Portland, OR
The 1996 merchandise trade deficit of $165 billion, an all-time record, is further evidence that America's approach to international trade and investment is not working. Over the last dozen years, the trade deficit has totaled more than $1-+ trillion, and helped turn the United States from being the world's largest creditor nation to the world's largest debtor. During this period, a period of increasing trade liberalization, the nation has experienced falling wages, increased job insecurity, declining incomes for the majority of American families, increasing inequality and poverty, and a disastrous decline in jobs in the manufacturing sector.
International economic policies which simply promote open markets, unregulated capital mobility, export growth and the protection of private property are inadequate to address the complexities of the global economy. Workers not just corporations must be empowered, and government needs to reassert itself to insure that the benefits of increased trade and investment be widely distributed.
Congress will soon be considering proposals for new trade negotiating authority. The AFL-CIO believes that no grant of fast track trade negotiating authority should be returned for Congressional consideration that does not include provisions and enforcement mechanisms for addressing worker rights, labor standards and environmental protection. These provisions must be part of the core agreement and subject to the same dispute settlement procedures available to other covered issues. Simple expansion of NAFTA should be rejected. The interests of workers must no longer be shunted aside to inadequate side agreements.
Further, it is vital to reassert governmental control over international capital markets. The financial crisis in Mexico is a grim reminder of the folly of relying solely on the "market" as a means of achieving economic prosperity. Negotiating authority must address this issue directly.
The inadequacies of NAFTA as a model for economic integration are vividly illuminated by the proposed opening of border states to Mexican bus and truck traffic. This opening is being urged by transportation companies despite significant differences between U.S. and Mexican laws and regulations regarding employment standards, job and highway safety, inspection capabilities, and environmental quality. The AFL-CIO recommends that the Administration reconsider this ill-conceived proposal.
Addressing these problems and fulfilling these objectives is vital in order to create a global economy that is a source of stability and growth, not chaos and division. Without them, the AFL-CIO will vigorously oppose any grant of trade negotiation authority.