CDZ President Obama On International Trade

[Procrustes Stretched]

Here we are with a discussion on international trade. I wonder how many myths people hold dear about how the President views the trade deals and what his supporters and opponents say that just does not hold up to scrutiny \

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The full interview: President Obama defends the TPP | Marketplace.org

Ryssdal: Last time we talked, I pushed you a little bit on how jobs inevitably when trade agreements get done, they inevitably go away...

Obama:I think the starting point is skepticism when it comes to trade, because the story that people associate with trade — the story I associate with trade, I mean, remember I’m a progressive Democrat who came out of a —

Ryssdal: I remember.

Obama: — manufacturing state and saw plants close down in small towns, and people who had worked there all their lives suddenly are left in the lurch. So I’ve seen the negative effects of trade, but the argument that I’ve made, and I make this especially to my union friends because they support me on everything else but on this one —

Ryssdal: Yeah, they talking to you on this one?

Obama: — we have a difference. What I‘ve said to them is that companies in the United States who are pursuing a low-wage strategy and have decided that the way for us to compete and make a profit is to find the lowest wages possible, they’ve already left. They’re already gone.

And the question now becomes, how do we position ourselves so that we don’t lose in the future? This trade deal doesn’t make up for all the offshoring that’s happened over the last 20, 30 years. I’m the first one to acknowledge that. But I can tell you that under my administration, manufacturing has grown faster than any time since the 1990s. And that’s not just autos, that’s across sectors...

We’re not going to bring back all the manufacturing jobs that were lost. The economy is dynamic and is changing. More of it is in the service sector than it used to be. Unions have become weaker, and, frankly, companies have moved to a much more short-term approach to quarterly profits as opposed to long-term investment. All those trends have conspired to make it tougher on a lot of middle-class families, and the way to reverse that is to invest in education, invest in things like infrastructure that can’t be exported, train our workers so that they continue to be the best in the world, make sure we’re investing in research and development so that we can continue to innovate..."

What I say to them is, "Well, we should have learned some lessons from NAFTA, and in fact that’s what we’ve done, which is why now we have enforceable environmental provisions and enforceable labor provisions." And as I said before, Vietnam is not going to suddenly have the same standards that we do. Malaysia is not going to suddenly enforce environmental provisions exactly the way we do, but we will have raised the bar for them, and if in fact they have these higher standards, which means that they have responsibilities and costs for operating in those countries that are higher than they currently are, then I’m confident that we can compete and we will continue to see insourcing of jobs moving here, moving back. What we can’t do is think that somehow, if we draw a moat around this country, that we’re going to be able to avoid globalization and technology, because frankly when you look at job loss and lost leverage, automation and technology has probably contributed more than trade has to that problem. The anxieties are real, the concerns are real, but the prescription is not for us to try to look backwards. The prescription here is for us to look forward, and that’s what this trade deal does.

Ryssdal: Mr. President, thanks very much for your time, sir.

Obama: Great to talk to you, Kai. Thank you, always a pleasure.

Featured in: Marketplace for Tuesday, October 6, 2015​

 

[warf]

Looking at it from my blue collar perspective all these trade deals hurt us. They may be good for the owner class bottom line. But for the people they suck.

I'm old enough to remember when a working man supported his family and his wife could stay home and raise the kids. And a young man who didn't go to college could find jobs in which he could learn skills that led to well paying jobs.

Now they both must work and the kids are raised by wolves.

How much of the gain in U.S. manufacturing came from reclassifying burger flippers as manufacturers?

 

[waltky]

Proponent of NAFTA now opposed to TPP...

Defying Obama, Clinton opposes TPP
Fri, Oct 09, 2015 - POLITICKING? Despite having described the trade pact as setting the ‘gold standard in trade agreements’ in 2012, Clinton now says that it does not sufficiently protect US jobs

Potential Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton dealt a significant blow to US President Barack Obama in his efforts to secure approval from Congress on his signature trade agreement, saying on Wednesday she could not support the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the 12-nation pact she bolstered as secretary of state and that liberals in the Democratic Party have vehemently opposed.

After months of delicately avoiding expressing an opinion on the controversial trade deal, Clinton said the agreement in its current form did not meet her “high bar” for protecting US workers, the environment and advancing national security. “I appreciate the hard work that President Obama and his team put into this process and recognize the strides they made,” Clinton wrote in a statement. She specifically criticized the agreement for lacking sufficient protections against currency manipulation, which she said “kills American jobs,” and provisions that benefit global pharmaceutical companies over patients.

Her opposition to the trade pact comes just before Tuesday’s first Democratic presidential debate and represents the latest and most potentially damaging break with Obama. In recent weeks, Clinton has taken a series of stands important to the liberal wing of the party, which has been increasingly swept up by the campaign of US presidential hopeful Senator Bernie Sanders. Last week, she proposed doing away with the so-called Cadillac tax on certain healthcare plans, aligning herself with labor unions on undoing a key part of Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

MORE

 

[the_human_being]

Proponent of NAFTA now opposed to TPP...

Defying Obama, Clinton opposes TPP
Fri, Oct 09, 2015 - POLITICKING? Despite having described the trade pact as setting the ‘gold standard in trade agreements’ in 2012, Clinton now says that it does not sufficiently protect US jobs

Potential Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton dealt a significant blow to US President Barack Obama in his efforts to secure approval from Congress on his signature trade agreement, saying on Wednesday she could not support the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the 12-nation pact she bolstered as secretary of state and that liberals in the Democratic Party have vehemently opposed.

After months of delicately avoiding expressing an opinion on the controversial trade deal, Clinton said the agreement in its current form did not meet her “high bar” for protecting US workers, the environment and advancing national security. “I appreciate the hard work that President Obama and his team put into this process and recognize the strides they made,” Clinton wrote in a statement. She specifically criticized the agreement for lacking sufficient protections against currency manipulation, which she said “kills American jobs,” and provisions that benefit global pharmaceutical companies over patients.

Her opposition to the trade pact comes just before Tuesday’s first Democratic presidential debate and represents the latest and most potentially damaging break with Obama. In recent weeks, Clinton has taken a series of stands important to the liberal wing of the party, which has been increasingly swept up by the campaign of US presidential hopeful Senator Bernie Sanders. Last week, she proposed doing away with the so-called Cadillac tax on certain healthcare plans, aligning herself with labor unions on undoing a key part of Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

MORE

This really puts the Dems in a pickle. Their Savior, Obama supports it. Their candidate and heir -apparent opposes it. Who do they support?

 

[jasonnfree]

Proponent of NAFTA now opposed to TPP...

Defying Obama, Clinton opposes TPP
Fri, Oct 09, 2015 - POLITICKING? Despite having described the trade pact as setting the ‘gold standard in trade agreements’ in 2012, Clinton now says that it does not sufficiently protect US jobs

Potential Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton dealt a significant blow to US President Barack Obama in his efforts to secure approval from Congress on his signature trade agreement, saying on Wednesday she could not support the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the 12-nation pact she bolstered as secretary of state and that liberals in the Democratic Party have vehemently opposed.

After months of delicately avoiding expressing an opinion on the controversial trade deal, Clinton said the agreement in its current form did not meet her “high bar” for protecting US workers, the environment and advancing national security. “I appreciate the hard work that President Obama and his team put into this process and recognize the strides they made,” Clinton wrote in a statement. She specifically criticized the agreement for lacking sufficient protections against currency manipulation, which she said “kills American jobs,” and provisions that benefit global pharmaceutical companies over patients.

Her opposition to the trade pact comes just before Tuesday’s first Democratic presidential debate and represents the latest and most potentially damaging break with Obama. In recent weeks, Clinton has taken a series of stands important to the liberal wing of the party, which has been increasingly swept up by the campaign of US presidential hopeful Senator Bernie Sanders. Last week, she proposed doing away with the so-called Cadillac tax on certain healthcare plans, aligning herself with labor unions on undoing a key part of Obama’s Affordable Care Act.

MORE

This really puts the Dems in a pickle. Their Savior, Obama supports it. Their candidate and heir -apparent opposes it. Who do they support?

Sanders. If TPP was so great it wouldn't be kept a secret. There's also anti TPP Trump as an option if Sanders doesn't get the nomination.

 

[D Truth]

Well, lets have fun this "election".
Vote Sanders in the primary.
Trump in the general.

Then, build the wall.

 

[waltky]

What is the WTO?...

What is the World Trade Organization?
15 Dec.`15 - The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an international agency with 162 member countries and its purpose is to promote international commerce. It has become closely associated with globalisation and is a frequent target for critics of the process.

The WTO's main functions are to provide a forum for negotiations to reduce barriers to international commerce, and to administer a system of rules governing trade. The WTO was established in 2005, when it took over essentially the same functions from the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which came into force in 1948.

The WTO was established in 2005, taking over from GATT which had overseeing international trade since 1948​

One of the motivations for creating the GATT was a wish to dismantle the barriers to trade that had been erected between the two world wars. Most economists regard the establishment of these interwar trade barriers as misguided and say they probably aggravated the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Uruguay Round

A series of eight "rounds" of negotiations under the GATT led to the progressive reduction in trade tariffs - taxes which are imposed only on imported products. The eighth and final such round, known as the "Uruguay Round" ended with a much wider agreement. This went beyond the GATT's focus on trade in industrial goods, and covered services, such as banking and telecommunications, intellectual property and agricultural subsidies. The Uruguay Round also led to the establishment of the WTO with a new and more effective system for dealing with trade disputes.

Rocky road ahead? In recent years, the lack of global progress has led some to sign more limited trade deals​

The WTO has seen the launch of one new set of global trade negotiations. It is called the Doha Round; it was launched in the Qatari capital in November 2001. Progress has been very slow. The Round has produced an agreement on "trade facilitation" which means improving customs procedures. Agreement on other aspects, including further reductions in tariffs and farm subsidies, has been elusive.

How the WTO is organised[/utl]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35074942