NAFTA

[Alleycat]

Any info on this topic would be appreciated.

An individual I work with has brought up NAFTA on several occasions stating that we would not be in the shape we are in today with outsourcing if Clinton did not sign this agreement. I do not know enough about the subject to comment but my limited understanding is that this was a NORTH AMERICAN (as the title states) trade agreement between the US, Canada & Mexaco. What bearing does shipping jobs over to India and China have to do with this. If you can direct me to some good sites maybe I can read up and be prepared next time.

Thanks

[Massacure]

1. NAFTA was signed December 17, 1992 by Former President Bush

Bush signed the actually treaty, however treaties need to be signed into law for it to count as us taking part in it. Clinton signed it into law in 1993, and it took effect January 1st, 1994.

They can't blame Clinton though, because Bush Snr. was the one who actually negotiated it with Canada and Mexico. As you said, it has no effect on China and India.

[Kenneth ken]

2. ...

The actual NAFTA document here:

NAFTA

A review of NAFTA at the seven year mark from the Economic Policy Institute here:

NAFTA at Seven

and another review of NAFTA by someone named Nick Campolo, written in 1998:

Are We Better Off?"

As for what NAFTA has to do with outsourcing to China, India, et al; nothing really, but the GATT first signed in 1947, spawned the WTO during the Uruguay round of negotiations, in 1994, (which was ratified by the Democratic-controlled Congress, and subsequently signed into law by Clinton on December 8, 1994 does have much to do with outsourcing to China and India.

Some of that here:

World Trade Agreement 1994 (establishing the WTO and including GATT Uruguay 1994)

So, my personal opinion is, NAFTA isn't as big a factor as GATT/WTO, but it still does fall to Clinton, and the DLC as major factors in the outsourcing of jobs. Of course, it's patently obvious that the GOP would have been perfectly happy to be able to "take credit" for both agreements; they just happened to be out of power at the time.

And thus you have my underlying reasons for claiming the DLC is in fact the COINTELPRO wing of the Republican party.

[Wright Patman]

3. What's funny is that NAFTA

no longer works even for Mexico. Their maquiladoras are going out of business due to competition from China. That's one reason illegal immigration keeps trending higher. I predict within 20 years half the Mexican population will have moved up here.

NAFTA is a bipartisan betrayal of the middle class of America. Negotiations began under the Reagan administration and Bush signed the negotiated product, but there was no more enthusiastics supporter of NAFTA than the Clinton-Gore administration.

I remember VP Gore "debating" Ross Perot on Larry King Live about it. Perot was against it, although the way he took a dive during that program looked suspicious to me. But I am pretty paranoid.

[IrateCitizen]

5. NAFTA failed Mexico before the maquiladoras began closing

One of the conditions under which Mexico was able to enter NAFTA was that they repealed an article of their Constitution that guaranteed the right to collective ownership of land. The reason for this was that US and Canadian timber and agribusiness companies insisted on it -- timber so that they could exploit the timber resources in the highlands regions of inland Mexico, agribusiness so they could expand their market reach by creating dependence.

The result of this action was that thousands of people were immediately denied the right to farm land that they and their ancestors had been farming for ages. The most prominent area in which this occurred was the Chiapas region, in which the Zapatista rebellion has taken place as a direct result of the effects of NAFTA.

While I am not going to romanticize about a life of subsistence farming, what happened here was nonetheless tragic. People in these regions had their entire way of life pulled out from underneath them like a rug. Their communities were shattered. They had to send their younger family members (particularly girls) to the cities to find work. There's hardly a day that goes by anymore that doesn't have a story about some young woman going to the cities to find work going missing or being found dead.

The thing is that average wages in Mexico actually went DOWN in the immediate aftermath of NAFTA. Furthermore, the restrictions on technology transfers written into the agreement guaranteed that Mexico would not be able to follow the path to industrial and economic progress that the likes of Japan, South Korea and China did -- rather, they would be stuck in a role as a low-cost assembler of products and provider of cheap labor.

This doesn't even begin to address the environmental impacts on all countries involved, all of which have been negative. Nor does it address the inherent bias in the investor-state clause and the private, insider tribunals that hear trade claims.

All in all, NAFTA is a giant failure for the majority of citizens. However, for the rich, it is a bonanza (if largely in the short term). That's why the mainstream press spoke of it so glowingly for so long.

[Robert Oak]

4. Nafta most "advertised"

But, this has been a disaster
and also has little to do with the worse disaster called the China PNTR


but, you need to point out, 1st and foremost we need to get Bush & Co.
out...they are pushing through bad trade agreement after bad trade agreement.

After the election we need to keep being active trying to get trade
agreements that work for the US.

Kerry has given promise to fixing them a tad...it's questionable whether
they can be fixed...

but at least he's going to re-examine the free trade mantra.

Bush and Co. are busy dismantling the United States through these trade
agreements.

I have quite a bit of info in my signature URLs.

[KalicoKitty]

6. NAFTA was Reagan’s brainchild.

But, George H. W. Bush successfully fought for and negotiated the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that was later signed into law.

Ronald Reagan implemented the Canada-U.S. that Poppy signed! “Thank you all very much for coming. And now I have the high honor of signing this agreement. Thank you.” – George W. Walker Bush, December 17, 1992


At this point, the President signed the North American Free Trade Agreement.


President Clinton who had a repuking congress, did sign the NAFTA bill, and I wish it was undone.

Then Junior....

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/09/20030903-3.html


Photo of DuMbya signing Free Trade Agreement Bills: