Being against TPP because of NAFTA is fighting the last battle again. There are no jobs to lose with

[Motown_Johnny]

4. But those 4 billion "customers" have almost no buying power.

The problem with competing with people making $0.29 an hour isn't just that it forces American worker's wages down. It is that those people can't afford to buy anything made by people making ~$15.00 an hour.


It isn't like you are going to get 150 people in China pitching in to buy a flat screen TV or 1500 of them pooling their resources for an Escalade.


The very fact that the only way to defend these free trade agreements is to misrepresent the buying power of individuals in these countries is more proof that it is wrong. Stop pretending that billions of poor people are potential customers for American products, they aren't.

They are only potential customers for other producers who pay next to nothing. These trade agreements help create manufacturing bases in low wage countries so they can sell to other low wage countries as well as to the US.

They aren't buying from us. If they were we might still have a textile industry.




Edit to add:

Yes, we are going through a very stupid period, the period of Free Trade.