For those wanting to repeal NAFTA. If you spend your time on it

[RB TexLa]

I guess it's just misuse of time but if you plan to spend money on trying to get it repealed you'll get better use out of burning your money this winter for heat. Guess I just hate seeing people waste money.

[Captain Hilts]

1. Yep. It's China's Most Favored Nation trade status that's killing our manufacturing, not Mexico. nt

[Oregone]

2. NAFTA is just the normal rallying cry for abandoning all free trade

Don't think people against NAFTA would keep Asian free trade either if they got any traction

[Elwood P Dowd]

3. NAFTA is NOT Free Trade.

NAFTA is an outsourcing/investment scam masquerading as Free Trade, just like all the other republican/corporate scams. These scams masquerading as Free Trade have cost us 10 million jobs and 6 trillion dollars in current account deficits the past 20+ years. The big corps and Wall Street have made a killing though on the slave labor in places like China and Mexico. They also love them some massive pollution and avoiding labor laws, consumer product safety laws, and not paying any worker benefits.

[Oregone]

4. Um, thats exactly what free trade is

Yes, the original concept assumes capital and the means of production would not be transferable, but people long caught onto that falsehood prior to its implementation. Free trade is nothing other than creating a system than cannot punish outsourcing and foreign investment; it eliminates the sovereignty of the country and their ability to freely tariff in such situations

[Elwood P Dowd]

7. David Ricardo is rolling over in his grave every time some pundit mentions "Free Trade".

:crazy:

[nadinbrzezinski]

17. So is Adam Smith by the way

:hi:

Oy thanks for reminding me I have to re-read Ricardo... too...

Who to tackle first after Smith? Marx (his whole thing was a response to Smith's Labor) or Ricardo?

[ZeitgeistObserver]

5. Free trade as American as apple pie.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_trade#The_United_States_and_free_trade

[Oregone]

10. What? You mean they didn't tariff imported slaves?

But I thought America was always fair!

[harkadog]

6. Yes, let's just go down without a fight.

[RB TexLa]

8. Scream at the clouds all you want, you will not stop the future.

I just hate to see people waste money.

[Oregone]

9. What is the future? Either work for Indian/China wages, or don't work at all

Yeah, Id hate to "waste" money fighting that.

[Elwood P Dowd]

13. That's what he wants. Been supporting republican trade deals on DU for years.

How anyone can claim to be a progressive Democrat and continue to support flawed corporate republican scams like NAFTA is beyond me.

[OhioChick]

15. Oh, you noticed, too? n/t

[Elwood P Dowd]

16. He has a friend below.

Says we have a manufacturing surplus. Amazing isn't it?

[pampango]

23. I've seen the contention that we have a manufacturing surplus with "free trade" partners, but

a huge deficit with the rest of the world, particularly China. It was from a National Association of Manufacturers guy who claimed to be using Census Department data, but I don't know if the data he was citing is accurate.

[Elwood P Dowd]

11. We're wasting 100 billion dollars a year in current account deficits thanks to NAFTA.

That, and almost 2 million jobs lost. We're wasting billions a year on NAFTA, and corporate investment/outsourcing scam lovers like you keep posting your love of it on DU.

[TreasonousBastard]

12. Actually, its thanks to oil imports. Our manufacturing account tends to show a surplus...

But, yell all you want-- the Chinese and everyone else with low wages and low transaction and capital costs will eat into our exports no matter what we do.

(Rather than piss on about trade deals you know little about, ask the Germans and Japanese how they handle this problem.)

[Elwood P Dowd]

14. That's BS.

We haven't had a manufacturing surplus in years!

[TreasonousBastard]

20. Well, just one quick one here...

http://www.csmonitor.com/Money/new-economy/2010/0401/US-manufacturing-export-orders-hit-20-year-high

although I'd have to do some addition to get the aggregate manufacturing totals (they are broken down into segments most places)

And, who else in the world has around 3 trillion in GDP directly from the manufacturing segment? The US is still the largest manufacturer on the planet, like it or not.

The jobs problem is partly China, India, Haiti and other low-wage places, but they tend to take a lot of the low-end assembly jobs that don't pay much around here anyway. More of a problem is automation and other means of increasing productivity (including parting out the drudge work) that allows more goods to be made by fewer people.

[Elwood P Dowd]

21. Manufacturing was 28% of GDP when I was a kid.

Now it's more like 12% and shrinking by the year. And it's not just manufacturing jobs that are leaving. Manufacturing just started the ball rolling. The spin-off and support jobs tied to manufacturing are leaving. Computer and engineering jobs are leaving. Customer and technical support jobs are leaving. I know college engineering graduates that are mowing grass or working at Home Depot to survive. In my 63 years, I've never seen such a clusterfuck. The USA is committing economic suicide right before my very eyes.

[TreasonousBastard]

22. You're my age, and when we were kids Europe and Japan were still...

getting over the war. A lot of our "decline" was their getting back up to speed with more modern factories while we tried to keep the old ones working.

So, how are the other billions on the planet to raise their standards of living without the leading economies of US, Europe, and Japan kicking in a little bit?

[Bluebear]

18. Do you post anything that isn't unrecommended into oblivion?

Just asking.

"You will not stop THE FUTURE" indeed.

[Elwood P Dowd]

19. He is a huge fan of any deal that ships jobs out of the USA

and has been that way on DU for several years. NAFTA, GATT, WTO, CAFTA, MFN, he loves them all.