NAFTA
| The dismal "science" |
| Key concepts |
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$ Economics |
| More about economics |
| Notable economists |
Staunch opponents NAFTA assert that the only thing that the agreement provided for was improved exploitation by capital in the cheap labor markets. However, they generally use the term "exploitation" in a vague and ill-defined way, roughly equivalent to any type of employer-employee relationship in which the employee is paid a low salary by Western standards. However, the standard view among economists is that those investments did create somewhat better working opportunities at higher salaries than the alternative employment opportunities for Mexicans, as well as welfare-enhancing effects trough the availability of goods and other exchange-rate related effects to the whole economy.
Opponents also assert that NAFTA is the cause of the implosion of small farming in all three countries and the enhancement of big agribusiness.
Ross Perot famously predicted in the 1992 U.S. Presidential Election that the result of implementation of NAFTA would be a "sucking sound" of jobs migrating to Mexico, creating unemployment problems in the U.S., especially in the manufacturing labor market. However, most economists (including Paul Krugman) supported NAFTA and predicted that no such thing would happen. They pointed out instead that both proponents and opponents of the treaty were largely exaggerating its pros and cons. In the end, after 1994, the U.S. experienced a long period of low unemployment, until around 2008 when the recession (due to a different kind of deregulation) began. To some extent, those economists could be challenged on the grounds that real wages for the vast majority of workers in the United States began declining in the United States beginning with the early 2001 recession (only a few years after NAFTA took effect) and have continued to decline ever since. In addition, the recovery from that recession was the first jobless recovery in U.S. history, further bolstering that potential challenge.
[edit] Other interpretations
NAFTA is an acronym that means: "North American Cheap Labor Agreement"
The sad commentary is that now the dollars are freer to cross the borders than the people. Granted, this is partly due to the post-9/11 decision to require passports for travel between the three nations.
In the decades since the enactment of NAFTA, it's effects are still hotly debated. Joseph Stiglitz, one of the American drafters of the agreement, came out against it in 2004 and remains so. More than twenty years later, Brad DeLong, another of the American drafters remains steadfastly supportive. Organized labor continues to push for it's repeal, though in recent years the U.S, they've been more focused on making it easier for immigrants to enter the United States and easier for them to become naturalized. If successful, this would partly mitigate the problem of labor being less able to cross the border than capital.
[edit] Secrets revealed!
Conspiracy nuts worry about the construction of a NAFTA Superhighway as a product of the hypothetical North American Union. The highway will presumably be paid for in Ameros.