Trade Crazy: The Push for Fast-Track Trade Authority

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Trade Crazy: The Push for Fast-Track Trade Authority

Monday, 23 February 2015 09:34
By Dean Baker, Truthout | Op-Ed


Washington politics always involves a high level of silliness (does President Obama really love the US?), but when it comes to trade policy it shifts to full-fledged craziness. Anything is fair game when the political establishment wants to pass major trade agreements like NAFTA or the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). At such times we see respectable Washington types making pronouncements bearing so little relationship to reality they would cause Sarah Palin to cringe.

The Washington Post gave us one such gem last week when it took issue with those saying that currency rules should be part of any new trade pact. Its lead editorial last Thursday argued against including any provisions on currency. Its main point is best summarized by a paraphrase of an old Barbie doll line, "currency values are hard."

The Post argued that it would be impossible to distinguish between policies intended for other purposes, like the Fed's quantitative easing (QE) program that was designed to boost growth, and policies whose main purpose is to depress the value of the currency. An assertion like this in the context of a debate on trade is laughable.

Every provision in trade agreements will have ambiguities most of which are much more difficult to resolve than this one. Trade deals all prohibit export subsidies, almost by definition. But what about publicly funded vocational training in which the government picks up much of an exporter's training costs? What about publicly financed infrastructure that reduces the exporter's cost to send its products out of the country?

What about publicly financed research (e.g. the National Institutes of Health) that hugely reduce the cost to private firms of innovation? What about below market interest loans provided by the Export-Import Bank? If the Post is really concerned about potential ambiguities raising difficult enforcement issues then it would be staunchly opposed to restrictions on export subsidies, since many of these issues actually are hard. ......................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/29238-trade-crazy-the-push-for-fast-track-trade-authority