So why is NAFTA the Great Satan among populists?

[Lago PARANOIA]

1.) What exactly is so bad about NAFTA? Does it really do these things?

2.) As far as the bad parts of NAFTA go, are they completely unmitigable or was it something that could've been controlled with ancillary political policy?

'cause, like, I'm getting a distinct 'raaar, GMO crops will destroy civilization' vibe when I hear leftists criticize NAFTA and globalization in general.

[Maj]

I am under the impression that NAFTA is what has enabled so much relocation to Mexico.

[Count Arioch the 28th]

I can't speak for the populist perspective, but I can say why I have a lesser opinion of it.

When I was working for Tycho, I had applied for a job in Banff, Alberta. I received a call from HR saying that as an American citizen, I couldn't get a job in Canada. When I mentioned NAFTA, they said that NAFTA only applied to the US, and that Canada didn't participate in it.

That could be right, or it could be that Tycho was wrong, or it could be that Canadians are dicks (and they kind of are in my experience). Maybe all three are right in differing degrees.

[Username17]

1.) What exactly is so bad about NAFTA? Does it really do these things?

2.) As far as the bad parts of NAFTA go, are they completely unmitigable or was it something that could've been controlled with ancillary political policy?

'cause, like, I'm getting a distinct 'raaar, GMO crops will destroy civilization' vibe when I hear leftists criticize NAFTA and globalization in general.

NAFTA does not do most of the things people say it does. NAFTA did not bring about the golden age of free trade driven growth that the neo-liberals promised, nor did it pound a stake through the heart of the American worker like the isolationists warned. The actual effects were and are fairly minor.

To the extent that NAFTA is and was a bad thing, it mostly has to do with the abrogation of democratic institutions in the favor of treaties written partially by corporations. In general, democratic institutions have behaved much better than undemocratic bureaucracy of experts in the last few years, and twenty years ago the same pattern held. So NAFTA does some shit like reverting some stuff from public domain to perpetual corporate ownership. That's bad. Also, it's stupid.

But it's overall impact has been very very small. Fundamentally, Canada, the United States, and Mexico already traded a lot with each other in 1993. The barriers to trade were pretty low, and there wasn't a lot of room to bring them down further. Environmental impact was pretty small. There were provisions to try to fight the "race to the bottom," and either they were broadly successful or there actually wasn't much pressure created in the first place because NAFTA didn't have much impact.

The threat of things like NAFTA remains. The European Union really is forcing hugely unpopular and unsuccessful policies on tens of millions of people. But between the fact that NAFTA is only between three countries that are already deeply integrated and broadly allied on most issue, and the fact that its ability to force policy changes on the constituent nations is very weak, nothing remotely like that has occurred in North America. The North American Union, when it comes, just isn't likely to be the kind of fuckup that the EU was and is.

-Username17

[Meikle641]

Frankly, I'd be more concerned about the TPPA. I don't see how it will possibly help the average Canadian.

https://www.eff.org/issues/tpp

[Lago PARANOIA]

Okay, so why do Perot-like populists find NAFTA so scary? Are there specific provisions that they link to specific outcomes and they just blow it up in effect, are they confusing correlation with causation (the immigration rate in the United States went up hugely thanks to this and the Brady Bill!) or is it like Satanic music and comic books where there isn't even a proposed mechanism but concerned citizens just fell into the hysteria?

[Username17]

Okay, so why do Perot-like populists find NAFTA so scary? Are there specific provisions that they link to specific outcomes and they just blow it up in effect, are they confusing correlation with causation (the immigration rate in the United States went up hugely thanks to this and the Brady Bill!) or is it like Satanic music and comic books where there isn't even a proposed mechanism but concerned citizens just fell into the hysteria?

I think in that case it's just like their fear mongering about the UN. Since it's international and not subject to local voting in any way, you can blame it for pretty much anything. Remember that Perot was basically a scam artist to the extent that he wasn't a crazy man. The actual proposals that Perot supported was simple "kick the poors" stuff: he wanted to shift taxation to regressive fuel taxes and away from progressive income taxes. He wanted to cut social security. Blah blah blah.

So blaming bad things on nebulous foreigners and shit really helps. It allows you to absolutely avoid talking about how regressive taxation and cutting pensions will destroy jobs. Because you can rant about a fantasy world where jobs are being stolen by Mexicans or something.

-Username17

[Lago PARANOIA]

First of all, wikipedia sucks ass. I mean, big surprise, yeah, but you'd think that an article on Ross Perot's 1992 campaign would talk more about his positions and why he took them.

Secondly of all, Ross Perot has to be one of the biggest fucking frauds on the planet. I know that Mitt Romney is pretty much on the short list of 'greatest liars in American history' but the Romneybot's got nothing on Mr. Stupidchart. Fucker takes two positions on almost every political policy. So why am I not surprised at the thought that he's the one behind the NAFTA fearmongering?

[Koumei]

So blaming bad things on nebulous foreigners and shit really helps. It allows you to absolutely avoid talking about how regressive taxation and cutting pensions will destroy jobs. Because you can rant about a fantasy world where jobs are being stolen by Mexicans or something.

It seems to be working over here.

[ACOS]

[Occluded Sun]

Fantasy world? What makes the law of supply and demand suddenly cease to be applicable merely because Mexicans are involved?

Admittedly, "they reduced the offered wages for our jobs" isn't as catchy as "they took our jobs", but the basic concept is valid.

[Kaelik]

Fantasy world? What makes the law of supply and demand suddenly cease to be applicable merely because Mexicans are involved?

Admittedly, "they reduced the offered wages for our jobs" isn't as catchy as "they took our jobs", but the basic concept is valid.

Because the vast majority of jobs are:

1) Jobs that require being nearby, like Mcdonalds person.
2) Jobs that require high skill, and thus are not being competed with by most people.
3) Jobs that we are already having Chinese do for us.

[Occluded Sun]

So? The jobs in question are the ones that the Mexicans are taking. I don't quite understand why you don't recognize how many jobs are in question - or why you think they're not important - but even if there weren't all that many involved jobs in an absolute sense, or many important ones, that doesn't make much difference to the people whose options largely consist of those jobs.

[Kaelik]

So? The jobs in question are the ones that the Mexicans are taking. I don't quite understand why you don't recognize how many jobs are in question - or why you think they're not important - but even if there weren't all that many involved jobs in an absolute sense, or many important ones, that doesn't make much difference to the people whose options largely consist of those jobs.

Okay yes, I feel bad for the 50 people who lost their jobs when the one factory in the entire country that had the perfect balance such that it was still slightly more efficient to keep that factory open than to move it to China closed because it was moved to Mexico.

So?

[Occluded Sun]

Then there are all the construction jobs. And agricultural harvesting in particular once paid well enough that there were Americans who supported themselves seasonally migrating from harvest to harvest.

'Trickle-down' demonstrably doesn't work. Reality is trickle-up.

[Username17]

But in the real world, manufacturing unit labor costs look like this:



In the last twenty years, we've lost more manufacturing jobs to Germany than to Mexico. And it isn't because they had lower wages there - Germans have higher wages. And you'll note that despite having an even stronger customs union in Europe, that the manufacturing jobs stay in Germany. And do not, for example, go to Greece or Portugal where labor costs less than half as much.

This is because the actual determinants of where it is a good place to put a factory have almost nothing to do with labor costs and have much more to do with the location of appropriately skilled workers, the availability of sales channels, and the proximity of adjunct industries. BMW makes cars in Germany because that is where the skilled factory workers and the factories that make the screws and engine parts they need happen to be. Saving twenty euros an hour per worker isn't even a tempting offer if it means getting cut off physically from the secondary and tertiary industries that BMW relies on in its upstream supply chain.

The Detroit automotive industry contracted because the downtown core of Detroit was allowed to deteriorate and the area became less attractive to do industry in. Not because Mexicans used their sexy sexy low wage expectations and weak exchange rate to entice industrialists to abandon the American people.

-Username17

[Kaelik]

Then there are all the construction jobs. And agricultural harvesting in particular once paid well enough that there were Americans who supported themselves seasonally migrating from harvest to harvest.

Construction jobs require you to be in the location things are being constructed. NAFTA is not going to cause us to construct a building in Mexico and import it.

Same for agriculture. The shit has to be grown where it is grown, and oranges are still grown in Florida, not in Mexico.

The reason people can't migrate from harvest to harvest has to do with a lot of things, one of which is machines that do a lot of harvesting. None of which is exporting plants to Mexico and then importing the fruit.

[Laertes]

The big issue is ultimately globalisation. Humanity is currently in the process of bringing vastly more of its members into a global economy, which means that what was once a wage and a standard of living relative to other people in your country is now getting measured relative to everyone on earth.

It used to be that unskilled Americans could live as farm labourers, skilled blue-collar Americans could live as car-factory assembly line workers, and low-pay white-collar Americans could live as IT helpdesk phone monkeys. However, when you stop being measured relative to other Americans and start being measured relative to, say, Bangladeshis or Chadians or Germans, then the relative scale starts to look very different. Instead of Detroit being a poor place, it suddenly becomes a relatively wealthy place that has fuck all jobs for relatively wealthy people. Which is why it's hard to get a job in Detroit because you're still trying to live in what is, globally, a pretty good neighbourhood.

Skilled manufacturing and engineering jobs are going to go to the neighbourhood where those sorts of people live, and as Frank points out that neighbourhood is increasingly not called Detroit, it's called Germany. Duller assembly work goes to Taiwan Slovakia. Child slaves working in sweatshops are in Vietnam and Bangladesh, rather than the Garment District of New York. The world is becoming more stratified by region, just as centuries ago countries became more stratified by region.

If this sounds like a bad thing to you, then you're probably the sort of asshole who genuinely believes that the welfare of one of your countrymen you've never met is worth more than the welfare of one foreigner you've never met. The urbanisation and economic development of the world is massively improving the average human standard of life, including access to water, education, sanitation and health care; and it also contributes to everyone's wealth because as more people have more money, they spend more of it and then everyone's better off.

It's also a limited thing: there are only seven billion humans. This is a race to the bottom, yes, but there is a very hard cap at the bottom.

To my mind, the real issue is preventing the capture of the democratic process by those super-wealthy people who've been created as a side effect of so much economic change. Globalisation is on the whole a positive force; this part isn't.

[Occluded Sun]

If this sounds like a bad thing to you, then you're probably the sort of asshole who genuinely believes that the welfare of one of your countrymen you've never met is worth more than the welfare of one foreigner you've never met.

The welfare of 'countrymen' ultimately effects the country. And therefore, on the other people living in that country.

All else being equal: yes, the welfare of a fellow citizen is more important than the welfare of a non-citizen. Why bother having citizenship, otherwise?

[Kaelik]

Then there are all the construction jobs. And agricultural harvesting in particular once paid well enough that there were Americans who supported themselves seasonally migrating from harvest to harvest.

All else being equal: yes, the welfare of a fellow citizen is more important than the welfare of a non-citizen. Why bother having citizenship, otherwise?

Are you aware that NAFTA effects tariffs, and is not in fact an immigration treaty? NAFTA did not summon people to the US to "took our jobs."

[fectin]

Occluded Sun is correct if you assume everything is zero-sum.

That is a reckless assumption short term, and downright foolish long term.

[Schleiermacher]

The welfare of 'countrymen' ultimately effects the country. And therefore, on the other people living in that country.

All else being equal: yes, the welfare of a fellow citizen is more important than the welfare of a non-citizen. Why bother having citizenship, otherwise?

Why bother indeed. Countries increasingly aren't a sensible unit of human society. Some issues are more local, many issues are transnational and can best be adressed from a transnational perspective. Conflicts of interests between nation-states retard human progress and cooperation.

[Occluded Sun]

Why bother indeed. Countries increasingly aren't a sensible unit of human society.

There is a famous photograph of the North Korean / South Korean border at night from the perspective of low Earth orbit.

There is a less famous but still well-known photo of the U.S. / Mexican border where it runs right through a city. Which one escapes me at the moment, I'll see if I can find it. But the difference between the two sides is nearly as stark as the two sides of the Korean DMZ.

Countries are a very important factor in societies. And I find it difficult to imagine why anyone would want that to be otherwise.

[rampaging-poet]

Countries are a very important factor in societies. And I find it difficult to imagine why anyone would want that to be otherwise.

... because it would be better if there weren't arbitrary lines on a map that determined who did and didn't have enough electricity to stay awake at night?

[Ikeren]

At least some of the NAFTA fear mongering is based around Chapter 11 claims, which allow corporations to sue governments for passing laws blocking their businesses, which, among other things, allowed a company to sue a Mexican town for a good chunk of money when they attempted to block a hazardous waste dump from going in their town.

Chapter 11 also gets criticized for most often being successfully claimed against Canada and Mexico, and rarely successfully claimed against the US government. There also was a case where the Ontario government tried to stop people on the US side of the great lakes from bottling and selling great lake water, and they got sued for that (not that you'd want to drink great lakes water, anyways).

As stupid as some of this is, I agree with Frank's thought that it is, overall, minor.