Now is not the time to renegotiate or cancel NAFTA - Bush

[TopGunna]

Toro,

I agree with your take on the situation - but I do think Shogun's point was that even though output has increased, there are fewer people employed in manufacturing jobs, which is also correct.

Your overall take is the most reasonable, I think. It's tough to argue that NAFTA is the key cause of the decrease in manufacturing jobs, when the US manufactuing output continues to grow steadily. To maintain growth despite fewer employees implies a huge increase in productivity.

I've always felt that in any economy, the producers exist to satisfy the consumers. Protectionism seems to say that it's the other way around, and consumers should front the costs to satisfy producers.

 

[Toro]

Can you show me a real life scenerio outside of the rhetorical bullshit? 'cause I can use the loss of mom and pop retail stores to wal mart, the importation of cheap plastic shit from third world countries that the american standard of living CANNOT compete with, AND the overall decrease in manufacturing jobs.

You can use mom and pop shops? What, do you think that the mom and pop shops paid $30 an hour before Wal-Mart came in? You're not showing me a real life example because you aren't showing me all the other jobs that were created because Wal-Mart lowered prices. Sorry.

More on manufacturing output and employment. The difference between employment and output is a very simple one.

http://cafehayek.typepad.com/hayek/2006/02/we_dont_make_an.html

 

[Toro]

Toro,

I agree with your take on the situation - but I do think Shogun's point was that even though output has increased, there are fewer people employed in manufacturing jobs, which is also correct.

Your overall take is the most reasonable, I think. It's tough to argue that NAFTA is the key cause of the decrease in manufacturing jobs, when the US manufactuing output continues to grow steadily. To maintain growth despite fewer employees implies a huge increase in productivity.

I've always felt that in any economy, the producers exist to satisfy the consumers. Protectionism seems to say that it's the other way around, and consumers should front the costs to satisfy producers.

Thanks.

Its important to understand that rising productivity leads to rising standards of living because we can make more with less. That is one of the tremendous strengths of the United States. Over the past few decades, productivity growth in this country has been higher than almost all other industrialized countries.

 

[Shogun]

You do understand the differences between "employment" and "output," right?

Manufacturing output has been rising. The graph is from the St Louis Fed. Index data used to construct this graph.

http://www.economagic.com/em-cgi/data.exe/blsin/inu0002us0


You're "links" are news stories and politicians saying that NAFTA is bad. So?

I do understand the difference between OUTPUT and EMPLOYMENT. Then again, I wasn't the one suggesting that OUTPUT meant increased EMPLOYMENT.

and, my links included the DEPARTMENT OF LABOR. so, indeed.

 

[Shogun]

Gee, no kidding. That's why I've spent too much time on this board telling Republican cheerleaders that the economy isn't in great shape.

Now show me the cause and effect. Show me empirically that NAFTA is is the cause of these job losses.

Its false causality. Politicians and ideologues saying it is so doesn't make it so.

As for this idea that manufacturing jobs are being replaced by low wage jobs, wrong! The change in jobs since 1997.

http://usmessageboard.com/showthread.php?t=51331

oh yes.. it's a FALSE CORRELATION that so called free trade matches the decline of manufacturing jobs, eh?


oook.


clearly, your word means more than Dept of Labor stats.

 

[Shogun]

Thanks for the link but you are wrong about output and employment. Output is the total amount made. Employment is the number of people employed. Different things.

no shit. which is why I found it rather easy to post evidence indicating the decline of manufacturing jobs DESPITE the fact that you brought up OUTPUT.


So, did you want to tell me how our middle class has been able to support itself on MORE manufacturing jobs or would you rather stick with the ambiguous "creates more jobs"?

 

[Shogun]

On jobs in America

Total employed in America

Free trade between Canada and the US signed 1988...... 105,345
NAFTA signed 1993...... 110,844
2007...... 137,623

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/suppl/empsit.ceseeb1.txt

and again, here you are trying to suggest that the creation of retail jobs makes up for what has been lost in standard of living that was ONCE attainable with a factory job.

Should I be impressed that more poeple make LESS money these days?

 

[BrianH]

no shit. which is why I found it rather easy to post evidence indicating the decline of manufacturing jobs DESPITE the fact that you brought up OUTPUT.


So, did you want to tell me how our middle class has been able to support itself on MORE manufacturing jobs or would you rather stick with the ambiguous "creates more jobs"?

I agree, It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Manufacturing is not what it used to be. Take a look at all of the stuff that you own, I'll bet ay least 75% is manufactured overseas (China, Taiwan, Korea, etc....). Many things that used to be manufactured here. It's a shame really....we're going to be up a shit-creek without a paddle in the event of a world war.

 

[Shogun]

The empirical evidence on international trade



http://benmuse.typepad.com/custom_house/2008/01/blue-collar-blu.html

There have been several other studies concluding the same.

a blog, eh?




well, IM convinced.

 

[Shogun]

You can use mom and pop shops? What, do you think that the mom and pop shops paid $30 an hour before Wal-Mart came in? You're not showing me a real life example because you aren't showing me all the other jobs that were created because Wal-Mart lowered prices. Sorry.

More on manufacturing output and employment. The difference between employment and output is a very simple one.

http://cafehayek.typepad.com/hayek/2006/02/we_dont_make_an.html

Im showing you the cost of your ambiguous "creates more jobs" solution to outsources labor as noted above. It's not just been the death of the manufacturing sector. In fact, to a small business owner who cant compete with cheap plastic shit from wal mart, or the retail price it takes for AMERICAN products to compete with third world slave labor, Im sure their income counts even if you don't.

JOBS created because wal mart's prices? yes, Im sure peasant classes in china who are used to working for pennies a day LOVE their brand new job.


and, if you can't get over YOUR discrepency about employment and OUTPUT then why did you bring OUTPUT into the conversation when I brought up employment? Do you need post numbers or a few quotes?

 

[Shogun]

Thanks.

Its important to understand that rising productivity leads to rising standards of living because we can make more with less. That is one of the tremendous strengths of the United States. Over the past few decades, productivity growth in this country has been higher than almost all other industrialized countries.

I had a smartass comment here but I'm going to edit it out so you stick around this thread.




PS

Toyota takes 1Q world sales lead from General Motors
Wednesday April 23, 6:20 pm ET
By Tom Krisher, AP Auto Writer
Toyota takes 1Q world sales lead from General Motors after overtaking it in production in 2007
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080423/gm_global_sales.html?.v=8


probably has nothing to do with gas prices either. False Correlation, you know.

 

[Shogun]

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[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZffPTyHGDk[/ame]

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[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toySvwGF09s[/ame]

 

[Shogun]

I agree, It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Manufacturing is not what it used to be. Take a look at all of the stuff that you own, I'll bet ay least 75&#37; is manufactured overseas (China, Taiwan, Korea, etc....). Many things that used to be manufactured here. It's a shame really....we're going to be up a shit-creek without a paddle in the event of a world war.

I remember a time in the 80s when buying American shit was the thing to do. For some reason I seem to recall wal mart advertising all their american made shit too. Im not advocating shutting down shipping ports. But its crazy to ignore repercussions that damage the economics of our society as a whole just because it puts wealth into the swiss bank accounts of a small portion of america. Even if the first card they play is the "investor and their 401k" hand. Further, MEXICO isn't tring to help with our little illegal alien issue so Im not really in the mood to believe that a factory in mexico city is good for american labor.

 

[Shogun]

Sam Walton had great distribution methods as well. He built his stores near distribution centers so that items could be delivered quickly – usually within 24 hours. Additionally, he promoted a ‘Buy American’ trademark that appealed to customers in all the nearly 1,000 stores that he had seen constructed.


http://www.biographyshelf.com/sam_walton_biography.html

 

[BrianH]

Sam Walton had great distribution methods as well. He built his stores near distribution centers so that items could be delivered quickly – usually within 24 hours. Additionally, he promoted a ‘Buy American’ trademark that appealed to customers in all the nearly 1,000 stores that he had seen constructed.


http://www.biographyshelf.com/sam_walton_biography.html

Boy has that turned into a load of crap.

 

[Toro]

I do understand the difference between OUTPUT and EMPLOYMENT. Then again, I wasn't the one suggesting that OUTPUT meant increased EMPLOYMENT.

and, my links included the DEPARTMENT OF LABOR. so, indeed.

How hard is it for you to deduce?

I am the one the posted the graphs of increasing output and declining employment. You are the one arguing that what matters is jobs.

Remember? Its only two pages back!

http://usmessageboard.com/showthread.php?t=53741&page=2

oh yes.. it's a FALSE CORRELATION that so called free trade matches the decline of manufacturing jobs, eh?


oook.


clearly, your word means more than Dept of Labor stats.

Have you ever taken a class in regression? You understand the relationship between dependent and independent variables? You understand concepts such as serial correlation? If you do, you would know that you have to test different variables to understand the relationship between different factors and cause and effect.

So, yes, it is false causality. You have to separate different factors to understand cause and effect. That's why I posted an empirical study. You have done no such thing. You have posted anecdotes and made false analogies to declining employment levels.

I do understand the difference between OUTPUT and EMPLOYMENT. Then again, I wasn't the one suggesting that OUTPUT meant increased EMPLOYMENT.

and, my links included the DEPARTMENT OF LABOR. so, indeed.

You seem to be confused, first on employment and output

I wonder if 93-97 is as applicable to understanding where we are in 08 as product OUTPUT is, apparently, the same thing as EMPLOYMENT.

since they, apparently, aren't the same thing, and second, on your seemingly incomprehension that I agree with you that manufacturing employment has fallen since we are both referencing data from the BLS. So why do you keep telling me that employment is falling? I already know that. I knew that when they released the data. Your repeating this fact does not substantiate your argument.

no shit. which is why I found it rather easy to post evidence indicating the decline of manufacturing jobs DESPITE the fact that you brought up OUTPUT.


So, did you want to tell me how our middle class has been able to support itself on MORE manufacturing jobs or would you rather stick with the ambiguous "creates more jobs"?

Because what matters is output, not jobs. Hey, we could have the Federal government take a billion dollars and hire a thousand people to dig ditches for a million dollars. Think of the thousand jobs we'd create, AND we'd create a thousand new millionaires. By your logic, we should do this because you can see the high-paying jobs being created, never mind that a billion dollars would be taken out of the economy and transfered to a lucky few. The effect of protectionism is to take money from a large group of people to give it to a few.

As for the middle class being reliant on manufacturing jobs, that couldn't be more wrong. Do simple math. The number of jobs in America at the end of 2007 was 138 million. The number of manufacturing jobs was 13.8 million.

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/suppl/empsit.ceseeb1.txt

In other words, manufacturing jobs was 10&#37; of total jobs. But we're supposed to believe that the middle class is dependent on manufacturing?

Funny that even though the proportion and outright numbers of manufacturing jobs have been declining, the middle class has not.

The middle class isn't disappearing - it's moving up.

The Census reports that the share of U.S. households earning $35,000 to $75,000 a year (in '06 dollars) - roughly, the middle class - has indeed shrunk slightly over the last decade, from 34 percent to 33 percent. But so, too, has the share earning less than $35,000 - from 40 percent to 37 percent.

It's the share of households earning more than $75,000 that's jumped - from 26 percent to 30 percent.

Trade has helped America transform itself into a middle-class service economy. Yes, the country's lost a net 3.3 million manufacturing jobs in the past decade - but it's added a net 11.6 million jobs in service and other sectors where average wages are higher than in manufacturing. Most of these new jobs are in better-paying categories, like professional and business services, finance and education and health services.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/11072007/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_truth_on_trade_424240.htm?page=0

So it appears that the middle class has shrunk by a whopping 1%, even though it appears that a bigger proportion of the workforce is now making more than $75k and even less are below $35k.

and again, here you are trying to suggest that the creation of retail jobs makes up for what has been lost in standard of living that was ONCE attainable with a factory job.

Should I be impressed that more poeple make LESS money these days?

Wrong. This is myth perpetuation. Since you didn't either click on this link or outright ignored it, I'll post this graph

Contrary to the mythology, manufacturing jobs have not been replaced by low-end retail jobs. Over the past 10 years, the loss of 3.3 million jobs have been offset by the creation of 11.6 million that pay more than the average wage in manufacturing.

Source - as you keep repeating - Bureau of Labor Statistics.

a blog, eh?




well, IM convinced.

Are you serious? It is a post on a large study in a book by an academic. I thought you would have figured out that all you had to do was click the link in the post for reference. Sorry. I won't make that assumption next time.

Here ya go.

http://bookstore.petersoninstitute.org/book-store/4143.html

A synopsis

http://www.petersoninstitute.org/publications/briefs/lawrence4143.pdf

A preview

http://www.petersoninstitute.org/publications/chapters_preview/4143/alliie4143.pdf

I had a smartass comment here but I'm going to edit it out so you stick around this thread.

You mean you haven't been making smart-ass comments already?

PS

Toyota takes 1Q world sales lead from General Motors
Wednesday April 23, 6:20 pm ET
By Tom Krisher, AP Auto Writer
Toyota takes 1Q world sales lead from General Motors after overtaking it in production in 2007
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080423/gm_global_sales.html?.v=8


probably has nothing to do with gas prices either. False Correlation, you know.

Toyota is productive than GM. Thank you for proving my point.

But since you said earlier that it would be better for America if Americans paid an extra 10 grand for a car, feel free, the next time you want to buy a vehicle, to go to the salesman and say you want to do your part for America by offering to pay $10,000 more than the sticker price, and quality doesn't matter, so make sure you get an inferior vehicle.

Because its better for Americans to pay more for an inferior product.

 

[Toro]

Here is what John Engler, president of the National Association of Manufacturers and a former three-term governor of Michigan, had to say about trade with Mexico and NAFTA.

It is amazing how some presidential candidates are blaming the North American Free Trade Agreement for U.S. job losses. They seem to believe that a substantial part of the three million manufacturing jobs lost since 2000 resulted from Nafta, and that outsourcing of manufacturing production to Mexico and Canada resulted in a huge trade deficit.

Too bad they don't know that the growth in the deficit isn't due to manufactured goods, but to oil and gas imports. ...

What the antitrade advocates have been hiding from the candidates (or maybe don't know themselves) is that almost all of the increase in our Nafta deficit since 2000 has been in increased U.S. imports of energy from Canada and Mexico. In fact, $58 billion of the $62 billion increase in our Nafta deficit has been in energy imports. That's 95% of the total increase.

We need that oil and gas, and we would rather get it from our friendly neighbors. Surely no one seeks to argue that America would be better off saying no to Mexican and Canadian oil and gas, advocating that we instead import that energy from less secure sources farther from our borders.

Except for energy, though, our trade deficit within Nafta has hardly grown at all – only $3.5 billion from 2000-2007. Our agricultural and manufactured goods sales to Nafta countries have just about kept pace with our imports. ...

the increase in our nonenergy deficit within Nafta has accounted for only 2% of the increase in our global nonenergy deficit since 2000.

Why are the candidates so focused on 2% of our trade problem rather than on the other 98%? Our nonenergy deficit with the high-wage, high-environmental-standard European Union (with whom we have no free trade agreement) grew 10 times as much as it did with Nafta. ...

in the case of Nafta, that job impact has been almost exactly balanced by increased U.S. production and exports of farm and factory goods. ...

Nafta has been part of the solution, not the problem. We can do even better if we focus on how to make American manufacturing more competitive than it is.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120873451908929781.html?mod=todays_us_opinion

 

[Zoomie1980]

The North tried. THAT's what led to the Civil War. However, that topic is being discussed currently in two threads on this board and we don't need to make it three.

It might not be the sole reason, but it's a reason, and where it creates other jobs is in Mexico, not the US.

I'm all for mentarily penalizing the Hell out of US corporations that move jobs outside this country, and I'm for cutting out all this free trade agreement crap and making it cost others to do business with us.

When do we start looking out for own asses instead of trying to appease the world?

Well I have found something I have to disagree with you on. Trade CREATES more jobs than it costs. It is a GOOD thing to move obsolete, 19th century industries like Textiles overseas....because we NEED THOSE WORKERS to man industries for the 21st century that trade helps create by leaving more money in consumer's pockets which they spend on other stuff creating MORE jobs. In a FREE market industries, and the jobs that go with them, decline for a REASON. But there are NEW and MORE VIBRANT businesses and industries that take their place.

What usually goes with those old, obsolete industries are old and obsolete employment models, namely unions, which are a MAJOR reason why many of those old industries begin to fail anyway. There's a reason the Toyota and BMW plants in the south are vibrant and profitable and the old guard big three factories in Michigan aren't....

 

[Shogun]

like I said, dude...


my links are only from the fucking department of labor.


enjoy those videos of your argument having it's ass handed to it. care of mr greenspan.

 

[dread]

NEW ORLEANS (AP) - President Bush has replied to criticism from Democratic presidential candidates and says that now is not the time to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement or to walk away from the accord.

Bush told a joint news conference Tuesday with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper that now is the time to make the trade agreement work better and to reduce trade barriers world wide.

Bush also used the opportunity to renew his call for Congress to pass a free trade pact with Colombia.



http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9071E2O6&show_article=1






good job, conservatives!

My personal opinion about this is that President Bush is wrong. He has done wrong by our truckers and he keeps putting America at more risk. What I mean by this is that doing business with Mexico has in my mind put not just American jobs on the line but even more important to me is the safety of our border and American lives. Just like President Bush's attempt to allow Dubai to buy up our ports he is thinking about HIS fiscal legacy and NOT our personal soverienty.