GOP senator calls Trump’s trade agreement ‘great win’ — before admitting she has no idea what’s in it

[steve_bank]

The overall balance with Canada in total cash value was OK. But there has been long standing issues with dairy products and subsidized wood products dumped in the USA.

Establishing A min wage for auto workers in Mexico working on cars for the USA sounds good.

Don't know if it has been addressed. Mexican trucking was given wide access to US roads with poorly maintained trucks.

 

[jonatha]

He claims there are substantial changes to the point of origin requirements with regards auto sub assemblies.

Old rules - 62.5% North American content to avoid duties.

New rules - 75%

 

[jonatha]

Canadian wines.

There are Canadian wines?

Right next to the Canadian pineapple and oranges?

 

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Canadian wines.

There are Canadian wines?

Right next to the Canadian pineapple and oranges?

Exactly. So, "forcing" Canadian wine stores to put US wines next to Canadian wines isn't suddenly going to make Canadians go, "They make wine in America? I had no idea, eh!"

 

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Establishing A min wage for auto workers in Mexico working on cars for the USA sounds good.

You must have missed this point from my previous post (emphasis mine):

On the face of it, the “high wage” requirement for the origin of parts used in imported vehicles does seems like something new and potentially important. However, the penalty for importing vehicles that fail to meet this target is small—a tariff of just 2.5 per cent. Fiorani and Schuster both said that some car companies, rather than encouraging their Mexican suppliers to pay higher wages or reorganizing their supply chains and sourcing more of their parts domestically, are likely to go ahead and pay the tariff. “A 2.5-per-cent tariff on vehicles imported from Mexico is less costly than raising the wages of Mexican workers, and far less costly than moving production to the United States,” Fiorani said. “It will have a minimal impact.”

Iow, they won't raise their min wage rates and the problem Trump is pretending he's addressing will still exist; it will still be cheaper for the automakers to build in Mexico.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Canadian wines.

There are Canadian wines?

Right next to the Canadian pineapple and oranges?

You laugh, but Alberta is the world's second largest exporter of oranges.

Southern Ontario has grape orchards. I'd presume British Columbia has some as well, in addition to the Maritimes.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Niagara region of Ontario has plenty of vineyards. It is wine country. And it is one of the few sources of ice wines as well.

 

[bilby]

Well, I haven't seen last weekend's NRL Grand Final yet*, but I am very confident that Melbourne will have won, as they are the team I want to win.

Bullshit. You were rooting for "Not New South" Hey, I was surprised about this years State of Origin as well. Out of curiosity, do you think, in your lifetime, Queensland will give away a home venue to Melbourne or say Adelaide?

I hope not - the bus ride to Lang Park is long enough for me.

But yes, I see the Storm as the Maroons 'B' squad. The chooks totally dominated though, it was a deserved win.

 

[RVonse]

Congrats to you and the 140,000 other people employed in the US steel industry. Tough titty for the rest of us, right?



You're supposed to rejoicing in the "not quite the worst trade deal ever". Why do you hate the middle class?

"Fuck you, I got mine."

The point wasn't "fuck you, I got mine." The point was "I am part of the working class and Trump trade policy has clearly made a positive impact on our lives."

 

[Jarhyn]

Congrats to you and the 140,000 other people employed in the US steel industry. Tough titty for the rest of us, right?



You're supposed to rejoicing in the "not quite the worst trade deal ever". Why do you hate the middle class?

"Fuck you, I got mine."

The point wasn't "fuck you, I got mine." The point was "I am part of the working class and Trump has made a positive impact on our lives."

Sounds a lot like "fuck you, I got mine" to me.

 

[RVonse]

Fair enough Jarhyn. It sounds like "fuck you, I got mine" to you. Would you rather the rust belt of this country be out of work or under employed? Would it help you if other US citizens are out of work or under employed?

Is it going to help you (assuming you are even a US citizen) for the US steel industry to tank or go under?

 

[ZiprHead]

Fair enough Jarhyn. It sounds like "fuck you, I got mine" to you. Would you rather the rust belt of this country be out of work or under employed? Would it help you if other US citizens are out of work or under employed?

Is it going to help you (assuming you are even a US citizen) for the US steel industry to tank or go under?

There's a lot more auto workers, appliance manufacturer workers, and other steel utilizing industry workers that could lose their jobs than steel workers. And when that happens, you too could very well be out on the street again.

 

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Not to mention these little tidbits from Business Insider:

Joseph Francois and Laura M. Baughman, economists at consulting group The Trade Partnership, found in a recent study that the number of jobs lost in industries that rely on steel and aluminum to produce goods would far outweigh the jobs protected in the metals industry.

"The tariffs and retaliation would increase U.S. steel employment and non-ferrous metals (primarily aluminum) employment by 26,346 jobs, but cost a net of 495,136 jobs throughout the rest of the economy, for a total net loss of nearly 470,000 jobs," the study said.

Other economists estimated that the net loss would be somewhat smaller, but almost no major study showed that the tariffs would result in a net boost to employment.

Mary Amiti, Sebastian Heise, and Noah Kwicklis, economists at the New York Federal Reserve, could not pinpoint the exact number of jobs that could be lost from the tariffs. But they said the overall change was relatively clear.

"Although it is difficult to say exactly how many jobs will be affected, given the history of protecting industries with import tariffs, we can conclude that the 25 percent steel tariff is likely to cost more jobs than it saves," the economists wrote.

On an individual industry level, the tariffs could be devastating for some US workers. Benn Steil and Benjamin Della Rocca, trade experts at the Council on Foreign Relations, estimated that up to 40,000 auto workers could lose their jobs as a result of the steel tariffs alone.

"Employment in the US auto industry will suffer from Trump's tariffs to a vastly greater degree than it could possibly benefit in the US steel industry," Steil and Della Rocca wrote.

Real-world implications from the tariffs have already been evident. According to an analysis by the Wall Street Journal, job growth in the top steel-producing metro areas is well below the pace for the broader US. In fact, four of the top 10 steel producing areas in the US actually saw declines in employment, compared to a 1.6% employment growth average for the nation as a whole, since the tariffs were originally announced in March.

Aside from the fact that the deal does little to nothing to help the US steel industry, here are some important points from the Brookings Institute:

Overall, the changes from the old NAFTA are mostly cosmetic. After a year and a half of negotiations, the three parties are going to end up with a new trade deal that looks remarkably similar to the old NAFTA. The main structure of the deal is largely intact; the biggest changes include higher rules-of-origin requirements for the auto sector, marginally greater U.S. access to the Canadian dairy market, and a scale-back of the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) rules. Thus we shouldn’t expect to see any dramatic economic effects from this deal—though if it convinces businesses’ that U.S. withdrawal from NAFTA is no longer on the table, resolving this uncertainty may lead to a small increase in investment.
...
While this might be a (modest) short-term victory for the U.S., it risks undermining America’s long-term interests. The fact that both Mexico (on autos) and Canada (on dairy) took some small steps to appease Trump’s demands should not be surprising—the U.S. is more important to their economies than vice versa. Does this imply Trump was right all along, that previous American trade negotiators had been foolishly taken advantage of? Hardly. Indeed, while the U.S. gained a few minor, discrete achievements in these talks, Trump’s approach in the renegotiations have likely undermined broader long-term American interests. As a global power, the U.S. has sought to exert influence by investing in “soft power,” the ability to convince other countries their own interests in fact align with those of the U.S. In seeking to squeeze a few more dimes out of Canada and Mexico, Trump is telling America’s allies that they should no longer be so inviting of American power. Since Trump’s election, a number of U.S. allies have already taken steps to balance against U.S. power, and diversify their interests away from America. The U.S. approach to NAFTA’s renegotiation should only accelerate this trend. In other words, the important question was never whether the U.S. could shake down its trade partners to extract some modest gains, but rather whether it should. Mexico and Canada won’t forget how the U.S. treated them—and will readjust their plans accordingly, as will other countries that observed these talks. In the long run, this will undermine America’s influence in the world.

All of which will no doubt be taken into account by both Republicans and Democrats when this goes to Congress some time in December (long after the midterms).

 

[Jarhyn]

Fair enough Jarhyn. It sounds like "fuck you, I got mine" to you. Would you rather the rust belt of this country be out of work or under employed? Would it help you if other US citizens are out of work or under employed?

Is it going to help you (assuming you are even a US citizen) for the US steel industry to tank or go under?

There's a lot more auto workers, appliance manufacturer workers, and other steel utilizing industry workers that could lose their jobs than steel workers. And when that happens, you too could very well be out on the street again.

Hence "fuck you, I got mine". Thing is, I don't expect any huge disruptions to where I work. I have little skin in this game. But I can see the trade off as easily as you.

As to the quoted bullshit about the rust belt, I would much rather we spend some money, build some schools, spend more money on those schools, and start building higher tech/research/engineering out in the rust belt, replacing uneducated work with skilled labor. Once you have eggheads doing really cool shit, you have an entire support structure for those people creating even more jobs.

Education is literally the panacea for all our industrial imbalances. We could even use that high educational focus to build out manufacturing again, and beat China on labor. Research all the things. Change the rust belt into the research belt.

 

[bilby]

Fair enough Jarhyn. It sounds like "fuck you, I got mine" to you. Would you rather the rust belt of this country be out of work or under employed? Would it help you if other US citizens are out of work or under employed?

Is it going to help you (assuming you are even a US citizen) for the US steel industry to tank or go under?

There's a lot more auto workers, appliance manufacturer workers, and other steel utilizing industry workers that could lose their jobs than steel workers. And when that happens, you too could very well be out on the street again.

Hence "fuck you, I got mine". Thing is, I don't expect any huge disruptions to where I work. I have little skin in this game. But I can see the trade off as easily as you.

As to the quoted bullshit about the rust belt, I would much rather we spend some money, build some schools, spend more money on those schools, and start building higher tech/research/engineering out in the rust belt, replacing uneducated work with skilled labor. Once you have eggheads doing really cool shit, you have an entire support structure for those people creating even more jobs.

Education is literally the panacea for all our industrial imbalances. We could even use that high educational focus to build out manufacturing again, and beat China on labor. Research all the things. Change the rust belt into the research belt.

You can't do that; The churches won't allow it. Education - real, deep, effective education in how logic and science work, rather than rote memorisation of the facts that are likely to appear in the exam questions - causes atheism, and tends to make students rebel against those aspects of the established authority that make no sense. Churches hate it when that happens. So do governments.

If you want to eliminate the rust belt, first you are going to need to eliminate the bible belt.