One million jobs could disappear' if benefits lost

[Omaha Steve]

Full story: http://www.thailabour.org/news/file.php?id=06082101



One million jobs could disappear' if benefits lost

FTI, Board of Trade to put findings to govt

Petchanet Pratruangkrai
21 06
The Nation

The latest assessment indicates that at least one million local workers across all industries would lose their jobs and many small and medium-sized enterprises would be forced to shut down should the United States in November confirm its intention to end the tax holiday on Thai goods under the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP).

The Federation of Thai Industries (FTI) and the Board of Trade of Thailand met last week to assess the effects of the US announcement of plans to cut duty-free benefits on Thai goods. Their findings will be submitted to the Commerce Ministry and then forwarded to the US Embassy in Bangkok this week.

The withdrawal of the privileges would cause major problems for Thai manufacturers, which in a worst-case scenario would see businesses forced to shut down their operations.

This could cause the loss of about one million domestic jobs, with the impact on one sector often spilling over into other industries.

The US government is reviewing GSP benefits to 13 countries: India, Brazil, Argentina, Indonesia, Russia, the Philippines, Croatia, Kazakhstan, Romania, South Africa, Turkey, Venezuela and Thailand. It has opposed the renewal of the programme because it says the benefits are unfairly distributed to a small group of countries.

Manufactured products hardest hit by GSP removal include electronics and electrical appliances, rubber and plastic goods, jewellery and ceramics.

[MadMaddie]

1. So is this like a domino theory...if a country loses this many

jobs and companies could this trigger a domino effect around the world?

What are the impacts to the world?

[Warpy]

2. At this point, they can cry me a river and then jump in and drown

All these jobs they're going to lose if they have to start paying their damn taxes are jobs that were looted from the US, helped along by these sweetheart tax deals.

There is no way the US worker can compete with this shit, and no reason he should have to.

[FILAM23]

3. Sounds like a good start

More action like this might help the Americn worker

[w4rma]

4. American buisnesses pay taxes. Multinationals should pay the same. nt