Help Me Here On The TPP As I Have One Major Question I'd Like Answered......

[global1]

I read here that most everyone is against the TPP. President Obama is working to get this passed.

Now I can't believe that President Obama would do anything detrimental to this country and cost us jobs and hurt the middle class.

I got to think that he knows something about this and how it could benefit us and that he has our best interests at heart.

I don't think he wants to do anything either that would damage his legacy either.

So would someone please respond to why they think President Obama is pushing for something that would hurt us? Do you really think he would do something like that?

[arcane1]

1. I think the republicans are all for the TPP as well. So I heard anyway.

[global1]

2. So I Guess If The Repubs Are For It - It Must Be Bad And.....

the President and us should be against it. Is that what you are saying?

[arcane1]

5. No, just adding some context.

I disagree with the premise that Obama wouldn't do this even if some were harmed by it.

[djean111]

6. There have been enough posts about the TPP, here at DU, that you could not possibly

think that those who are against it are just against it because the GOP is for it. You cannot possibly think that negativity about the TPP is that simplistic. Right?

[global1]

8. I Was Just Responding To That Post Which Seemed To Insinuate That....

the poster has now since clarified his/her meaning.

[KoKo]

26. Here's a good brief on TPP from last year's SOTU...from "Public Citizen's Lori Wallach"

This is from the last SOTU ....but, even more relevant since Obama wants to set up FAST TRACK to ram through the TPP as soon as he finishes tonight's speech.

-----------------

SOTU, TPP, TAFTA -- WTF?
Posted: 02/13/2013 1:52 pm EST Updated: 04/15/2013 5:12 am EDT

Did you notice the two rabid skunks President Obama unleashed at the State of the Union picnic?

Creating American jobs! Rebuilding American manufacturing! Boosting American exports! Promoting innovation! Ensuring strong health and environmental protections! Completing an 11-nation NAFTA-style "free trade" agreement (FTA) called the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) - aka NAFTA with Vietnam? Launch of "free trade" negotiations with Europe long-demanded by multinational corporations to eliminate vital consumer protections - the Trans-Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (TAFTA)?

Two of these things are not like the others. Indeed, TPP and TAFTA would gut many of the most worthy goals included in Obama's SOTU address if the American public and Congress let them come to fruition.

Says who? Well, the official U.S. government trade and employment data, to start with. Since the implementation of our existing FTAs, more than 60,000 U.S. manufacturing facilities have been shuttered and we have lost five million manufacturing jobs - fully one quarter of America's manufacturing jobs prior to the agreements' implementation. Like TPP, these past pacts include investment rules that actually incentivize the offshoring of American jobs.

And, U.S. export growth to countries that are not FTA partners has exceeded U.S. export growth to countries that are FTA partners by 38 percent over the last decade. The aggregate U.S. trade deficit with FTA partners has increased by more than $144 billion (inflation-adjusted) since the FTAs were implemented. In contrast, the aggregate deficit with all non-FTA countries has decreased by more than $55 billion since 2006 (the median entry date of existing FTAs). Even using the Obama administration's net exports-to-jobs ratio and excluding China trade, the FTA trade deficit surge alone implies the loss of nearly one million American jobs. So, let's do more of the same NAFTA-style pacts, but this time with Vietnam, the low-wage offshoring alternative to China.


Maybe the TPP and TAFTA touting is just pure cynicism. For instance, note that the president did not reiterate his 2010 State of the Union goal of doubling U.S. exports in five years by passing more "free trade" agreements. With two years left, the United States should be 60 percent of the way toward achieving this goal. Instead, the U.S. International Trade Commission annual 2012 trade data released this weekend show that under the sluggish 2012 export growth rate of two percent, we will not achieve the president's goal until 2032.

And, the FTAs that Obama touted in last year's State of the Union address have not created the promised industrial jobs. Rather, U.S. government trade flow data tracking the initial outcomes of FTAs with Korea, Colombia and Panama, which took effect in 2012, show that combined U.S. exports to the three countries during the months of FTA implementation fell four percent relative to the same months of 2011. U.S. goods exports to Korea plummeted by 10 percent and the U.S. trade deficit with Korea grew 26 percent. That equates to thousands of lost U.S. jobs just in the first year of that latest batch of more-of-the-same NAFTA-style deals.

Indeed, the annual U.S. trade deficit in goods excluding oil rose six percent in 2012 to $628 billion, the largest non-oil U.S. trade deficit in the last five years. The U.S. trade deficit with China (even with oil included) broke all past records, topping $321 billion. That Obama more-of-the-same trade agenda is working so well, why not more of the same...

But there's more!

While TPP negotiations have been conducted in extreme secrecy for three years, some texts have leaked, including the intellectual property chapter. It contains extreme SOPA-style copyright enforcement terms that would undermine Internet freedom and innovation. Says who? The Electronic Frontier Foundation and some of Congress' most reliable pro-"free-trade" voters from House Oversight Committee Chair Darrell Issa (R-Cal.) to Senate Trade Subcommittee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) to Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Cal.).

And, that Trans-Atlantic FTA? That's the pet project of the Trans-Atlantic Business Dialogue a club of financial, agribusiness, pharmaceutical, chemical and other U.S. and European multinationals. TAFTA's focus would not be trade per se - border taxes (tariffs) are already low. Rather, these talks are aimed at eliminating a list of what multinational corporations call "trade irritants" but the rest of us know as strong food safety, environmental and health safeguards.

The target list? The strongest consumer and environmental policies on either side of the Atlantic. U.S. firms want Europe to gut their superior chemical regulation regime, their tougher food safety rules and labeling of genetically modified foods and their tougher climate policies. European firms are targeting aspects of the U.S. financial reregulation regime, our stronger drug and medical device safety and testing standards and more.ger drug and medical device safety and testing standards and more.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lori-wallach/sotu-tpp-tafta-wtf_b_2678523.html

[sabrina 1]

48. The President listens to 'advisers' on this matters. He told us in his speech on lifting the ban on

Offshore Drilling, 18 days before his advisers were proven to be fatally wrong, that the ban on Offshore Drilling was out dated. He told us his 'expert' advisers had informed him that equipment today was not like it was when the ban was first put in place, iow, we Progressives were out-dated.

His advisers assured him that oil spills were most unlikely considering all the advancements made which we, those who agreed with him in his campaign, that the Offshore Drilling Ban must remain in place (he stated he would fight to keep it in place) were simply not 'up' on all the new, safer technology, according to his advisers.

18 days later 11 men lost their lives and our environment was badly impacted for years to come.

Unfortunately, the President has surrounded himself with Corporate CEOS from Monsanto eg.

I'm sure, despite that fatal error by his advisers on Oil Spills, he believes his Corporate Advisers on this deal, are 'experts' and would not steer him wrong.

WE probably know more about what is in that Corporate Coup, as it has been referred to, than he does.

There have been leaks, thanks to Wikileaks, so we do know a little of what is in it. On the Environment and the Internet. And it's not good.

Hightower gives a run-down on what is involved here:

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is not about free trade. It's a corporate coup d'etat--against us

Twenty years later, the corporate gang that stuck us with NAFTA is back, hoping to fool us with an even more destructive multinational deal. (This calls for another immortal quote from George W: "Fool me once, shame on--shame on you. Fool me--you can't get fooled again." Well, you know what he meant).

This time we really must pay attention, because TPP is not just another trade deal. First, it is massive and open-ended. It would hitch us immediately to 11 Pacific Rim nations (Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam), and its door would remain wide open to lure China, Indonesia, Russia, and other nations to come in. Second, note that many of those countries already have trade agreements with the US. Hence, THIS AMAZING FACT: TPP is a "trade deal" that mostly does not deal with trade. In fact, of the 29 chapters in this document, only five cover traditional trade matters!

The other two dozen chapters amount to a devilish "partnership" for corporate protectionism. They create sweeping new "rights" and escape hatches to protect multinational corporations from accountability to our governments... and to us. Here are a few of TPP's provisos that would make our daily lives riskier, poorer, and less free:

It's worth reading the whole thing if you really want to know why both Left AND Right (those who can still think, Faux of course is for it) are trying desperately to stop it.

As for why Obama would push such a harmful bill? I've come to the conclusion that politicians are politicians who live in a different world, listening to Corporate Entities whispering in their ears, but not to the people who elected them.

So I don't worry about 'why' someone we supported to do the OPPOSITE of this horrible 'agreement' is doing something like this. The focus has to be on trying to stop it.

[Scuba]

3. You think calling torturers 'patriotic' and their critics 'sanctimonious' helped us?

[global1]

7. What?????....nt

[Scuba]

15. In response to your question ...

So would someone please respond to why they think President Obama is pushing for something that would hurt us? Do you really think he would do something like that?

... I'm asking if you think calling torturers 'patriots' and their critics 'sanctimonious' helped us. My point is that I believe this hurts us.

[1StrongBlackMan]

23. We already had that discussion and ...

most understand, that is what he said ... only if you cut out words, or really wanted to hear him say that.

[djean111]

4. Obama is a corporate president, and the TPP and other agreements like it are corporate coups.

The Investor States take precedence over sovereign laws and regulations that would affect their profits.

[StopTheTPP]

12. Call your rep tomorrow to tell them NO on fast track.

[Maedhros]

9. This is a very naive statement:

Now I can't believe that President Obama would do anything detrimental to this country and cost us jobs and hurt the middle class.

He's already done many things that are detrimental to this country - violating international law by not prosecuting admitted war criminals is one of the more egregious.

[former9thward]

10. Odds are he will speak about it tonight.

Maybe he will have the reasons then.

[djean111]

14. He thinks objections are "kneejerk" - possibly because it is so secretive that hey, why would

anyone be against it. The worker protection thing keeps getting trotted out - but those protections are unenforceable.
For icing on that cake, we won't be able to see where our food is coming from any more, because to label, say, shrimp as coming from Vietnam will let those who don't want shit-polluted shrimp to avoid buying the shrimp.
Poor countries will be blocked from getting/making generic drugs. All government contracts over a dollar amount MUST be let out for bids to all signatory countries. Which puts the Bernie Sanders idea of giving Americans jobs rebuilding infrastructure in the trash heap, plus, American firms will be bidding against countries who pay shit wages.

That's what he will not be saying. Google Stop the TPP - you will get an eyeful. And craw full.

[StopTheTPP]

11. Okay, everyone in this thread, call your reps and senators and tell them NO on fast track!

Just do it! Just call! Take part in the defense!

[Maedhros]

13. Here are a few articles that may help you:

http://www.economicpopulist.org/content/wikileaks-exposes-trans-pacific-partnership-bad-trade-deal-again-5590

Below is the Public Citizen synopsis on the leaked TPP intellectual property draft. Yes, you read that right, corporations are out to patent plants. The hits just keep on coming and many national laws, like net neutrality for example, are defeated through trade deals by circumventing sovereign states' law as a barrier to trade. In other words, corporations and their bought and paid for government representatives negotiate, in secret, ways to get around national law and stuff those ways in trade agreements, which corrupt government officials then pass.

* A measure that could expand online service provider surveillance of Internet users’ activity, including in the United States;

* A rule to require the patenting of plant-related inventions, such as the genes inserted into genetically modified plants, putting farmers in developing countries at the mercy of the agriculture industry, including seed manufacturers such as Monsanto, and threatening food security in these countries more broadly;

* Proposals for mitigating the pact’s harms to access to medicines in developing countries, none of which will suffice;

* The elimination of proposals for patents on surgical methods;

* A reduction in scope of other proposed monopoly protections for the pharmaceutical industry; and

* The expected failure of a thinly veiled U.S. attack on an India-style pro-competition patent law, which facilitates access to medicines.

https://www.eff.org/issues/tpp

The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a secretive, multinational trade agreement that threatens to extend restrictive intellectual property (IP) laws across the globe and rewrite international rules on its enforcement. The main problems are two-fold:

(1) Intellectual Property Chapter: Leaked draft texts of the agreement show that the IP chapter would have extensive negative ramifications for users’ freedom of speech, right to privacy and due process, and hinder peoples' abilities to innovate.

(2) Lack of Transparency: The entire process has shut out multi-stakeholder participation and is shrouded in secrecy.

The twelve nations currently negotiating the TPP are the US, Japan, Australia, Peru, Malaysia, Vietnam, New Zealand, Chile, Singapore, Canada, Mexico, and Brunei Darussalam. The TPP contains a chapter on intellectual property covering copyright, trademarks, and patents. Since the draft text of the agreement has never been officially released to the public, we know from leaked documents, such as the May 2014 draft of the TPP Intellectual Property Chapter [PDF], that US negotiators are pushing for the adoption of copyright measures far more restrictive than currently required by international treaties, including the controversial Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA).

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/11/the-tpp-if-passed-spells-the-end-of-popular-sovereignty-for-the-united-states.html

Making it all the more remarkable, or not, that our political class — Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Max Baucus and Orrin Hatch, a bipartisan caucus, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Editorial Board of The New York Times, to name a few of the usual suspects — would pursue an agreement, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) that sells out popular sovereignty to transnational investors, and allows them to rule us. I know your friends think this sounds like nutty black helicopter stuff, but it’s true! It’s true! (Tell them to watch Yves on Bill Moyers, in a really sharp transcript.) So bear with me, please, as I work through the thesis. First, I’ll look at how TPP replaces popular sovereignty with transnational investor rule, in two ways. Next, I’ll take a very quick look at the state of play. Finally, I’ll suggest that all is not lost, and in fact the TPP can be defeated.

[TreasonousBastard]

16. I don't hate the TPP.

I don't know enough about it to know if I should like it, but I a large part of my background is in international trade and I usually see expanded trade as a positive. Trade goes back to ancient times when there were the overland spice routes and the Mediterranean routes in Europe and North Africa. Asia, Africa and the Americas had their own systems of trade.

TPP opinions around here are kind of limited-- business likes it so it must be bad. That is a very simplistic look at it. Trade won't go away (nor should it-- protectionism was a major cause of the Depression) so it must be managed to keep it honest.

Yes, the British East India Company caused a lot of trouble in the name of trade, but it also brought new products, wealth, and culture to its Empire. The Conquistadors were far worse and simply scavenged and enslaved their conquests, while the Norse gave you the alternative-- trade or die. This was some of the bad news, but through it all civilization advanced and we as a species became less tribal. Not that much, but a little. Trade today is far more civilized, but it does attract some of the same attitudes as the pirates of old.

Yes, there are too many bankers involved in the TPP, but it is primarily importers and exporters who are calling the shots. Note that China is NOT invited, and the reason for that should be obvious-- China is becoming bigger than the European and North American economies it competes with and could put us largely out of business if we don't work with a bloc of nations with similar interests.

http://www.ustr.gov/trade-agreements/

Is a government site that give an introduction to most of the many agreements we are already involved in

[1StrongBlackMan]

24. 1+ ...

Like you, I don't know what the final product will be, so I can't say I like it or hate it.

But what I do know, is if someone tries really, really hard to convince me of something without so much a mention of the US government's negotiating objectives, that largely negate the horrors of the thing they are trying to convince me of ... well, that tells me something.

[dflprincess]

31. The fact that we aren't being told what's in it - that Congress is not being told what's in it

should be the first clue that something is very, very wrong with this deal.

"It is incomprehensible to me that the leaders of major corporate interests who stand to gain enormous financial benefits from this agreement are actively involved in the writing of the TPP while, at the same time, the elected officials of this country, representing the American people, have little or no knowledge as to what is in it." -- Bernie Sanders

[1StrongBlackMan]

32. Trade deals are never negotiated in public ...

just like labor agreements, and thousands of other agreements that impact your life daily.

And Bernie knows that!

[msongs]

17. in secret behind our backs. call obama and ask for a copy to be posted on the internet tomorrow nt

[KoKo]

18. Why did Bill Clinton want NAFTA passed? Why did the Supreme Court give us "Citizen's United."

DLC/THIRD WAY/Wall Street, Military, Media, Industrial Complex.

Or for short. It's Big Business for Wall Street and Big Agra, Pharma, and the Oligarchs who are invested heavily in those interests.

If you are too young to know America when Average Citizens had Job Security and Consumer Rights were important (Legacy after the 60's and FDR's New Deal before) when Labor was a buffer between Corporate Greed and the Workers then you wouldn't understand what we've lost. The push for Globilization controlled by Big Business and Special Interest Groups are what's behind this and Obama just like Clinton is convinced that this is the way to go. Reagan got onto this before both of them....and is considered by them as a Great President.

Wikipedia has the basics about TPP and TPIP and discusses NAFTA/GATT (passed under Clinton) and there has been much posted here on DU about it for the past few years.

[Roland99]

19. And Hillary is a key supporter of TPP

[KoKo]

20. delete...

[1StrongBlackMan]

21. Well ...

because the US government's negotiating position protects American jobs by making off-shoring more expensive (i.e., by establishing a wage floor, increased workplace protections, collective bargaining rights and enhanced environmental protections).

I offer: most of those opposing the TPP are doing so based on leaked proposals that really are scary ... that's why they're being leaked ... and they have no faith in (any) government, let alone President Obama.

(If you have a couple of months ... take note of the loudest voices on DU, opposing the TPP ... then use the DU search function to find a single post of theirs that reflects positively on President Obama, or government. It'll take along time and a really close looking; but, take heart, the first step will soon be done for you.)

[TreasonousBastard]

27. I keep forgetting mention...

(as if it will do any good) that leaks from secret negotiations are strategic.

Some times they are leaked to garner support, other times they are leaked to drive opposition, and often enough they are simply leaked to see what the reaction will be.

To make judgments on tiny bits of leaked information, things that may never be in the final draft, makes no sense.

[1StrongBlackMan]

29. True ... So true ...

having been at the negotiating table for more than a few (labor) contracts and other agreements, I know that to be true.

And, my experience has it ... most of what is leaked, never makes it into the agreement (or is seriously watered down).

[KoKo]

22. Public Citizen Report & Website:

Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP): Job Loss, Lower Wages and Higher Drug Prices
Have you heard? The TPP is a massive, controversial "free trade" agreement currently being pushed by big corporations and negotiated behind closed doors by officials from the United States and 11 other countries – Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam.


The TPP would expand the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) “trade” pact model that has spurred massive U.S. trade deficits and job loss, downward pressure on wages, unprecedented levels of inequality and new floods of agricultural imports. The TPP not only replicates, but expands NAFTA’s special protections for firms that offshore U.S. jobs. And U.S. TPP negotiators literally used the 2011 Korea FTA – under which exports have fallen and trade deficits have surged – as the template for the TPP.

In one fell swoop, this secretive deal could:

offshore millions of American jobs,
roll back Wall Street reforms,
sneak in SOPA-like threats to Internet freedom,
ban Buy American policies needed to create green jobs,

jack up the cost of medicines,
expose the U.S. to unsafe food and products,
and empower corporations to attack our environmental and health safeguards.




Although it is called a "free trade" agreement, the TPP is not mainly about trade. Of TPP's 29 draft chapters, only five deal with traditional trade issues. One chapter would provide incentives to offshore jobs to low-wage countries. Many would impose limits on government policies that we rely on in our daily lives for safe food, a clean environment, and more. Our domestic federal, state and local policies would be required to comply with TPP rules.

The TPP would even elevate individual foreign firms to equal status with sovereign nations, empowering them to privately enforce new rights and privileges, provided by the pact, by dragging governments to foreign tribunals to challenge public interest policies that they claim frustrate their expectations. The tribunals would be authorized to order taxpayer compensation to the foreign corporations for the "expected future profits" they surmise would be inhibited by the challenged policies.

We only know about the TPP's threats thanks to leaks – the public is not allowed to see the draft TPP text. Even members of Congress, after being denied the text for years, are now only provided limited access. Meanwhile, more than 500 official corporate "trade advisors" have special access. The TPP has been under negotiation for six years, and the Obama administration wants to sign the deal this year. Opposition to the TPP is growing at home and in many of the other countries involved.

Se puede encontrar recursos en español aquí.

TPP Corporate Empowerment Map: See which foreign corporations near you could use NAFTA-style investor rights to challenge laws and regulations under TPP
Factsheet Series: Learn how TPP's investment rules harm Public Access to Essential Services, Public Health and the Environment
Flyer: Get all the quick facts on TPP and then spread the word
Find out more on the blog: Read the latest on TPP on Eyes on Trade

https://www.citizen.org/tpp
https://www.citizen

Get Informed | Reports and Memos | Press Room | Congress Speaks Out | Other Resources


MUCH MORE AT:

https://www.citizen.org/tpp

[MrMickeysMom]

25. Jeebus Fucking Christ...

[Recursion]

28. Because employment, wages, and median income rose after NAFTA

So the hope is that the same thing would happen after TPP. Like NAFTA, it would raise the wage floor and toughen environmental standards in multiple countries in the Pacific rim. Like NAFTA, agriculture and heavy manufacturing in the US will probably do pretty well; light manufacturing will probably do pretty badly.

For all the hair-on-fire hysterics about trade, the late 1990s were actually a pretty good time to be working in the US.

Also note that offshoring/outsourcing, what people complain most about, isn't particularly addressed by NAFTA or TPP, and is going to keep happening no matter what our trade agreements are.

[brentspeak]

33. You've already been proven to be a liar on the subject

As the following posters to your NAFTA propaganda thread demonstrated:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6045913

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6052120

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6045815

You didn't actually think your bull$hit would go unchallenged, did you?

[Recursion]

34. Nope. Those data stand

Saying "bullshit" isn't a refutation. A refutation would be demonstrating that wages, employment, or income went down after NAFTA. Which nobody can do. Because they didn't.

The alleged ruin NAFTA made of our economy didn't happen. If it did, somebody could have shown it. More people had jobs, at higher wages, yielding higher incomes. Why are you against working people making more money?

[brentspeak]

36. It was the other posters who disproved your bull$hit

And your child-like logical fallacies ("Why are you against working making more money?&quot demonstrates your intellectual ineptitude.

[Recursion]

37. I have no idea why you're against lower unemployment and higher wages and incomes

It's strange to see that here, but there we go.

(Hint: you could also, you know, demonstrate that those things didn't happen after NAFTA. I mean, you could, except that they did in fact happen after NAFTA.)

The anti-trade side here really needs some data other than "manufacturing jobs". It doesn't matter what percent of our workforce is in manufacturing, any more than it matters what percent of our workforce is in agriculture. What matters is how much of the population has a job, and how much those jobs pay.

[brentspeak]

38. Whoever's paying you to spam economic B.S. here isn't

getting their money's worth.

[Recursion]

39. Yup, yet again no response (nt)

[brentspeak]

40. You were already responded to

Now report to your masters that your propaganda attempts here didn't work:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6052120

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=6045815

[Recursion]

41. Does it make you feel better to assume anyone who disagrees with you has a Svengali?

I mean, does it make this more emotionally easy for you? It's literally impossible that I could look at the economic performance of the 1990s and decide that Perot's warnings about NAFTA seemed to have been unfounded, and that the resulting trade-oriented economy was a pretty good one?

Is that literally that hard for you to deal with?

[Elwood P Dowd]

44. You are full of shit again.

The economic gains from the 1990s came from the tech boom and didn't have a damn thing to do with that piece of shit NAFTA. It was put into effect in 1994 and like all such trade deals, it took several years before the effects started being felt.

[Recursion]

46. What nonsense. The tech boom destroyed more jobs than NAFTA could dream of destroying

Remember how companies used to have typing pools? DTP software killed those jobs. Intraoffice couriers? Email killed those jobs. Secretaries for every professional? Not anymore: Exchange servers got rid of those jobs. Instead of a team of draftsmen you now have one guy with Autocad. Instead of teams of graphic artists you have one guy with photoshop. Factories now need a small team to manage the machinery rather than a large floor of production workers. Remember when there used to be travel agents?

The tech boom destroyed millions of jobs, just like the wheat thresher did.

[madfloridian]

30. Sorry, but both parties "cost us jobs and hurt the middle class."

Clinton pushed NAFTA, and then came more.

[Recursion]

35. Why was unemployment lower after NAFTA's passage than before, then? (nt)

[madfloridian]

42. Do you have statistics on that?

I do know people who in the last few years got hired back into the work force....at about half the salary they got before for doing the same job.

Still I am right....both parties have pushed the trade agreements that benefit corporations but are killing the middle class.

[Recursion]

43. Yes. Unemployment went down, labor force participation went up, wages went up, incomes went up

In all five quintiles



(Maroon is unemployment; blue is the labor participation rate; the red line is when NAFTA went into effect. Note that in the 2 years after the chart cuts off, the unemployment rate has fallen even more, down to 1993 levels.)

NAFTA passes, unemployment goes down, and labor force participation goes up. Does that mean NAFTA caused it? No, but it means it didn't destroy jobs in aggregate.

Maybe more people were working, but at lower wages?



Certainly that happened to some people, but these data show that the median non-supervisory wage went up after NAFTA was implemented.

That's all well and good, but did this actually translate into higher incomes? Yes.



Here's the same data by quintile:



Notice every single quintile has a higher inflation-adjusted income today than before NAFTA passed.

[madfloridian]

45. Makes my point about the middle class.

And the 4th and bottom quintiles are almost stagnant. Looks like only the top 5% and the top quintille really have much buying power now.

[Recursion]

47. I also would like the gains for the lower quintiles to be higher

Though if you look at the middle quintile's gains after NAFTA, if they had stayed on that trajectory the median income would be $75K right now. That said, even the poorest fifth of Americans earns more in real dollars today than they did in 1993.