Thinking About What the TPP Threatens

[unhappycamper]

http://watchingamerica.com/News/226425/thinking-about-what-the-tpp-threatens/

Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement negotiations are coming to a close. Late-joining Japan is repeating the concessions to the U.S. set forth in prior consultations. Is this in the national interest?

Thinking About What the TPP Threatens
Chunichi Shimbun, Japan
By Editorial
Translated By Stephanie Sanders
10 November 2013

~snip~

The institutions of each country are obstacles for the U.S., permeated by the market principle, and the “power of the one percent,” which aims above all to increase its wealth. Accordingly, U.S. companies and the U.S. government use the cliché “level the playing field.” Under the banner of a “level playing field,” which certainly sounds like fair reasoning, the U.S. completely breaks or reverses obstructive rules and institutions at its convenience.

“The essence of TPP is market hijacking. With current trends, the traditions and mutually supportive society that Japan has come to hold dear are crumbling. ‘Open Japan’ is becoming ‘Broken Japan,’” says University of Tokyo’s Professor Nobuhiro Suzuki, Agricultural Economics.

Japan’s strict food safety standards are an obstacle to the export expansion of U.S. agricultural products; because school lunch “local production for local consumption” incentives are also a barrier to entry, the U.S. is acting in a “make it change” sort of manner. This is a matter of choosing between citizens’ lives and corporate profit.

Nevertheless, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says, “We aspire to be the world’s easiest country for businesses to operate in.” He relaxes regulations, favors the taxation system and makes it easy even for foreign businesses to earn to their heart’s content. That coincides closely with America’s aims.

[Laelth]

1. Interesting. k&r for exposure. n/t

-Laelth

[upi402]

2. "This is a matter of choosing between citizens’ lives and corporate profit"

Uhhhh yeah. Sure is.

It really IS too simple for the media to mention. I mean, there are sports stars with bum knees to cover AT LENGTH.