Americans should know that re-negotiating NAFTA with Canada won't save jobs.

[glarius]

In last night's debate both Hillary and Obama said they would attempt to re-negotiate NAFTA with Canada and Mexico to stop the jobs from leaving America. The problem is not Canada. The minimum wage here is $8.00, which certainly is not causing all those manufacturing jobs to flee north. I know some have gone to Mexico, (we've lost some to Mexico too), but it seems to me that most of them have gone to India, China or somewhere in Asia, where the wages are pittance.
I don't know how it would be done, but I think you have to go after the companies and stop them by means of taxes or whatever.
Re-negotiating NAFTA will not fix the problem.

[hendo]

1. Thank you. I am glad that someone took the time to point this out. (nt)

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

2. The Uruguay round of GATT is never mentioned.

:cry:

[redstate_democrat]

3. I actually do

think it would require businesses to think long and hard before they move jobs out. If you have strong labor, environmental, and human rights STANDARDS included in these agreements, and on top of that, take away the incentive to relocate outside of the country and provide that incentive to companies that stay in the U.S., I think that would provide a great way to keep jobs here. Then if you overhaul the health care system by making health care more affordable by providing businesses with tax credits for health care coverage, then that will also add to the "sweet heart" deal of staying in the U.S. I understand that a lot of businesses relocate to Canada because of the free health care there. That's a huge break on businesses. If you REQUIRE LABOR STANDARDS which include worker protection, right to organize, fair wages, etc, then the competition basically boils down to PERFORMANCE and not exploitation of workers. If you add environmental standards, then there is no desire left to offshore business to pollute other countries or evade environmental regulations and standards here in the U.S. If you include human rights standards, then that pressures governments to act on areas in their own countries to do the work they may be neglecting. All of these trade agreements need to be reevaluated.

[dkf]

4. Biggest advantage Canada has over US is national healthcare

[Armstead]

5. How do Canadians view NAFTA?

I used to listen to the CBC a lot during the original debates on free trade in the latter 80's and early 90's. It seemed at that time, there was a lot of division over how it would affect Canada's sovergnty and identity. A lot were more worried about the effect of being overwhelmed by the United States more than anything.

How do Canadians view that now?

Just curoious.

[Spazito]

7. This Canadian is for throwing out NAFTA and negotiating a...

REAL fair trade agreement. Canada and the US have had trade agreements of various kinds for many, many years so there is no doubt, imo, that we will continue to have one so why not have one that actually works for the people and NOT the corporations. Let's have one that has strong labour and environmental rules that will be enforced.

NAFTA, as it exists now, is only for the benefit of the corporations at the expense of the citizens of Canada, Mexico and the United States. It allows the corporations to by-pass any environmental laws, labour laws and penalizes Provinces/States who try to strengthen their laws in these and other areas.

Just my 2 cents on this.

I started out being neutral on NAFTA but, after seeing how it actually works, am strongly against it.

[tokenlib]

6. I was thinking that last night..the real issue is...

..all the "American" corporations moving jobs overseas and getting tax benefits.. The corporations need to be penalized for outsourcing and for moving their HQ off shore to evade taxes. It's time to step on these bastards.

[applegrove]

8. Canada & Mexico also have cheaper cost for things like sugar. So we

are getting candy factories. The US artificially keeps the price of sugar high. That is hurting on sector of the economy very much.