and SEIU hospital workers. A busload of volunteers traveled from Baltimore and a delegation of 75 Penn State students.
Two young white students from Michigan State University in Lansing spoke. “Its spring break at Lansing and many of our classmates are down in Florida,” one of the MSU students said. “I have no regrets that I decided to stay here and not go to Florida. We found nothing but Obama supporters out there.” The crowd roared.
Massachusetts Governor, Deval Patrick, said that he, like Obama, is from Chicago’s south side and faced questions about his “funny name,” Some said “it is not your turn” to be governor, he said. “We are saying it is his TIME,” Patrick said. “We are going to decide who is electable.” The crowd cheered.
During an open-mike, Guy Djoken, president of the Frederick County, Maryland, NAACP hailed the grassroots movement that has sprung up for Obama. “What are we going to do with this movement after we get him to the White House?” Djoken asked.
Patrick said a November victory is just the first stage. A new stage “will start the day he gets to the White House,” Patrick said. “Its hard to govern with the grassroots. Its new to America.” But without that grassroots power, there will be no change, he said.
SEIU President Andy Stern likened Obama to a sailing ship skipper. “He can have all the navigational skills in the world but without wind in wind in the sails, the ship will just go in circles,” Stern said. “We are the winds of change in those sails, for equal rights, equal pay.”
[Subscribe to the People's Weekly World]
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio—Wade through a foot of snow to a voter’s door here and it doesn’t take long for the subject to turn to NAFTA’s carpet-bomb destruction of jobs in the Mahonning Valley.
The 30-year plague of plant closings is issue number one on voters’ minds as we plod from door to door getting out the vote for the March 4 Ohio primary. Both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton have brought busloads of canvassers to go door to door here and both are facing those searching questions.
“I think NAFTA is horrible,” said Dorinda Anderson, who lost her union job at Delphi Packard that manufactures components for GM cars including the nearby Lordstown plant.
Delphi is still open, she said, but with only about 600 workers after a downsizing in which she lost her job. She had been a Clinton supporter until she heard Barack Obama speak at an overflow rally at Youngstown State University a few days ago. She was an instant convert to his message of hope and change.
She was working as a volunteer receptionist at Obama headquarters, the Greater Mill Creek Community Center when I spoke with her. “NAFTA is the reason we have lost so many jobs here in Ohio,” Anderson continued. “The steel mills have closed down. Everything is leaving, jobs are leaving, people are leaving. They don’t even give us any advance notice. Just recently we lost another 3,000 jobs at Delphi. Now its down to about 500 or 600 workers.”
If John McCain is elected in November, “we will have a third term of George W. Bush. It will be more of the same. I thought it was horrible that Bush was asked about $4 a gallon gas and he answered, ‘What! Nobody told me.’ Bush is a lame duck living in a bubble.”
To be accurate, the economic crisis here predates NAFTA enacted in 1994. Youngstown Sheet & Tube closed down it’s Campbell Steel works in 1978 destroying thousands of jobs.
But NAFTA, sold by President Bill Clinton as an antidote that would create millions of new jobs in fact destroyed three million manufacturing jobs. Hillary Clinton has a heavy burden to explain Bill Clinton’s role in signing NAFTA even if she now criticizes it, Anderson said.
The shutdowns and layoffs continue at a dizzying pace and the ruination is obvious in the thousands of empty and abandoned homes we plod past as we go door to door. Youngstown once had a population of 160,000. Now it is 60,000.
Willy Williams, a former Lordstown auto worker who likewise lost his job in a GM downsizing, is also campaigning for Obama. An active United Auto Worker retiree, he scoffed at Bush’s claim that the U.S. is going through a temporary “slow down,” not a recession.
“Its been a recession here for a long, long time,” Williams said. “But if we do the right thing, get the right President in there, I think we can bring it together, bring us out of the economic crisis we are in. Obama is the man.”
Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich) warmed up the crowd of volunteers at Obama headquarters. “Ohio is going to go Obama, March 4,” Conyers said. “He is the ‘come-from-behind’ candidate. He has a ground operation all over the state of volunteers like you. We can change America and move in a new direction.”
That night, an Obama rally turned into a “Town Meeting” at New Bethel Baptist Church. It was sponsored by the Change to Win labor federation. Attendance was swelled by Teamster union members, and SEIU hospital workers. A busload of volunteers traveled from Baltimore and a delegation of 75 Penn State students.
Two young white students from Michigan State University in Lansing spoke. “Its spring break at Lansing and many of our classmates are down in Florida,” one of the MSU students said. “I have no regrets that I decided to stay here and not go to Florida. We found nothing but Obama supporters out there.” The crowd roared.
Massachusetts Governor, Deval Patrick, said that he, like Obama, is from Chicago’s south side and faced questions about his “funny name,” Some said “it is not your turn” to be governor, he said. “We are saying it is his TIME,” Patrick said. “We are going to decide who is electable.” The crowd cheered.
During an open-mike, Guy Djoken, president of the Frederick County, Maryland, NAACP hailed the grassroots movement that has sprung up for Obama. “What are we going to do with this movement after we get him to the White House?” Djoken asked.
Patrick said a November victory is just the first stage. A new stage “will start the day he gets to the White House,” Patrick said. “Its hard to govern with the grassroots. Its new to America.” But without that grassroots power, there will be no change, he said.
SEIU President Andy Stern likened Obama to a sailing ship skipper. “He can have all the navigational skills in the world but without wind in wind in the sails, the ship will just go in circles,” Stern said. “We are the winds of change in those sails, for equal rights, equal pay.”
[Subscribe to the People's Weekly World]
Saturday, March 1, 2008
Ohio union members say it's about jobs
By John Wojcik
In Toledo, Ohio, a 100-year-old plant that makes plumbing fixtures is closing. Two hundred men and women who make $19 an hour at the American Standard plant will be out on the streets.
In the same city, Johnson Controls, which made seats for the vehicles at the Jeep plant, lost its contract to a company in India.
The Ford stamping plant in Toledo’s suburbs, where workers make fenders and dash panels, will close soon.
It is much the same throughout Ohio, which has lost over 200,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000. “Manufacturing is getting its head handed to us around here,” said Thomas Joseph, business manger of Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 50, which represents workers all over northwest Ohio.
The two Democratic presidential candidates, Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, have promised a fight to change this and organized labor in unionized Ohio has jumped into the 2008 elections to push for that change.
Some unions support Obama and others back Clinton. Signs are, however, that labor’s unity on issues will pull all unions together behind the eventual Democratic nominee and that many outside of organized labor will join in.
Infrastructure investment supported by the AFL-CIO could create hundreds of thousands of jobs.
Many in Ohio see their state, with a huge reserve of skilled workers, as the perfect place to build an economy based on renewable energy technology.
Toledo itself is a historic center for the glass industry, which could benefit from government-backed efforts to increase the use of solar energy.
The 6-million-member Change to Win federation has endorsed Obama because he says he would renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Unions see NAFTA, with its lack of decent labor and environmental standards, as responsible for the loss of millions of U.S.
jobs.
The 10-million-member AFL-CIO has not made an endorsement. Some AFL-CIO unions, including the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the American Federation of Teachers and the Machinists, are backing Clinton.
Unions have jumped into the Obama and Clinton campaigns because each has called for significant infrastructure investment, development of alternative energy and other green collar jobs and strengthening labor standards for both existing and any future trade agreements.
The AFL-CIO has called for repeal of Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy, extension of tax cuts to working people and tax credits to help working families pay for college.
Obama and Clinton both support these positions and say government has a responsibility to protect workers who are struggling.
All the unions in Ohio are concerned about the mortgage crisis. In the Toledo area home prices average $100,000, yet the city is in the top 20 in the nation in number of foreclosures.
Obama calls for $10 billion in bonds to help workers avoid foreclosure. He would also give a tax credit to struggling homeowners to cover 10 percent of the interest on their mortgages each year. Clinton would temporarily freeze foreclosures and interest rates on adjustable rate mortgages
John Anklam, 39, is a recently laid off autoworker enrolled in a Teamster-endorsed truck driver training program in Toledo.
“His stand against NAFTA and his inspiring style is why I’m for Obama,” he said. “We need a fair shake and we can’t get it if they can dump us for cheaper labor somewhere else.”
Asked what he would do if Clinton becomes the nominee, Anklam said, “McCain would be a disaster. I’ll support her if that happens. She may not be as exciting but she’s got brains and she’d fight for the jobs.”
Karen Ackerman, AFL-CIO political department director, said, “Labor will be united for the election of a pro-worker president in November. The unions will be mobilized on the issues that unite most Americans: an economy that works for all, universal health care, support for the Employee Free Choice Act so that everyone can exercise their right to form a union, and an end to the war in Iraq so that money will be available to rebuild our country.”
At its executive council meeting in San Diego, March 4–6, the federation’s leaders are expected to authorize $54 million for grassroots organizing around the elections. Total spending on 528 races, including presidential, senatorial, congressional and state legislative races and ballot initiatives, is expected to reach $200 million, according to Ackerman.
[Subscribe to the People's Weekly World]
In Toledo, Ohio, a 100-year-old plant that makes plumbing fixtures is closing. Two hundred men and women who make $19 an hour at the American Standard plant will be out on the streets.
In the same city, Johnson Controls, which made seats for the vehicles at the Jeep plant, lost its contract to a company in India.
The Ford stamping plant in Toledo’s suburbs, where workers make fenders and dash panels, will close soon.
It is much the same throughout Ohio, which has lost over 200,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000. “Manufacturing is getting its head handed to us around here,” said Thomas Joseph, business manger of Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 50, which represents workers all over northwest Ohio.
The two Democratic presidential candidates, Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, have promised a fight to change this and organized labor in unionized Ohio has jumped into the 2008 elections to push for that change.
Some unions support Obama and others back Clinton. Signs are, however, that labor’s unity on issues will pull all unions together behind the eventual Democratic nominee and that many outside of organized labor will join in.
Infrastructure investment supported by the AFL-CIO could create hundreds of thousands of jobs.
Many in Ohio see their state, with a huge reserve of skilled workers, as the perfect place to build an economy based on renewable energy technology.
Toledo itself is a historic center for the glass industry, which could benefit from government-backed efforts to increase the use of solar energy.
The 6-million-member Change to Win federation has endorsed Obama because he says he would renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Unions see NAFTA, with its lack of decent labor and environmental standards, as responsible for the loss of millions of U.S.
jobs.
The 10-million-member AFL-CIO has not made an endorsement. Some AFL-CIO unions, including the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the American Federation of Teachers and the Machinists, are backing Clinton.
Unions have jumped into the Obama and Clinton campaigns because each has called for significant infrastructure investment, development of alternative energy and other green collar jobs and strengthening labor standards for both existing and any future trade agreements.
The AFL-CIO has called for repeal of Bush’s tax cuts for the wealthy, extension of tax cuts to working people and tax credits to help working families pay for college.
Obama and Clinton both support these positions and say government has a responsibility to protect workers who are struggling.
All the unions in Ohio are concerned about the mortgage crisis. In the Toledo area home prices average $100,000, yet the city is in the top 20 in the nation in number of foreclosures.
Obama calls for $10 billion in bonds to help workers avoid foreclosure. He would also give a tax credit to struggling homeowners to cover 10 percent of the interest on their mortgages each year. Clinton would temporarily freeze foreclosures and interest rates on adjustable rate mortgages
John Anklam, 39, is a recently laid off autoworker enrolled in a Teamster-endorsed truck driver training program in Toledo.
“His stand against NAFTA and his inspiring style is why I’m for Obama,” he said. “We need a fair shake and we can’t get it if they can dump us for cheaper labor somewhere else.”
Asked what he would do if Clinton becomes the nominee, Anklam said, “McCain would be a disaster. I’ll support her if that happens. She may not be as exciting but she’s got brains and she’d fight for the jobs.”
Karen Ackerman, AFL-CIO political department director, said, “Labor will be united for the election of a pro-worker president in November. The unions will be mobilized on the issues that unite most Americans: an economy that works for all, universal health care, support for the Employee Free Choice Act so that everyone can exercise their right to form a union, and an end to the war in Iraq so that money will be available to rebuild our country.”
At its executive council meeting in San Diego, March 4–6, the federation’s leaders are expected to authorize $54 million for grassroots organizing around the elections. Total spending on 528 races, including presidential, senatorial, congressional and state legislative races and ballot initiatives, is expected to reach $200 million, according to Ackerman.
[Subscribe to the People's Weekly World]
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
NAFTA destroyed auto in Ohio
by Joel Wendland
NAFTA has moved front-and-center in the race for the Democratic nomination, not because any one candidate moved it there, but because free trade policies have hollowed out Ohio's manufacturing industry. Workers have forced the issue back into the spotlight.
According to a brief report by the labor-backed Economic Policy Institute, Ohio has lost 200,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000.
EPI admits that since NAFTA was implemented about 15 years ago, the automotive trade, a sector crucial to the economies of states like Ohio and Michigan, between the US and Mexico has grown. But "the effects on Ohio and other industrial states have been overwhelmingly negative."
In auto parts, for instance, the U.S. had a $2.4 billion surplus with Mexico in 1993; by last year the deficit was $12 billion. The auto deficit in total, reports EPI, stood at about $31 billion 2007.
EPI doesn't really get into finger-pointing, which is fine. But a little more analysis would be helpful.
NAFTA eliminated trade barriers between Mexico and the US. This fact made it profitable for GM, for example, to close factories in Ohio and Michigan and other places and move production to Mexico.
In the process good union jobs with good benefits were killed here – with attendant ripple effects like a weakened tax base for stable communities and public services, growing unemployment problems, internal migration etc. – in favor of low-pay and weak labor rights in Mexico.
Only the labor movement and the UAW have stood in the way of a complete breakdown of unionized auto production in the US.
While right-wing xenophobes are quick to blame Mexico and Mexicans, the real culprits in this affair are the corporations and the profit system that puts profits before our communities and our needs. Additionally, politicians who side with corporate interests and fail working families are also culpable.
The NAFTA debate in Ohio is crucial because both Democrats (Clinton a little more recently than Obama) are promising to renegotiate NAFTA in order to stem the flow of jobs out of the economy.
By contrast, John McCain traveled to Ohio and told voters there that they should just get used to it and kiss good paying jobs good bye.
No more stark difference ever existed.
NAFTA has moved front-and-center in the race for the Democratic nomination, not because any one candidate moved it there, but because free trade policies have hollowed out Ohio's manufacturing industry. Workers have forced the issue back into the spotlight.
According to a brief report by the labor-backed Economic Policy Institute, Ohio has lost 200,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000.
EPI admits that since NAFTA was implemented about 15 years ago, the automotive trade, a sector crucial to the economies of states like Ohio and Michigan, between the US and Mexico has grown. But "the effects on Ohio and other industrial states have been overwhelmingly negative."
In auto parts, for instance, the U.S. had a $2.4 billion surplus with Mexico in 1993; by last year the deficit was $12 billion. The auto deficit in total, reports EPI, stood at about $31 billion 2007.
EPI doesn't really get into finger-pointing, which is fine. But a little more analysis would be helpful.
NAFTA eliminated trade barriers between Mexico and the US. This fact made it profitable for GM, for example, to close factories in Ohio and Michigan and other places and move production to Mexico.
In the process good union jobs with good benefits were killed here – with attendant ripple effects like a weakened tax base for stable communities and public services, growing unemployment problems, internal migration etc. – in favor of low-pay and weak labor rights in Mexico.
Only the labor movement and the UAW have stood in the way of a complete breakdown of unionized auto production in the US.
While right-wing xenophobes are quick to blame Mexico and Mexicans, the real culprits in this affair are the corporations and the profit system that puts profits before our communities and our needs. Additionally, politicians who side with corporate interests and fail working families are also culpable.
The NAFTA debate in Ohio is crucial because both Democrats (Clinton a little more recently than Obama) are promising to renegotiate NAFTA in order to stem the flow of jobs out of the economy.
By contrast, John McCain traveled to Ohio and told voters there that they should just get used to it and kiss good paying jobs good bye.
No more stark difference ever existed.
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