General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: There's only one principle behind TTIP, CETA and other 'free trade' agreements [View all]Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)The promotion of consumerism, materialism, and disposability. Rather than promote the idea of spending more to buy higher quality products that last, 'Free Trade' is all about producing the cheapest possible products in the cheapest, least environmentally friendly way possible, having 'consumers' buy ever larger amounts of junk products to replace those that they already bought that wore out quickly or became 'obsolete', and add to the ever larger piles of garbage around the world.
The higher the cost of products, the more likely they are to be profitable to produce domestically, even in countries with high labour costs. Free Trade pushes us towards the cheap and poorly made, towards plastic and the easily broken, easily thrown away world.