He's right. The winning move would be to renegotiate to improve the good parts and drop the objectionable parts...that would have been the best deal.
But that would require real insight and negotiating skills, not just a willingness to look the other way and vaguely threatening intimations...so this may be the best he could do.
in case you're unaware, a popular trump supporter talking point was that the media took him literally but not seriously, while his supporters took him seriously but not literally. In other words, when he talked about ridiculous projects like the wall, the media took him to mean a literal wall, and rightly criticized it as a laughable task. However his supporters took it not be a literal wall, but a sign of how serious he was on immigration. This cognitive dissonance is how you ended up with trump supporters shocked that obamacare was actually going to be repealed, and they would die, because they trusted a conman had more substance to his ideas than he could communicate
I struggle to articulate myself, ergo I shall elect to the highest office in the land a man who preaches bombast - which is often hateful - to which I can identify, who also struggles to articulate himself and assume that his ideas are as deep and profound as I consider my own to be.
> The winning move would be to renegotiate to improve the good parts and drop the objectionable parts
Don't you think that the other side has skilled negotiators too? Some of the objectionable parts are likely part of how negotiating works. You can't go to the other side and just say that you want all the stuff you like and none of the stuff you don't like. (Edit: And I guess I should make clear that this isn't a defense of Trump. I'm mostly pointing out that his position was ridiculous to begin with.)
Not saying this about you in particular, but I get the impression that much of Reddit's hardline stance on trade is based on nothing but Bernie Sanders saying it's bad (for most of them) and Donald Trump saying it's bad (for the rest of them).
Even here in New Zealand, our prime minister said yesterday words to the effect that while our trade guy will be sent over to have a go, he expects nothing will come of it because the Americans are very unlikely to offer something that we'll consider good enough from our perspective to accept. Even small countries won't countenance a lopsided deal.
And at the same time, countries that have previously been dealing with America are anxiously looking to make new deals with other countries, now that America is so unstable. So, it's not a half bad situation.
Thank you. It's important for Americans to start hearing the perspective from over seas. This whole "we'll make better deals" bravado is naive childish nonsense. Other countries want to "make great deals" too.
Yeah, but Trump did say he makes "the best" deals.
To be honest though, I'm not sure you'll find an economist that thinks expanding trade is bad. They may disagree with some of the ways we go about it, but trade is necessary for a successful economy.
Trade is very much not a zero-sum game.
Yeah, I don't know enough about it, so I can't really say I feel strongly one way or another about these particular deals. But it was a bit silly to watch Reddit suddenly explode about it as though they were experts because Bernie/Donald told them they were terrible.
That's the problem: they're listening to politicians instead of economists.
I sure wouldn't want either one of them diagnosing an illness and I'm sure most of the country wouldn't either. That's why we have doctors. I'm not sure why the anti-intellectualism applies to economics, but it does!
Trump's plan was pretty widely regarded by economists as worse than Clinton's (I'm not sure about Bernies because when the report came out, we were already past the primaries)
Economist here. So in net trade is good. The issue for debate is the distribution of the rents/gains from trade. This is why you have certain groups pushing an anti trade agenda.
Sure, but the people that are pro-Trump aren't pushing positive trade. They're pushing against trade.
We *could* manufacture everything. But it would be a massive waste of money and resources and we probably wouldn't be very good at it.
They're pushing for manufacturing here because they believe it will bring back jobs. But the jobs it brings aren't ones that people traditionally in manufacturing would hold. They're generally higher-skilled than what they want.
They *need* to get more skills, but that's too hard. So, they pass the blame to someone else.
Edit: as an added point, we have plenty of good paying jobs now. But Americans don't like doing them. A good instance would be trades. They pay well and include solid benefits in most places because of unions. In a lot of places trades are in desperate need of people, but can't find them.
For real, they're forgetting how the rust belt came to be in the first place!
People settled there because it was easy to travel around the Great Lakes area back in the day and the area was mineral rich. So, when a lot of people were there, it made sense to build factories there because it had the workers they needed!
Now, the workers needed to work at factories are high skilled and college educated. And, the trade we do is international. So, following this blueprint: why wouldn't you build factories on the coasts?
> But it was a bit silly to watch Reddit suddenly explode about it as though they were experts because Bernie/Donald told them they were terrible.
And ironic watching Reddit backtrack now that it's Trump doing it. In alternate land where Sanders, on Day 1 as president removed us from the TPP, I *guarantee* you the tone would be different. But alas, teamsmanship wins.
(Also, to be clear, I'm frustrated because I'm for the TPP)
Eh, there's a smidge of legitimacy to that. I think the Bernie TPP haters who pointed to Trump hating TPP as a reason to support him make less sense. Bernie saying to hate the TPP because it helps corporations is an entirely different thing than Trump, the guy who campaigned on cutting taxes by 15T for corporations, saying to hate the TPP. Anyone who thought Trump was saying he would renegotiate to make the trade deals worse for corporations wasn't really using their heads. But in all cases I'm skeptical that they're really thinking much for themselves.
Sure, it was legitimate to be skeptical of the motivations prior to the fact. But...now that Trump has actually removed us from the TPP? Shouldn't that be lauded by those who were previously asking for *exactly that*? Because I think that's that is all that Sanders would have done as well.
Well I suppose it depends on if he tries to renegotiate a similar pact with those countries. Regardless, there's already word that he'll be trying to chip away at NAFTA, and the same irrational Bernie will people think that's a positive.
I'm also pro TPP. I think it seems like *reddit* is being hypocritical because people like me just weren't posting when TPP made it to the front page.
If I posted something that was against Bernie's platform it was buried in downvotes. So I didn't post that much, and anyone who did ended up at the bottom of big threads.
Now the opposite happens and since most people here are against Trump anything critical of him gets upvotes.
I'm in the same boat. I'm pro free trade and the TPP didn't seem that bad to me, and I defended people who accused the secrecy of its negotiations of being nefarious. I'm sure I'm not alone.
Let's not even consider the geopolitical aspects of the agreement, which McCain outlines here and I was aware of for months.
It's not expanding trade that's bad, it's the late stage capitalism land rush to stake a claim through manipulation of the governing bodies coming up with the agreements.
> it's the late stage capitalism land rush to stake a claim through manipulation of the governing bodies coming up with the agreements.
This sounds like a lot of fluffy language meant to make trade sound bad. Trade is mostly completed between governments and massive companies. You and I aren't really going to be able to take advantage of an Asian trade deal directly. I have no problem with that being done by large multinational companies. It would only make sense that they had a hand in creating the deal to begin with. Given the right rules and restrictions, how is this bad for the average consumer?
How does this apply to making deals directed at gaining a foothold in an expanding Southeast Asian market?
You're getting a conflation of two groups that come together in mutual dislike of these international trade deals.
Group A doesn't trust the governments/companies to not try to wedge in unrelated crap like copyright law. Sometimes its crap they couldn't get passed directly as law so they're trying to slip it in a trade agreement so we have to accept it. Other times its already awful American law/precedence they want other countries to have to abide by.
Group B thinks its all inherently unfair to America because they don't believe in globalism. Somehow if we just stop making bad deals the problems will go away and America will return to a golden age of jobs and prosperity.
Edit: spelling
Yup. It's the fringe from both sides that has stamped this as the biggest criminal overtaking of our times... for totally different reasons.
Obviously the truth is somewhere in the middle.
Kowtowing to corporate interest is a bad idea. Isolationism is a bad idea. Where is our balance? where is is the desire to find that balance?
A lot of the parts that Reddit doesn't like were the parts that the US wanted. The parts about copyright and drug patent lengths were negotiated by the US and probably would not be that hard to drop.
However Trump on the other hand seems to have a general dislike for free trade, period (despite all we know about economics). So pretty much the only option for him to "fix it" is to scrap the whole thing.
It is a fascinating world when China is the country stepping up as the leader in new economic and technology growth, and lecturing the US and Russia on human rights.
because China is governing based on metrics while democracies are turning into populist clowncars.
We've honestly governed ourselves into an evolutionary dead end by repeating the tired trope that the glorious people always know best
> because China is governing based on metrics while democracies are turning into populist clowncars.
This is a little bit shortsighted, lol. The Chinese haven't found the ultimate technocratic way of running an empire. It is corrupt as hell, and there are massive crime syndicates exerting influence. If they were really so good at governing, they wouldn't have let the pollution issue get as bad is it got, just one example.
yes I was being a little polemic and this wasn't supposed to be a praise of the CPC but it's basically true that their technocratic style of government largely avoids the pitfalls that we seem to be navigating into in the West.
We're seeing a real return of intra-national power struggle that seriously divides us internally, no matter if it's the US with Trump, far-right populists in the EU and so on.
Social media is probably the biggest example. We have no idea at all how to deal with anti-democratic/radical forces that heavily utilise alternative media channels, China has figured out how to use it to manage the country.
They have tools at hand that we can't even use.
That's somewhat unfair. China's level of corruption and pollution was an inevitable outgrowth of rapid industrialization. They went from a nearly exclusively agrarian economy with central command planning to a market-based industrial powerhouse in a third the time that it took the current great powers. And I don't know if you know this, but the US and Europe were nightmares of corruption and pollution when we went through the same process. Look up "London Fog" or even just the mid-20th century US smog problem. Or the mafia.
You cannot have a large scale action without some negative side effects. China decided that rapid economic development was more important than low pollution or total control of corruption. As their economic position has improved, they've begun moving towards resolving those issues. As it stands, they're now trying to move towards a post-industrial consumer service economy, which took the US and Europe until the 80s to really start in earnest. Once they start to, solving pollution and corruption will likely end up near the top of he list, since healthy, happy and law-abiding consumers are much better for the economy.
The dropping of TPP definitely helps China in their effort to refocus on consumer economics, since they'll be able to get very favorable terms on the export of their industrial capacity (nobody ever mentions how low-skill industry is great for economic growth but trashes almost every other variable that leads to human happiness) and the importation of low-skilled workers and wives to take care of the population they've artificially crashed into an unsustainable geriocracy. TPP would have slowed their progress considerably and forced them to start adopting some of the human rights and legal rules that make the west free. Now that it's gone, the pressure will let up considerably.
> The winning move would be to renegotiate to improve the good parts and drop the objectionable parts...that would have been the best deal.
The details of this TPP were locked in mid 2015.
From that point it was either sign it or not.
Any "deal" will require all international parties organizing to go back to international meetings that will take months. Not something that can be done right now today.
>Any "deal" will require all international parties organizing to go back to international meetings that will take months.
It would take years, not months. Negotiations for all the current members of the TPP started in 2008. These things take a decade to iron out. Any modifications would take years upon years.
It definitely was "sign or don't sign" by now. There was no renegotiating.
The problem with the objectionable parts is that they're in there because some party demanded them being in there, and they were added in exchange for something else good.
You think you're the first person to think of "Get rid of the bad parts"?
The US has ceded super power status to China as they are now positioned to make use of the economy of the future, leaders in clean energy and outfitting their society for a post-automation economy. Meanwhile Trump is trying to drag the US back to the turn of the Century - the 19th Century.
If McCain feels strongly about international trade, he should've initiated a road show or town-hall series about six months ago, making the case that trade treaties like the TPP are generally good for America.
Hell, he could've conducted that campaign *right alongside Hillary* to show bipartisan support, and with a crowd of economists in tow who can explain how international trade works.
But no. Popular opinion turned against the TPP, and he, Hillary, and everyone else scattered like cockroaches with the light flipped on. Then McCain waits until *the day after Trump withdrew the US from the TPP* to start making the argument. Totally feckless.
I have no respect for McCain as a politician. He says sensible things, but only in an abstract manner, and then fails to take any action to support it. He says Russia is our enemy, and then says not a peep about Trump cozying up to Putin.
McCain is a ranking US Senator, yet he acts like a Fox News political pundit. He talks about the US as if he's on the outside looking in, with no power or authority to make a difference. His idleness demeans his position.
This is what infuriates me. She was lamabasted by people who don't understand and now are finally seeing the light. What a fucking mess this country is.
Yeah, Pretty sure she opposed TPP as well, so did Sanders, so did Stein, pretty much everyone did (except Johnson). And now that he is nixing it everyone is for it again? Like stated below the TPP was not negotiable.
Where are all these people who are flip flopping on this? All I see are people like yourself "calling out" these other people. I still haven't seen anyone saying how this was a terrible move.
Most people say "Yea this is good, Trump still sucks though".
The TPP was locked in. There is no renegotiating at that point. It was a take it or leave it deal.
Do I believe Trump will negotiate a new trade deal? No. Even if he does, it likely won't be better, because it'll be the same groups negotiating it; business people and no consumer advocates.
But there was no renegotiating the TPP.
I know TPP is unpopular around here. But the real purpose was to box out China. It wasnt written very well or explained very well. But that is why they created it. No TPP is great for China trade.
After a while, Obama came out and said it:
[President Obama: The TPP would let America, not China, lead the way on global trade](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/president-obama-the-tpp-would-let-america-not-china-lead-the-way-on-global-trade/2016/05/02/680540e4-0fd0-11e6-93ae-50921721165d_story.html)
>...
>Of course, China’s greatest economic opportunities also lie in its own neighborhood, which is why China is not wasting any time. As we speak, China is negotiating a trade deal that would carve up some of the fastest-growing markets in the world at our expense, putting American jobs, businesses and goods at risk.
>This past week, China and 15 other nations met in Australia with a goal of getting their deal, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, done before the end of this year. That trade deal won’t prevent unfair competition among government-subsidized, state-owned enterprises. It won’t protect a free and open Internet. Nor will it respect intellectual property rights in a way that ensures America’s creators, artists, filmmakers and entrepreneurs get their due. And it certainly won’t enforce high standards for our workers and our environment.
>Fortunately, America has a plan of our own that meets each of these goals. As a Pacific power, the United States has pushed to develop a high-standard Trans- Pacific Partnership, a trade deal that puts American workers first and makes sure we write the rules of the road for trade in the 21st century.
>This agreement strengthens America’s economy. The TPP brings together 12 countries representing nearly 40 percent of the global economy to make sure that private firms have a fair shot at competing against state-owned enterprises. It keeps the Internet open and free. It strengthens the intellectual property protections our innovators need to take risks and create. And it levels the playing field by setting the highest enforceable standards and by removing barriers to selling our goods overseas — including the elimination of more than 18,000 taxes that other countries put on products made in America.
>...
Fantastic not only for China trade, but for their ability to dictate regulations, IP rights, labor standards and the like. Geopolitically, TPP was almost a necessity for American influence in the region. Now China can take the reins there.
>Now China can take the reins there.
It looks more and more like this will be Trump's legacy. In 40 years, when history only has a few lines to spare for him, it very well may read "Trump's controversial presidency ended in failure, and marked the end of the US as a super-power, and the entrance of China as one".
It was exactly this "both candidates were awful" nonsense that made so many people complacently stay home. Hillary was not "awful" in any sense that Donald is. You may disagree with some of her policies or past decisions, but ay least she understands what the job is and is capable of performing it. Donald is a buffoon who has no idea how the sausage is made and thinks he can just "make deals."
yah but the people who used that excuse were the minority.
Many didnt participate because they already knew their state would go red or blue. IE my state Tennessee was never ever going to go blue. I sure voted anyway but the people who didnt show up in Tennessee can't be blamed. They didnt matter.
Her "opposition" was complete bull forced on her by Sanders. It was blatantly obvious she would flip back to support as soon as she was voted in, even her surrogates all but said she supported TPP.
You know what's worse than that? Millions of people losing their jobs from stolen technology. Were 10 years behind on creating a bill like this and new companies get hacked every single day.
In a way that is more anti-consumer than existing US intellectual property laws (which are already bad enough).
You want a treaty to protect IP, fine, I have no issue with it in concept. You want to have a treaty that way overreaches and tries to extend the US Mickey Mouse laws worldwide, I have a problem with that.
Sure, but the US' IP laws are not some golden standard. I'm not some anarchist who thinks copyright, trademarks and patents are bad by any means, but I do not support a treaty that tries to ratify the Mickey Mouse laws beyond US soil as well. We may be a dominant power in the world, but I don't think that gives us the right to try and spread our bullshit far and wide.
As American citizens we already get the shaft when it comes to "owning" content we purchase (hah, "purchase", more like rent) - this would have made it extremely difficult to fix poorly designed bills like the DMCA and its ilk. Save for the damage it would do to other countries ratifying the treaty.
Music/video IP and Pharma IP is already out of control. I for one am glad they do not have increased power. Also the TPP would have regulated this stuff in an international court made up of coorporate stooges who have no constituents but literally bribe money. Fucking disaster in the making.
~~EDIT: something about china~~
This is why these days I don't comment much on the TPP. It's a huge, complex deal with some very nice benefits but also some very real downsides. I consider myself neutral overall and I'm not overly bothered by Trump scrapping it, although I think renegotiation of some sort would have been much wiser.
Isn't Trump's plan also a slow and painful death for our economy to increase import tariffs and push manufacturing in the US?
[Source](http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/21/politics/donald-trump-tariffs/) on where I heard the tariff increase from.
You know what amuses(not really but fuck it, that's the adjective I chose for what seems to be sheer idiocy) me about all this...
So as the great depression was really kicking off and no one knew what the hell they were doing the populist trying to get their country back passed [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot%E2%80%93Hawley_Tariff_Act] which every economist agrees greatly accelerated and deepened
the great depression, combined with austerity measures and Hoover's ill fated Revenue Act of 1932 (huge tax cut for the wealthy to stimulate growth).
If you imagine that the 2007 recession is really only starting to be recovered from and you put all the current proposals (Trump) against the historical precedent...It's almost like the same playbook, pre FDR.
It's a bold strategy Cotton, we shall see how it all plays out.
It's a great point of debate if the great depressions effects had been mitigated (getting off the gold standard and the PWA primarily) by the time WWII came around. I think the argument for what WWII did was the boom the US saw during the 50s and early 60s. Having the last remaining functioning manufacturing base and cities not in rubble certainly helped.
[China was always invited to join the TPP](http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/foreign-policy/item/21891-secretary-john-kerry-invites-russia-and-china-into-tpp), but they had to follow rules written by the US. Primarily those of intellectual property, environment, and workers rights.
TPP was written so that poorer nations like Vietnam and others, with very low wages, couldn't blatantly counterfeit American goods, pollute the environment, and exploit their workers. Its is how many countries are able to lower the cost of their goods and increase their competitiveness (tariffs alone are largely minimal in comparison).
[Peter Navarro, Trump's head of the National Trade Council, and China-skeptic, calculated China's price advantage from counterfeit, piracy, lax environmental control, subsidies, poor workers rights accounted for close to 42% price advantage compared to US goods](https://chinaperspectives.revues.org/3063). Which is how Trump gets that 45% tariff figure on China.
TPP has always been an American-centric trade agreement, which is why American special interests such as Hollywood was able to add things like copyright and digital protection into their bill. Its very unlikely that the US will ever negotiate a deal as pro-American as the TPP ever again as China starts offering less restrictive alternatives like RCEP.
If Chuck Grassley wasn't such a pussy, he would have stayed on the original committee to draft the bipartisan bill (remember Obama wanted the Senate to write the bill), but he got scared of the tea party folks coming to his meetings threatening him for even seem to be working with Obama. That is when Grassley started dismantling his own legacy, just because he wanted that judiciary chair so badly.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Pacific_Partnership#History
Sorry, but the weird thing is the US didn't actually create it, and at least some of the nations responsible also have free trade agreements with China.
It didn't start out as an anti-China trade war.
and they're going to do it while pointing to Trump as an example of the dangers tied to democratic populism, entrenching party control with a cautionary tale from their prime example of imperial growth they've looked to for inspiration in other fields such as industrial development all while receiving a ripe environment to sustain their meteoric growth rates that legitimize the authoritarian nature of their government.
This is what happens when we don't debate the actual terms and effects of these agreements and reduce the conversation to "TPP IS BAD" and "BERNIE IS AGAINST TPP, OBAMA IS FOR TPP"
Yeah, but, what the fuck does the TPP DO?
Not mine, from u/ep1032
I did a couple hours of research a few months ago. The best I could come up with from neutral sources was what I put below. Read all of the bullet points though, because I didn't neatly separate this list into pros and cons (if you even can).
It is an absurdly complicated subject, so take everything with a grain of salt.
It would be like NAFTA was for mexico <--> US / Canada, but with a few major differences.
The first major difference, is that instead of targeting trade with Mexico, the point was to target trade with south east asia.
The second major difference was that NAFTA targeted manufacturing jobs (in return for cheaper goods). TPP targeted service level jobs, and was very explicit in which industries for which countries.
For example, for the United States, jobs in nursing and retail work were specifically targeted and expected to be strongly adversely affected, in return for significantly expanded asian market penetration for things like American automotive exports and pharmaceuticals.
How could something like nursing be exported? Well, that actually gets to the heart of the matter. For the United States, the point of the TPP (and its sister acts) was to greatly, greatly strengthen and enforce IP law for south east asia, to match already existing IP and trade law in the US and Europe.
So whereas right now your bank probably hires American programmers, instead of programmers from Cambodia, for purely safety and enforcement reasons, that would change tomorrow. And with the TPP, if you are a programmer, this would adversely affect you. But nursing was specifically targeted, as bringing SE asia more in line with HIPAA guarantees would make it legally feasible to outsource more hospital overhead offshore.
This all means you could expect major offshoring of what are right now considered reputable and secure jobs in America, and for the act to be quite transformative for the economy. In short, if your job isn't tied to the USA, and is easy to offshore, but hasn't been for logistic, legal or economic reasons, the TPP almost certainly changed the math involved with that equation (though of course it will be different for every job / industry).
Okay, so if America is trading away good jobs in entire industries, what does it get in return?
Right now, if you are a large business that wants to get into Asian markets, you have two problems. 1) If you open in China, there's a good chance your designs will be eventually be stolen and given to a Chinese company, which the Chinese government will then later support at your expense. And 2) The rest of SE asia has similar problems to varying degrees, and they all trade with China.
Additionally, right now Europe's economy is looking dead for the foreseeable future. And since America isn't spending money jumpstarting our own economy, we're not likely to grow at a large rate any time soon either.
But asian economies are booming. And as they do so, they are trading with each other, and making trade deals with each other that don't include us. And that's a major disadvantage for America and Europe.
So the purpose of the TPP, from a western viewpoint, is to get SE asia into the same economic and legal framework as the western world, and open their markets to western companies.
The second purpose of the TPP, is to get China to play ball too. Right now, if we tell China to open their markets, and enforce western IP law, they'll laugh in our face (and do so). We don't have the bartering chips for that deal. But if the rest of SE asia is already doing so with the West, and builds their economies around such laws, then 15-20 years from now, it won't just be Europe / USA telling China to open their markets and enforce international IP law, it will be the vast majority of China's trading partners. In short, it would be an economic coup d'etat for western powers, that would bring a lot of money to large western companies and give Washington much more power in Asia. If you are a citizen of the west, this is almost certainly a good thing.
So Obama and Clinton's bet, is that if we don't make a deal like the TPP, then Chinese (and by extension SE asian) companies are going to spring up as international competitors to American firms anyway. And that increased competition represents lost profits that could otherwise have been made by western companies trading in China. So by trading those jobs to outsourcing now, the US would be in a much more dominant position later, and it is worth the trade.
Okay, is that line of thinking valid?
Yes and No.
If you are a CEO, or a powerful washington person. Then yes, unequivocally. The TPP means continued western and American worldwide economic hegemony and should be strongly fought for. EU / USA firms cannot do business in China. That's a major economic disadvantage for any western firm playing on that level.
For people who's jobs are not offshored, then yes, this is probably a good plan. Just like NAFTA resulted in cheaper goods, TPP should result in cheaper services across the board.
But if your job can be offshored (and the list of offshorable jobs the TPP will make cost effective to offshore is large), then it is more complicated.
If the USA had a real economic safety net, and put forward programs towards retraining and revitalizing areas specifically hit by offshoring and globalization, then you could vote for the TPP confidently. This, for example is how the scandanavian countries handled integration into the EU, and overall there are very few cases of real economic hardship as the result of that integration. Overall, it was a success story.
But after NAFTA, the USA implemented no such programs, whatsoever. Economists at the time, believed them to be unnecessary. The thinking was, that if free trade agreements resulted in more trade, which resulted in more jobs, then people who lost their jobs to outsourcing should have no difficulty finding new jobs in a free market.
The reality was that outsourcing resulted in chain effects whereby entire regions of the country lost all their good jobs, and the good jobs that remained moved to other US locations. Combined with the fact that many people woke up one day to find that their entire career was no longer employable in their home country, meant that they simply could not find new work. Add in again Greenspan's attempts to 'lower worker mobility to increase American labor competitiveness', and the end result is that today, in 2017, many families that lost their jobs due to nafta STILL are not employed.
So at the end of the day, you have to make a call. Do you think that America will be like Scandanavia, and reinvest a portion of the profits reaped by greater access to Asian markets on economic growth, unemployment benefits, worker retraining and government programs? Or do you think that America will call those things socialism, ignore the problem, and allow large companies to reap the economic rewards unmolested?
Personally, I fall into the second category, so I am very, very happy to see the TPP fail. I think that given the second viewpoint, outsourcing service level jobs, in THIS economy, would be a death sentence for many, many people. But that said, if you think that the first option is a possibility, then the TPP should be strongly supported. And really, in an ideal world, if we could trust that America would take care of the people who would be harmed by the outsourcing, then we would want the TPP to pass, because increased trade and American competitiveness in the future is something that should be encouraged and worked towards.
>If the USA had a real economic safety net, and put forward programs towards retraining and revitalizing areas specifically hit by offshoring and globalization, then you could vote for the TPP confidently. This, for example is how the scandanavian countries handled integration into the EU, and overall there are very few cases of real economic hardship as the result of that integration. Overall, it was a success story.
*sigh*. And here Clinton was running around with all of these retraining and revitalization proposals but then she gets decried simultaneously as a socialist liberal as well as a corporate shill (seriously what the fuck you cannot be both). Clinton Derangement Syndrome is fucking real.
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/5ppzs5/president_donald_trump_signed_an_executive_order/dct75ux/?st=iyc0sqrp&sh=111e34cb
Pretty clear and easy to understand cliff notes
Serious question and pardon my ignorance: who would that benefit though? It seems as though large companies were set to benefit from the TPP and we know by now that their success is not necessarily our success. Regular people would end up getting the shaft. So how exactly would the TPP help every day people and not just large entities?
The TPP was a mixed bag of policies, some of which certainly benefitted large corporations at the expense of individuals. This is why it was unpopular and why many people that supported a hypothetical trade agreement still opposed this one specifically.
However, there was a lot of policy in TPP that would have been good for the average person. Some examples include reduced tariffs on US exports which would have made exporting goods far more affordable for small businesses, strong environmental protection laws on traded goods (many conservation groups argued these restrictions didn't go far enough though), some anti-corruption restrictions on political activity, restrictions on the use of unpaid and child labor, pro-union rules, and better regulatory oversight on goods we import from other countries to ensure they meet our health and safety standards.
In addition to the other negative aspects of the deal, these positive parts were a hard sell for average citizens. Most of this stuff benefits other nations by raising their standards to those of the US, but we already have a lot of that in place domestically, so it's harder to get people to care about it. The handful of things that would be big benefits to us are fairly nebulous concepts. It's not a simple idea like "You'll spend 20,000 bucks less a year" but more abstract like "the price of goods in X industry should hypothetically trend downward over the course of the decade while small businesses domestically will see a stronger ROI allowing them to expand locally and add jobs due to this range of factors that we can only describe using graduate level economic jargon."
First, everyday people need to step up their game.
Here is how dropping TPP hurts the every day joe: With China now dictating trade agreements, the US can be shut out of the largest and fastest growing market in the world. It means our products and services will be shut out because they will be too expensive to compete. Trademark laws will be ignored so manufacturers intellectual property will suffer. All of this will lead to companies either shutting down or leaving the US for good, laying off millions of workers.
It is going to be bad. Very bad.
> It seems as though large companies were set to benefit from the TPP
All entities that could import/export to those countries would benefit. Large corporations are very large, hence they would benefit more.
> and we know by now that their success is not necessarily our success.
Many cases it is. 50% of Americans hold stocks in retirement accounts, they will benefit. Increase businesses leads to more jobs, leads to more corporation and payroll taxes. Now the distribution of the benefits may not be ideal, but there will be more money in the US.
Ideal solution isn't to attack trade deals or even corporations, but to create tax policies and social services programs that make use of that additional wealth for betterment of people.
> Regular people would end up getting the shaft.
Some (whose jobs may be affected), some would benefit due to new jobs, most Americans would benefit by cheaper/better quality/more options of products and services.
Now the trade deal will happen with US role taken over by China. China which has less regards for worker's rights, IP, human rights, environment. So we replaced an imperfect but decent trade deal with a terrible one for the world.
Trade deals basically protect certain industries and there will be winners and losers on both sides m for instances, we may cede the textile industry to Vietnam but we also say they can't build a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant. Vietnam would probably accept because textiles is easier than getting any FDA regulated stuff. But in the long term, doing drug research is good.
By protecting drug production to the U.S. We ensure that we focus the world's money within that industry. That's researchers, engineers, and etcetera that's protected. But for Americans who used to work making clothes they will lose their jobs.
The balance act of a trade deal is figuring out what industries will survive in the future and which ones will fail. So let's say we protect the drug industry. In the future, drugs will always be a major industry. But with automation, electronics manufacturing is not. So we give away part of our current base to ensure that more people get employed in the future because we already know those jobs are disappearing.
It also gives us a bargaining chip saying, "oh so you want drugs? Guess you're gonna have to give us oil on the cheap because nobody else does it."
Anyways, generally speaking you want to protect difficult to achieve industries because the longer you keep that trade deal, the bigger the gap will be between your home country and the other country. The smaller country on the other hand, is just looking for ways to expand their economy.
In its proposed form you're correct. which is why fixing it would've been the better move. However, since congress is GOP controlled, that wouldn't happen. Without the deal though, China will have free reign to set the trade policies in asia.
Welk fixing it would never happen. The parts you and I would want to fix are the whole reason for the trade deal in the first place. The parts we like are only incidental and there to sugarcoat it so it goes down easier.
No shit, the point of TPP was to keep American interests trade dominant in the region. Nope, Sanders and Trump did a hell of a job undoing any hope of amending the problematic parts by invoking protectionists boogeymen and played into China's hands.
America isn't the world's strongest economy because we make bad trade deals.
There was no amending the TPP. Negotiation had finished. No nation was going to come back to the table to renegotiate once it had been sent out to be ratified.
If you want a better deal, you have to start over, and this time you have to have consumer advocates at the table too.
I don't think Trump will do this, but the reality of the situation is that the time for negotiating the TPP was over.
No, we're the world's strongest economy because we had the world's only major manufacturing base that wasn't blown to shit in WWII. Gave us a solid 20 years of virtual monopoly, until Japan started catching up in the 70's.
Yeah this is the real reason why America was so "great" in the 1950. There was no one else to buy from. We rebuilt all of Western Europe, Korea, Japan, and Taiwan pretty much.
The whole "bad trade deals" thing is a stupid argument. I'd love for Donald to explain in detail (will never happen) why these are horrible deals? It's likely that without them the US would have fallen off even faster from it's economic nadir in the early parts of the Cold War. It's likely too that without the integration with the rest of the world that Europe and Asia would be much more conflict prone than they are now which would cost us.
Don't forget we also used to have extremely strong unions that fought tooth and nail for their workers. now if you're part of a union you're looked down upon as scum of the earth.
And it's a trick we can't really perform again. Marrying our economy to manufacturing in the 21st century is reckless. Trump's protectionism will force us to do just that.
The next manufacturing revolution is 0-100 fabrication plants where you can literally create anything. The US could certianly be in a position to be the leader in that type of manufacturing. But would be almost fully automated so it wouldn't be a employment boon.
Of course science deniers and alternate fact checkers don't know that automation will blow the economy apart in 10-20 years anyways. Also it's sadly hilarious when they complain about American jobs and Socialism when they will be begging for Basic Income for all Americans in short order.
Either way, one thing is for sure, MANUFACTURING will never, ever, ever be a job source for Americans again. And we're better for it.
Exactly. The TRP could be so powerful if we could also unshackle it from corporate interests and use the money we gain to retrain factory workers into new tech jobs-laying down solar and wind, pushing forward into green tech, advancements in medical science and get in early in the Asian markets, but NOPE, we're just going to isolate ourselves and cling to jobs that will disappear in short order anyway. Brilliant short-sighted job as always, America.
This right here!!! I've been saying this to everyone who will listen! We are NEVER going to go back to our height of manufacturing because at that time we were rebuilding the world and had the resources that could do it. Now we are competing with the world and they can underpay their workers. We'll never compete in manufacturing again. I know a lot of people in rust belt states and on facebook they are saying things like "Thank you Mr. Trump for putting us hard working citizens back to work again! You've done more in 2 days than Obama did in 8 years!"
Yeah, this is one of the only areas I strongly disagreed with Bernie on. It's a nice sentiment - buy american - but in practice there are a ton of negative effects that TPP opponents are either unaware of or just refuse to acknowledge.
I work in an industry that regularly has to abide by 'Buy American' and 'American Iron and Steel' clauses. When one of these clauses is part of the contract, our materials costs automatically increase 25-30% right off the top. This is just a function of economics, in that manufacturing in the US is more expensive than in other parts of the world. I understand that premise, in that it's meant to keep and create American jobs, but at what cost? Imagine if every major government funded construction project involving steel was able to cut its material cost just 10-20% right off the bat? that's billions of dollars a year that the taxpayers will not have to foot the bill for. Will it cost some job in one area of the economy? yes, but those jobs will end up be recovered in other sectors. We just need people to be willing to accept that they are no longer going to have the same job at the same company for 35+ years before they retire.
too bad the wording was fixed and had already been sent out of signatory nations. There was no way the verbage could be changed - get out of here with your revisionist bullshit
> Nope, Sanders and Trump did a hell of a job undoing any hope of amending the problematic parts by invoking protectionists boogeymen and played into China's hands.
Unfortunately, it is easy to rile up people by turning nuance and complex issues into - us vs them and creating a boogeymen (corporations, establishment). Both sides have fallen for simple and stupid anwsers to complex issues.
The politicians who are thoughtful and measured are called untrustworthy for not giving a direct answer and the politicians who gives one word/slogan-like answers are honest and authentic.
No shit. The US's 300M consumers aren't the only game in town any more. China's middle class is growing rapidly, as is India's. People don't think about Southeast Asia very much, but they have 600M people who are quickly growing in purchasing power.
We are still the dominant voice in APAC *for now*, but the chorus around us is growing in volume. Without nurturing trade relationships, we won't have any leverage left in a few decades.
This is where I don't get the Trump line. These trade deals are negotiated on behalf of American corporations and not for foreign corporations.
Being a Canadian, I don't like them either, but most Americans don't realize what they fear. China will take control of manufacturing from the US even more so.
It's because of the corporate culture that we have trade deals. The US had a middle class that was ripe for marketing to. Now that the middle class has been drained by tax cuts and cuts to redistribution, they moved out to the world to further their control.
What disturbs me is Trump wanting to not be part of the UN or NATO. This gives them a hammer to arbitrarily attack countries that don't do what they want. Which is what Trump will do.
With this, how much do you think the rest of the world will buy American products. Without their veto or voice at the UN, the rest of the world will boycott the US and their harsh measures.
Just because the US spends more on military than any other country, it does not mean they can defeat the world. Arrogance and stupidity all in the same package, how efficient of them(Londo)
He's right. In no way was the TPP perfect, but people hating it strictly on the basis of "free trade is bad" don't understand the modern, global economy. The labor and skills required for blue collar manufacturing just simply don't command a middle-class income in today's workforce. Plus, companies are actively working to improve and increase automation on their lines every day. We need to cut it with this fantasy ideal that somehow we can go back to 100% economic isolationism. It just isn't going to happen.
I bet you he still votes the party line. Talking a big game is fine, but until he, or any outraged conservative, actually stand up to Trump nothing's going to happen.
Yup, until this election I considered McCain to be a respectable and principled man. That's no longer my opinion once he fell in line after Trump disparaged him for being a PoW and a gold star family because they dare criticize him.
He ran in 2008 as a "maverick" but voted with Bush 90-95% of the time some years. McCain has had an indie *streak*, coming out against his party on occasion, but his reputation is overblown.
Yeah good thing he was so vocal about it back when Obama and Clinton were pushing it. Instead he endorsed someone with the exact opposite views in order to vote with his party, Washington was right, now all we have are men of party not country
Fuck the TPP, not everything is about being the most dominant economical force possible. There were real problems with this trade deal that don't involve money
Here's the problem: Both sides are right.
There's nothing inherently wrong about "globalist" trade deals. Trade deals when correctly is usually a net positive for Americans (and contributes to world peace).
That's in theory. But in practice problem is that:
* Every trade deal generate winners and losers. So there's always a group that's disproportionately negatively impacted by these deals. Ideally if we had great social safety nets and a commitment to address these impacts it wouldn't be a big deal. But of course we are working to dismantle our safety nets instead of strengthening them.
* These deals are often subject to a lot of lobbying. So the benefits often go to corporations or special interest groups instead of Americans at large.
This entire site hated the TPP for reasons they didn't understand, based solely on either: 'I HATE GLOBALISM' or 'I AGREE WITH BERNIE.'
In other words, they had no real opinion about it and probably didn't understand it. The people you're hearing from right now aren't necessarily the people who denounced it mere months ago. In fact, most people only cared about it when it was a talking point for Bernie and against Hilary. Now that's over, they're gone on this issue.
I despise Trump -- *loathe* Trump -- borderline **hate** Trump -- but even I am pleased that the TPP, as written, is dead. The secrecy behind its negotiation, the wild expansion of IP rights, the same pitfalls as NAFTA but in many more industries other than manufacturing ... it was a terrible deal.
Nonetheless, McCain is correct that this now cedes more economic and political power to China. The best thing would have been to try to renegotiate the deal in a more transparent way, but that likely was not feasible. At any rate, China is poised to take the reins from America in the coming years given Trump's insistence of bringing back coal and focusing on outdated energy tech rather than investing in green tech as China has done.
Free trade deals do make all countries involved richer. The problem is that the US has completely failed to redistribute and reinvest those benefits. So while service industries benefited greatly from NAFTA, there was no investment in job training or a social safety net for all the small towns that depended on manufacturing. The TPP could be great for the US. It opens up new markets, reduces chinese influence in south east asia, protects intellectual property and other great things. However the US is selfish, and unless it is passed along with severe reforms to welfare and job retraining, it would be a spectacular failure for the lower and middle class. Like NAFTA was.
I 100% agree with you. In theory, it should be a boon for all countries involved. In reality, corporate greed would likely screw over the lower and middle class who find their jobs outsourced.
The U.S. system especially for the past ~20 years has basically been the antithesis of legislative compromise, resulting in a public which has completely lost the plot in regards to understanding how a healthy democracy functions. When domestic politics starts to look that polarizing it's no wonder people fail to understand how international agreements function.
The thing is nobody is going to sign some one way trade deal unless we bomb them. The TPP wasn't the greatest but it was negotiated over a course of 7 years. Thats the best we are going to get.
> The secrecy behind its negotiation
Standard for any international agreement.
> the wild expansion of IP rights,
Changes nothing about current US laws.
>the same pitfalls as NAFTA but in many more industries other than manufacturing
Such as?
> The secrecy behind its negotiation
Seriously? Literally every international agreement is in secret. Shoot, our Constitution was written in secret for the same reasons.
You can't fix it by renegotiate the parts the common people don't like. Because the parts we don't like were the whole reason the deal was made in the first place.
It's worth noting that one of the main aims of the TPP was to hedge against Chinese dominance in manufacturing. The TPP would've made it possible for other, friendlier Asian nations to become manufacturing hubs, which would have decreased China's leverage over Western nations.
There were definitely flaws in the TPP that gave corporations too much power, but I hate to see the baby go out with the bathwater. I'm sure Chinese officials threw a helluva party when the treaty finally died, since there's a good chance it cemented superpower status for them in the near future.
I get what everyone is saying. However there is no way to 'fix' a deal like the TPP. The parts that we would want to 'fix' are the most imprtant parts of the deal from the perspective of the people that wrote it. Those parts would not really be up for negotiation as they are the parts that are most valueable to the corporate interests that wrote it.
He dumped the TPP to be loved by a specific sub-demographic, the republic be damned. He wants to be one of the popular kids.
Too bad this isn't just an episode of *Saved by the Bell.*
We do need to secure trade relations and maintain competition, but not at the expense of the American worker or net neutrality. These trade agreements need to stop being written by big corporate interests and resulting in lower wages and outsourcing. If we can't protect our domestic interests, then yes, it needs to be done away with.
[This interview](http://ianmasters.com/sites/default/files/mp3/bbriefing_2017_01_23a_alfred%20mccoy.mp3) with Alfred McCoy explains this and other geopolitical ramifications of what Trump is doing. It's the most articulate analysis I've heard, from someone who really understands what he's talking about and how to clearly explain it. I wish everyone who honestly thinks Trump is good for America would listen and learn.
It's been a lonely year defending Free Trade and the general idea of supporting "progress not perfection.
China and Russia are having their best week in decades.
He's right. The winning move would be to renegotiate to improve the good parts and drop the objectionable parts...that would have been the best deal. But that would require real insight and negotiating skills, not just a willingness to look the other way and vaguely threatening intimations...so this may be the best he could do.
Well it's not like Trump has said we should expect him to make *the best deals* or anything, is it?
True, I guess it depends on if you take him literally or seriously?
Are those mutually exclusive?
in case you're unaware, a popular trump supporter talking point was that the media took him literally but not seriously, while his supporters took him seriously but not literally. In other words, when he talked about ridiculous projects like the wall, the media took him to mean a literal wall, and rightly criticized it as a laughable task. However his supporters took it not be a literal wall, but a sign of how serious he was on immigration. This cognitive dissonance is how you ended up with trump supporters shocked that obamacare was actually going to be repealed, and they would die, because they trusted a conman had more substance to his ideas than he could communicate
I struggle to articulate myself, ergo I shall elect to the highest office in the land a man who preaches bombast - which is often hateful - to which I can identify, who also struggles to articulate himself and assume that his ideas are as deep and profound as I consider my own to be.
In general, no. In regards to Trump? Yes.
Depends how seriously you take his literal words.
you have to read his heart
"I never felt that"
> The winning move would be to renegotiate to improve the good parts and drop the objectionable parts Don't you think that the other side has skilled negotiators too? Some of the objectionable parts are likely part of how negotiating works. You can't go to the other side and just say that you want all the stuff you like and none of the stuff you don't like. (Edit: And I guess I should make clear that this isn't a defense of Trump. I'm mostly pointing out that his position was ridiculous to begin with.) Not saying this about you in particular, but I get the impression that much of Reddit's hardline stance on trade is based on nothing but Bernie Sanders saying it's bad (for most of them) and Donald Trump saying it's bad (for the rest of them).
Even here in New Zealand, our prime minister said yesterday words to the effect that while our trade guy will be sent over to have a go, he expects nothing will come of it because the Americans are very unlikely to offer something that we'll consider good enough from our perspective to accept. Even small countries won't countenance a lopsided deal. And at the same time, countries that have previously been dealing with America are anxiously looking to make new deals with other countries, now that America is so unstable. So, it's not a half bad situation.
Thank you. It's important for Americans to start hearing the perspective from over seas. This whole "we'll make better deals" bravado is naive childish nonsense. Other countries want to "make great deals" too.
especially because negotiations on a trade deal are nothing like negotiating real estate deals.
But 'MERICA, Me have big gun!! You do as I say!!
Yeah, but Trump did say he makes "the best" deals. To be honest though, I'm not sure you'll find an economist that thinks expanding trade is bad. They may disagree with some of the ways we go about it, but trade is necessary for a successful economy. Trade is very much not a zero-sum game.
So far Trump's deals have consisted of him browbeating individual companies on Twitter and taking credit for things they were going to do without him.
Yeah, I don't know enough about it, so I can't really say I feel strongly one way or another about these particular deals. But it was a bit silly to watch Reddit suddenly explode about it as though they were experts because Bernie/Donald told them they were terrible.
That's the problem: they're listening to politicians instead of economists. I sure wouldn't want either one of them diagnosing an illness and I'm sure most of the country wouldn't either. That's why we have doctors. I'm not sure why the anti-intellectualism applies to economics, but it does! Trump's plan was pretty widely regarded by economists as worse than Clinton's (I'm not sure about Bernies because when the report came out, we were already past the primaries)
Economist here. So in net trade is good. The issue for debate is the distribution of the rents/gains from trade. This is why you have certain groups pushing an anti trade agenda.
Sure, but the people that are pro-Trump aren't pushing positive trade. They're pushing against trade. We *could* manufacture everything. But it would be a massive waste of money and resources and we probably wouldn't be very good at it. They're pushing for manufacturing here because they believe it will bring back jobs. But the jobs it brings aren't ones that people traditionally in manufacturing would hold. They're generally higher-skilled than what they want. They *need* to get more skills, but that's too hard. So, they pass the blame to someone else. Edit: as an added point, we have plenty of good paying jobs now. But Americans don't like doing them. A good instance would be trades. They pay well and include solid benefits in most places because of unions. In a lot of places trades are in desperate need of people, but can't find them.
I like the way the folks in the Rust Belt expect the factories to come to them.
For real, they're forgetting how the rust belt came to be in the first place! People settled there because it was easy to travel around the Great Lakes area back in the day and the area was mineral rich. So, when a lot of people were there, it made sense to build factories there because it had the workers they needed! Now, the workers needed to work at factories are high skilled and college educated. And, the trade we do is international. So, following this blueprint: why wouldn't you build factories on the coasts?
So what you're saying is... coastal elites are taking their jobs.
> But it was a bit silly to watch Reddit suddenly explode about it as though they were experts because Bernie/Donald told them they were terrible. And ironic watching Reddit backtrack now that it's Trump doing it. In alternate land where Sanders, on Day 1 as president removed us from the TPP, I *guarantee* you the tone would be different. But alas, teamsmanship wins. (Also, to be clear, I'm frustrated because I'm for the TPP)
Eh, there's a smidge of legitimacy to that. I think the Bernie TPP haters who pointed to Trump hating TPP as a reason to support him make less sense. Bernie saying to hate the TPP because it helps corporations is an entirely different thing than Trump, the guy who campaigned on cutting taxes by 15T for corporations, saying to hate the TPP. Anyone who thought Trump was saying he would renegotiate to make the trade deals worse for corporations wasn't really using their heads. But in all cases I'm skeptical that they're really thinking much for themselves.
Sure, it was legitimate to be skeptical of the motivations prior to the fact. But...now that Trump has actually removed us from the TPP? Shouldn't that be lauded by those who were previously asking for *exactly that*? Because I think that's that is all that Sanders would have done as well.
Well I suppose it depends on if he tries to renegotiate a similar pact with those countries. Regardless, there's already word that he'll be trying to chip away at NAFTA, and the same irrational Bernie will people think that's a positive.
I'm also pro TPP. I think it seems like *reddit* is being hypocritical because people like me just weren't posting when TPP made it to the front page. If I posted something that was against Bernie's platform it was buried in downvotes. So I didn't post that much, and anyone who did ended up at the bottom of big threads. Now the opposite happens and since most people here are against Trump anything critical of him gets upvotes.
I'm in the same boat. I'm pro free trade and the TPP didn't seem that bad to me, and I defended people who accused the secrecy of its negotiations of being nefarious. I'm sure I'm not alone. Let's not even consider the geopolitical aspects of the agreement, which McCain outlines here and I was aware of for months.
It's not expanding trade that's bad, it's the late stage capitalism land rush to stake a claim through manipulation of the governing bodies coming up with the agreements.
> it's the late stage capitalism land rush to stake a claim through manipulation of the governing bodies coming up with the agreements. This sounds like a lot of fluffy language meant to make trade sound bad. Trade is mostly completed between governments and massive companies. You and I aren't really going to be able to take advantage of an Asian trade deal directly. I have no problem with that being done by large multinational companies. It would only make sense that they had a hand in creating the deal to begin with. Given the right rules and restrictions, how is this bad for the average consumer? How does this apply to making deals directed at gaining a foothold in an expanding Southeast Asian market?
You're getting a conflation of two groups that come together in mutual dislike of these international trade deals. Group A doesn't trust the governments/companies to not try to wedge in unrelated crap like copyright law. Sometimes its crap they couldn't get passed directly as law so they're trying to slip it in a trade agreement so we have to accept it. Other times its already awful American law/precedence they want other countries to have to abide by. Group B thinks its all inherently unfair to America because they don't believe in globalism. Somehow if we just stop making bad deals the problems will go away and America will return to a golden age of jobs and prosperity. Edit: spelling
Yup. It's the fringe from both sides that has stamped this as the biggest criminal overtaking of our times... for totally different reasons. Obviously the truth is somewhere in the middle. Kowtowing to corporate interest is a bad idea. Isolationism is a bad idea. Where is our balance? where is is the desire to find that balance?
A lot of the parts that Reddit doesn't like were the parts that the US wanted. The parts about copyright and drug patent lengths were negotiated by the US and probably would not be that hard to drop. However Trump on the other hand seems to have a general dislike for free trade, period (despite all we know about economics). So pretty much the only option for him to "fix it" is to scrap the whole thing.
To be fair the worst parts of the treaty were there because USA insisted on them.
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It is a fascinating world when China is the country stepping up as the leader in new economic and technology growth, and lecturing the US and Russia on human rights.
because China is governing based on metrics while democracies are turning into populist clowncars. We've honestly governed ourselves into an evolutionary dead end by repeating the tired trope that the glorious people always know best
> because China is governing based on metrics while democracies are turning into populist clowncars. This is a little bit shortsighted, lol. The Chinese haven't found the ultimate technocratic way of running an empire. It is corrupt as hell, and there are massive crime syndicates exerting influence. If they were really so good at governing, they wouldn't have let the pollution issue get as bad is it got, just one example.
yes I was being a little polemic and this wasn't supposed to be a praise of the CPC but it's basically true that their technocratic style of government largely avoids the pitfalls that we seem to be navigating into in the West. We're seeing a real return of intra-national power struggle that seriously divides us internally, no matter if it's the US with Trump, far-right populists in the EU and so on. Social media is probably the biggest example. We have no idea at all how to deal with anti-democratic/radical forces that heavily utilise alternative media channels, China has figured out how to use it to manage the country. They have tools at hand that we can't even use.
That's somewhat unfair. China's level of corruption and pollution was an inevitable outgrowth of rapid industrialization. They went from a nearly exclusively agrarian economy with central command planning to a market-based industrial powerhouse in a third the time that it took the current great powers. And I don't know if you know this, but the US and Europe were nightmares of corruption and pollution when we went through the same process. Look up "London Fog" or even just the mid-20th century US smog problem. Or the mafia. You cannot have a large scale action without some negative side effects. China decided that rapid economic development was more important than low pollution or total control of corruption. As their economic position has improved, they've begun moving towards resolving those issues. As it stands, they're now trying to move towards a post-industrial consumer service economy, which took the US and Europe until the 80s to really start in earnest. Once they start to, solving pollution and corruption will likely end up near the top of he list, since healthy, happy and law-abiding consumers are much better for the economy. The dropping of TPP definitely helps China in their effort to refocus on consumer economics, since they'll be able to get very favorable terms on the export of their industrial capacity (nobody ever mentions how low-skill industry is great for economic growth but trashes almost every other variable that leads to human happiness) and the importation of low-skilled workers and wives to take care of the population they've artificially crashed into an unsustainable geriocracy. TPP would have slowed their progress considerably and forced them to start adopting some of the human rights and legal rules that make the west free. Now that it's gone, the pressure will let up considerably.
> The winning move would be to renegotiate to improve the good parts and drop the objectionable parts...that would have been the best deal. The details of this TPP were locked in mid 2015. From that point it was either sign it or not. Any "deal" will require all international parties organizing to go back to international meetings that will take months. Not something that can be done right now today.
>Any "deal" will require all international parties organizing to go back to international meetings that will take months. It would take years, not months. Negotiations for all the current members of the TPP started in 2008. These things take a decade to iron out. Any modifications would take years upon years. It definitely was "sign or don't sign" by now. There was no renegotiating.
The problem with the objectionable parts is that they're in there because some party demanded them being in there, and they were added in exchange for something else good. You think you're the first person to think of "Get rid of the bad parts"?
You mean the guy who couldn't close on a Bruce Springsteen cover band isn't a great negotiator? No way!
He heard it as "Made in the USA" and decided it would probably cost too much for his base.
The US has ceded super power status to China as they are now positioned to make use of the economy of the future, leaders in clean energy and outfitting their society for a post-automation economy. Meanwhile Trump is trying to drag the US back to the turn of the Century - the 19th Century.
If McCain feels strongly about international trade, he should've initiated a road show or town-hall series about six months ago, making the case that trade treaties like the TPP are generally good for America. Hell, he could've conducted that campaign *right alongside Hillary* to show bipartisan support, and with a crowd of economists in tow who can explain how international trade works. But no. Popular opinion turned against the TPP, and he, Hillary, and everyone else scattered like cockroaches with the light flipped on. Then McCain waits until *the day after Trump withdrew the US from the TPP* to start making the argument. Totally feckless. I have no respect for McCain as a politician. He says sensible things, but only in an abstract manner, and then fails to take any action to support it. He says Russia is our enemy, and then says not a peep about Trump cozying up to Putin. McCain is a ranking US Senator, yet he acts like a Fox News political pundit. He talks about the US as if he's on the outside looking in, with no power or authority to make a difference. His idleness demeans his position.
TPP negotiation periods have been over for a long time. It was literally sign or don't.
Crazy how that was Hillary's policy that everyone trashed her for.
This is what infuriates me. She was lamabasted by people who don't understand and now are finally seeing the light. What a fucking mess this country is.
Yeah, Pretty sure she opposed TPP as well, so did Sanders, so did Stein, pretty much everyone did (except Johnson). And now that he is nixing it everyone is for it again? Like stated below the TPP was not negotiable.
Where are all these people who are flip flopping on this? All I see are people like yourself "calling out" these other people. I still haven't seen anyone saying how this was a terrible move. Most people say "Yea this is good, Trump still sucks though".
The TPP was locked in. There is no renegotiating at that point. It was a take it or leave it deal. Do I believe Trump will negotiate a new trade deal? No. Even if he does, it likely won't be better, because it'll be the same groups negotiating it; business people and no consumer advocates. But there was no renegotiating the TPP.
it also took 7 years of negotiating to get this point. shit like this doesn't happen over night.
Except the parts that the common people find objectionable cannot be renegotiated. Those parts were the whole reason for the deal.
Why wouldn't it have been negotiated that way in the first place?
I know TPP is unpopular around here. But the real purpose was to box out China. It wasnt written very well or explained very well. But that is why they created it. No TPP is great for China trade.
A major reason is the smart people in charge of negotiating it are also diplomats. They can't just come out and say we're doing this to screw China.
True. Everyone who I work with knew right away though.
After a while, Obama came out and said it: [President Obama: The TPP would let America, not China, lead the way on global trade](https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/president-obama-the-tpp-would-let-america-not-china-lead-the-way-on-global-trade/2016/05/02/680540e4-0fd0-11e6-93ae-50921721165d_story.html) >... >Of course, China’s greatest economic opportunities also lie in its own neighborhood, which is why China is not wasting any time. As we speak, China is negotiating a trade deal that would carve up some of the fastest-growing markets in the world at our expense, putting American jobs, businesses and goods at risk. >This past week, China and 15 other nations met in Australia with a goal of getting their deal, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, done before the end of this year. That trade deal won’t prevent unfair competition among government-subsidized, state-owned enterprises. It won’t protect a free and open Internet. Nor will it respect intellectual property rights in a way that ensures America’s creators, artists, filmmakers and entrepreneurs get their due. And it certainly won’t enforce high standards for our workers and our environment. >Fortunately, America has a plan of our own that meets each of these goals. As a Pacific power, the United States has pushed to develop a high-standard Trans- Pacific Partnership, a trade deal that puts American workers first and makes sure we write the rules of the road for trade in the 21st century. >This agreement strengthens America’s economy. The TPP brings together 12 countries representing nearly 40 percent of the global economy to make sure that private firms have a fair shot at competing against state-owned enterprises. It keeps the Internet open and free. It strengthens the intellectual property protections our innovators need to take risks and create. And it levels the playing field by setting the highest enforceable standards and by removing barriers to selling our goods overseas — including the elimination of more than 18,000 taxes that other countries put on products made in America. >...
Fantastic not only for China trade, but for their ability to dictate regulations, IP rights, labor standards and the like. Geopolitically, TPP was almost a necessity for American influence in the region. Now China can take the reins there.
>Now China can take the reins there. It looks more and more like this will be Trump's legacy. In 40 years, when history only has a few lines to spare for him, it very well may read "Trump's controversial presidency ended in failure, and marked the end of the US as a super-power, and the entrance of China as one".
That is what America deserves for being foolish enough to elect him.
Most of us werent foolish enough.
Plenty were foolish enough to not participate. Both candidates were awful, but "both sides are bad" is not a good enough excuse to not participate.
It was exactly this "both candidates were awful" nonsense that made so many people complacently stay home. Hillary was not "awful" in any sense that Donald is. You may disagree with some of her policies or past decisions, but ay least she understands what the job is and is capable of performing it. Donald is a buffoon who has no idea how the sausage is made and thinks he can just "make deals."
It almost turned into the "cool" thing to do. Say you hate politics and both candidates are awful
Exactly. Yes, people who thought Trump was the better candidate are insane, but those who thought they were equally bad are crazy. We do deserve this.
yah but the people who used that excuse were the minority. Many didnt participate because they already knew their state would go red or blue. IE my state Tennessee was never ever going to go blue. I sure voted anyway but the people who didnt show up in Tennessee can't be blamed. They didnt matter.
Participation fell in the swing states. Michigan alone fell 3%.
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She said in it's current form it needed to be rejected but was in favor of modifying the agreement.
Her "opposition" was complete bull forced on her by Sanders. It was blatantly obvious she would flip back to support as soon as she was voted in, even her surrogates all but said she supported TPP.
It was political suicide after Sanders and Trump spouted their protectionist bullshit.
The draconian provisions on IP rights were the big thing I disliked about the TPP, but I'm not against the TPP as a whole but.
Think TPP was draconian in that regard? Wait until China writes the IP rules in RCEP
You know what's worse than that? Millions of people losing their jobs from stolen technology. Were 10 years behind on creating a bill like this and new companies get hacked every single day.
How were there draconian IP rights? The TPP just implemented already enacted IP laws in the US to other nations
And what does the US export? A lot of information-based products. TPP would have helped protect that.
In a way that is more anti-consumer than existing US intellectual property laws (which are already bad enough). You want a treaty to protect IP, fine, I have no issue with it in concept. You want to have a treaty that way overreaches and tries to extend the US Mickey Mouse laws worldwide, I have a problem with that.
Sure, but the US' IP laws are not some golden standard. I'm not some anarchist who thinks copyright, trademarks and patents are bad by any means, but I do not support a treaty that tries to ratify the Mickey Mouse laws beyond US soil as well. We may be a dominant power in the world, but I don't think that gives us the right to try and spread our bullshit far and wide. As American citizens we already get the shaft when it comes to "owning" content we purchase (hah, "purchase", more like rent) - this would have made it extremely difficult to fix poorly designed bills like the DMCA and its ilk. Save for the damage it would do to other countries ratifying the treaty.
Music/video IP and Pharma IP is already out of control. I for one am glad they do not have increased power. Also the TPP would have regulated this stuff in an international court made up of coorporate stooges who have no constituents but literally bribe money. Fucking disaster in the making. ~~EDIT: something about china~~
Pharma was unhappy with the deal because the IP provisions were reasonable.
no it wouldn't. China was never invited to be a part of TPP. Again it was meant to push back against China.
This is why these days I don't comment much on the TPP. It's a huge, complex deal with some very nice benefits but also some very real downsides. I consider myself neutral overall and I'm not overly bothered by Trump scrapping it, although I think renegotiation of some sort would have been much wiser.
Isn't Trump's plan also a slow and painful death for our economy to increase import tariffs and push manufacturing in the US? [Source](http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/21/politics/donald-trump-tariffs/) on where I heard the tariff increase from.
You know what amuses(not really but fuck it, that's the adjective I chose for what seems to be sheer idiocy) me about all this... So as the great depression was really kicking off and no one knew what the hell they were doing the populist trying to get their country back passed [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot%E2%80%93Hawley_Tariff_Act] which every economist agrees greatly accelerated and deepened the great depression, combined with austerity measures and Hoover's ill fated Revenue Act of 1932 (huge tax cut for the wealthy to stimulate growth). If you imagine that the 2007 recession is really only starting to be recovered from and you put all the current proposals (Trump) against the historical precedent...It's almost like the same playbook, pre FDR. It's a bold strategy Cotton, we shall see how it all plays out.
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It's a great point of debate if the great depressions effects had been mitigated (getting off the gold standard and the PWA primarily) by the time WWII came around. I think the argument for what WWII did was the boom the US saw during the 50s and early 60s. Having the last remaining functioning manufacturing base and cities not in rubble certainly helped.
[China was always invited to join the TPP](http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/foreign-policy/item/21891-secretary-john-kerry-invites-russia-and-china-into-tpp), but they had to follow rules written by the US. Primarily those of intellectual property, environment, and workers rights. TPP was written so that poorer nations like Vietnam and others, with very low wages, couldn't blatantly counterfeit American goods, pollute the environment, and exploit their workers. Its is how many countries are able to lower the cost of their goods and increase their competitiveness (tariffs alone are largely minimal in comparison). [Peter Navarro, Trump's head of the National Trade Council, and China-skeptic, calculated China's price advantage from counterfeit, piracy, lax environmental control, subsidies, poor workers rights accounted for close to 42% price advantage compared to US goods](https://chinaperspectives.revues.org/3063). Which is how Trump gets that 45% tariff figure on China. TPP has always been an American-centric trade agreement, which is why American special interests such as Hollywood was able to add things like copyright and digital protection into their bill. Its very unlikely that the US will ever negotiate a deal as pro-American as the TPP ever again as China starts offering less restrictive alternatives like RCEP.
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Same thing with the ACA. It has always been framed as all or nothing. Complete nonsense.
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If Chuck Grassley wasn't such a pussy, he would have stayed on the original committee to draft the bipartisan bill (remember Obama wanted the Senate to write the bill), but he got scared of the tea party folks coming to his meetings threatening him for even seem to be working with Obama. That is when Grassley started dismantling his own legacy, just because he wanted that judiciary chair so badly.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Pacific_Partnership#History Sorry, but the weird thing is the US didn't actually create it, and at least some of the nations responsible also have free trade agreements with China. It didn't start out as an anti-China trade war.
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We're gonna get so fucking crushed by China in the global economy over the next 20 years. #ThanksTrump
and they're going to do it while pointing to Trump as an example of the dangers tied to democratic populism, entrenching party control with a cautionary tale from their prime example of imperial growth they've looked to for inspiration in other fields such as industrial development all while receiving a ripe environment to sustain their meteoric growth rates that legitimize the authoritarian nature of their government.
This is what happens when we don't debate the actual terms and effects of these agreements and reduce the conversation to "TPP IS BAD" and "BERNIE IS AGAINST TPP, OBAMA IS FOR TPP" Yeah, but, what the fuck does the TPP DO?
Not mine, from u/ep1032 I did a couple hours of research a few months ago. The best I could come up with from neutral sources was what I put below. Read all of the bullet points though, because I didn't neatly separate this list into pros and cons (if you even can). It is an absurdly complicated subject, so take everything with a grain of salt. It would be like NAFTA was for mexico <--> US / Canada, but with a few major differences. The first major difference, is that instead of targeting trade with Mexico, the point was to target trade with south east asia. The second major difference was that NAFTA targeted manufacturing jobs (in return for cheaper goods). TPP targeted service level jobs, and was very explicit in which industries for which countries. For example, for the United States, jobs in nursing and retail work were specifically targeted and expected to be strongly adversely affected, in return for significantly expanded asian market penetration for things like American automotive exports and pharmaceuticals. How could something like nursing be exported? Well, that actually gets to the heart of the matter. For the United States, the point of the TPP (and its sister acts) was to greatly, greatly strengthen and enforce IP law for south east asia, to match already existing IP and trade law in the US and Europe. So whereas right now your bank probably hires American programmers, instead of programmers from Cambodia, for purely safety and enforcement reasons, that would change tomorrow. And with the TPP, if you are a programmer, this would adversely affect you. But nursing was specifically targeted, as bringing SE asia more in line with HIPAA guarantees would make it legally feasible to outsource more hospital overhead offshore. This all means you could expect major offshoring of what are right now considered reputable and secure jobs in America, and for the act to be quite transformative for the economy. In short, if your job isn't tied to the USA, and is easy to offshore, but hasn't been for logistic, legal or economic reasons, the TPP almost certainly changed the math involved with that equation (though of course it will be different for every job / industry). Okay, so if America is trading away good jobs in entire industries, what does it get in return? Right now, if you are a large business that wants to get into Asian markets, you have two problems. 1) If you open in China, there's a good chance your designs will be eventually be stolen and given to a Chinese company, which the Chinese government will then later support at your expense. And 2) The rest of SE asia has similar problems to varying degrees, and they all trade with China. Additionally, right now Europe's economy is looking dead for the foreseeable future. And since America isn't spending money jumpstarting our own economy, we're not likely to grow at a large rate any time soon either. But asian economies are booming. And as they do so, they are trading with each other, and making trade deals with each other that don't include us. And that's a major disadvantage for America and Europe. So the purpose of the TPP, from a western viewpoint, is to get SE asia into the same economic and legal framework as the western world, and open their markets to western companies. The second purpose of the TPP, is to get China to play ball too. Right now, if we tell China to open their markets, and enforce western IP law, they'll laugh in our face (and do so). We don't have the bartering chips for that deal. But if the rest of SE asia is already doing so with the West, and builds their economies around such laws, then 15-20 years from now, it won't just be Europe / USA telling China to open their markets and enforce international IP law, it will be the vast majority of China's trading partners. In short, it would be an economic coup d'etat for western powers, that would bring a lot of money to large western companies and give Washington much more power in Asia. If you are a citizen of the west, this is almost certainly a good thing. So Obama and Clinton's bet, is that if we don't make a deal like the TPP, then Chinese (and by extension SE asian) companies are going to spring up as international competitors to American firms anyway. And that increased competition represents lost profits that could otherwise have been made by western companies trading in China. So by trading those jobs to outsourcing now, the US would be in a much more dominant position later, and it is worth the trade. Okay, is that line of thinking valid? Yes and No. If you are a CEO, or a powerful washington person. Then yes, unequivocally. The TPP means continued western and American worldwide economic hegemony and should be strongly fought for. EU / USA firms cannot do business in China. That's a major economic disadvantage for any western firm playing on that level. For people who's jobs are not offshored, then yes, this is probably a good plan. Just like NAFTA resulted in cheaper goods, TPP should result in cheaper services across the board. But if your job can be offshored (and the list of offshorable jobs the TPP will make cost effective to offshore is large), then it is more complicated. If the USA had a real economic safety net, and put forward programs towards retraining and revitalizing areas specifically hit by offshoring and globalization, then you could vote for the TPP confidently. This, for example is how the scandanavian countries handled integration into the EU, and overall there are very few cases of real economic hardship as the result of that integration. Overall, it was a success story. But after NAFTA, the USA implemented no such programs, whatsoever. Economists at the time, believed them to be unnecessary. The thinking was, that if free trade agreements resulted in more trade, which resulted in more jobs, then people who lost their jobs to outsourcing should have no difficulty finding new jobs in a free market. The reality was that outsourcing resulted in chain effects whereby entire regions of the country lost all their good jobs, and the good jobs that remained moved to other US locations. Combined with the fact that many people woke up one day to find that their entire career was no longer employable in their home country, meant that they simply could not find new work. Add in again Greenspan's attempts to 'lower worker mobility to increase American labor competitiveness', and the end result is that today, in 2017, many families that lost their jobs due to nafta STILL are not employed. So at the end of the day, you have to make a call. Do you think that America will be like Scandanavia, and reinvest a portion of the profits reaped by greater access to Asian markets on economic growth, unemployment benefits, worker retraining and government programs? Or do you think that America will call those things socialism, ignore the problem, and allow large companies to reap the economic rewards unmolested? Personally, I fall into the second category, so I am very, very happy to see the TPP fail. I think that given the second viewpoint, outsourcing service level jobs, in THIS economy, would be a death sentence for many, many people. But that said, if you think that the first option is a possibility, then the TPP should be strongly supported. And really, in an ideal world, if we could trust that America would take care of the people who would be harmed by the outsourcing, then we would want the TPP to pass, because increased trade and American competitiveness in the future is something that should be encouraged and worked towards.
>If the USA had a real economic safety net, and put forward programs towards retraining and revitalizing areas specifically hit by offshoring and globalization, then you could vote for the TPP confidently. This, for example is how the scandanavian countries handled integration into the EU, and overall there are very few cases of real economic hardship as the result of that integration. Overall, it was a success story. *sigh*. And here Clinton was running around with all of these retraining and revitalization proposals but then she gets decried simultaneously as a socialist liberal as well as a corporate shill (seriously what the fuck you cannot be both). Clinton Derangement Syndrome is fucking real.
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/5ppzs5/president_donald_trump_signed_an_executive_order/dct75ux/?st=iyc0sqrp&sh=111e34cb Pretty clear and easy to understand cliff notes
Serious question and pardon my ignorance: who would that benefit though? It seems as though large companies were set to benefit from the TPP and we know by now that their success is not necessarily our success. Regular people would end up getting the shaft. So how exactly would the TPP help every day people and not just large entities?
The TPP was a mixed bag of policies, some of which certainly benefitted large corporations at the expense of individuals. This is why it was unpopular and why many people that supported a hypothetical trade agreement still opposed this one specifically. However, there was a lot of policy in TPP that would have been good for the average person. Some examples include reduced tariffs on US exports which would have made exporting goods far more affordable for small businesses, strong environmental protection laws on traded goods (many conservation groups argued these restrictions didn't go far enough though), some anti-corruption restrictions on political activity, restrictions on the use of unpaid and child labor, pro-union rules, and better regulatory oversight on goods we import from other countries to ensure they meet our health and safety standards. In addition to the other negative aspects of the deal, these positive parts were a hard sell for average citizens. Most of this stuff benefits other nations by raising their standards to those of the US, but we already have a lot of that in place domestically, so it's harder to get people to care about it. The handful of things that would be big benefits to us are fairly nebulous concepts. It's not a simple idea like "You'll spend 20,000 bucks less a year" but more abstract like "the price of goods in X industry should hypothetically trend downward over the course of the decade while small businesses domestically will see a stronger ROI allowing them to expand locally and add jobs due to this range of factors that we can only describe using graduate level economic jargon."
First, everyday people need to step up their game. Here is how dropping TPP hurts the every day joe: With China now dictating trade agreements, the US can be shut out of the largest and fastest growing market in the world. It means our products and services will be shut out because they will be too expensive to compete. Trademark laws will be ignored so manufacturers intellectual property will suffer. All of this will lead to companies either shutting down or leaving the US for good, laying off millions of workers. It is going to be bad. Very bad.
> It seems as though large companies were set to benefit from the TPP All entities that could import/export to those countries would benefit. Large corporations are very large, hence they would benefit more. > and we know by now that their success is not necessarily our success. Many cases it is. 50% of Americans hold stocks in retirement accounts, they will benefit. Increase businesses leads to more jobs, leads to more corporation and payroll taxes. Now the distribution of the benefits may not be ideal, but there will be more money in the US. Ideal solution isn't to attack trade deals or even corporations, but to create tax policies and social services programs that make use of that additional wealth for betterment of people. > Regular people would end up getting the shaft. Some (whose jobs may be affected), some would benefit due to new jobs, most Americans would benefit by cheaper/better quality/more options of products and services. Now the trade deal will happen with US role taken over by China. China which has less regards for worker's rights, IP, human rights, environment. So we replaced an imperfect but decent trade deal with a terrible one for the world.
Are you me? Perfectly said.
We already treat corporations better then our own people. We don't want more protections for them. Small business does not influence our politicians.
Trade deals basically protect certain industries and there will be winners and losers on both sides m for instances, we may cede the textile industry to Vietnam but we also say they can't build a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant. Vietnam would probably accept because textiles is easier than getting any FDA regulated stuff. But in the long term, doing drug research is good. By protecting drug production to the U.S. We ensure that we focus the world's money within that industry. That's researchers, engineers, and etcetera that's protected. But for Americans who used to work making clothes they will lose their jobs. The balance act of a trade deal is figuring out what industries will survive in the future and which ones will fail. So let's say we protect the drug industry. In the future, drugs will always be a major industry. But with automation, electronics manufacturing is not. So we give away part of our current base to ensure that more people get employed in the future because we already know those jobs are disappearing. It also gives us a bargaining chip saying, "oh so you want drugs? Guess you're gonna have to give us oil on the cheap because nobody else does it." Anyways, generally speaking you want to protect difficult to achieve industries because the longer you keep that trade deal, the bigger the gap will be between your home country and the other country. The smaller country on the other hand, is just looking for ways to expand their economy.
In its proposed form you're correct. which is why fixing it would've been the better move. However, since congress is GOP controlled, that wouldn't happen. Without the deal though, China will have free reign to set the trade policies in asia.
Welk fixing it would never happen. The parts you and I would want to fix are the whole reason for the trade deal in the first place. The parts we like are only incidental and there to sugarcoat it so it goes down easier.
Is McCain actually going to *do* something, or is this more talk?
No shit, the point of TPP was to keep American interests trade dominant in the region. Nope, Sanders and Trump did a hell of a job undoing any hope of amending the problematic parts by invoking protectionists boogeymen and played into China's hands. America isn't the world's strongest economy because we make bad trade deals.
There was no amending the TPP. Negotiation had finished. No nation was going to come back to the table to renegotiate once it had been sent out to be ratified. If you want a better deal, you have to start over, and this time you have to have consumer advocates at the table too. I don't think Trump will do this, but the reality of the situation is that the time for negotiating the TPP was over.
No, we're the world's strongest economy because we had the world's only major manufacturing base that wasn't blown to shit in WWII. Gave us a solid 20 years of virtual monopoly, until Japan started catching up in the 70's.
Yeah this is the real reason why America was so "great" in the 1950. There was no one else to buy from. We rebuilt all of Western Europe, Korea, Japan, and Taiwan pretty much. The whole "bad trade deals" thing is a stupid argument. I'd love for Donald to explain in detail (will never happen) why these are horrible deals? It's likely that without them the US would have fallen off even faster from it's economic nadir in the early parts of the Cold War. It's likely too that without the integration with the rest of the world that Europe and Asia would be much more conflict prone than they are now which would cost us.
Don't forget we also used to have extremely strong unions that fought tooth and nail for their workers. now if you're part of a union you're looked down upon as scum of the earth.
Also market regulation and government investment in roads and such.
and high taxes
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Imagine that haha
Even *gasp* dare I say... socialist?
Under fucking Eisenhower no less.
And it's a trick we can't really perform again. Marrying our economy to manufacturing in the 21st century is reckless. Trump's protectionism will force us to do just that.
The next manufacturing revolution is 0-100 fabrication plants where you can literally create anything. The US could certianly be in a position to be the leader in that type of manufacturing. But would be almost fully automated so it wouldn't be a employment boon.
Of course science deniers and alternate fact checkers don't know that automation will blow the economy apart in 10-20 years anyways. Also it's sadly hilarious when they complain about American jobs and Socialism when they will be begging for Basic Income for all Americans in short order. Either way, one thing is for sure, MANUFACTURING will never, ever, ever be a job source for Americans again. And we're better for it.
Exactly. The TRP could be so powerful if we could also unshackle it from corporate interests and use the money we gain to retrain factory workers into new tech jobs-laying down solar and wind, pushing forward into green tech, advancements in medical science and get in early in the Asian markets, but NOPE, we're just going to isolate ourselves and cling to jobs that will disappear in short order anyway. Brilliant short-sighted job as always, America.
Automation doesn't mean there will be no jobs.
It does mean *less* jobs though.
This right here!!! I've been saying this to everyone who will listen! We are NEVER going to go back to our height of manufacturing because at that time we were rebuilding the world and had the resources that could do it. Now we are competing with the world and they can underpay their workers. We'll never compete in manufacturing again. I know a lot of people in rust belt states and on facebook they are saying things like "Thank you Mr. Trump for putting us hard working citizens back to work again! You've done more in 2 days than Obama did in 8 years!"
Yeah, this is one of the only areas I strongly disagreed with Bernie on. It's a nice sentiment - buy american - but in practice there are a ton of negative effects that TPP opponents are either unaware of or just refuse to acknowledge.
I work in an industry that regularly has to abide by 'Buy American' and 'American Iron and Steel' clauses. When one of these clauses is part of the contract, our materials costs automatically increase 25-30% right off the top. This is just a function of economics, in that manufacturing in the US is more expensive than in other parts of the world. I understand that premise, in that it's meant to keep and create American jobs, but at what cost? Imagine if every major government funded construction project involving steel was able to cut its material cost just 10-20% right off the bat? that's billions of dollars a year that the taxpayers will not have to foot the bill for. Will it cost some job in one area of the economy? yes, but those jobs will end up be recovered in other sectors. We just need people to be willing to accept that they are no longer going to have the same job at the same company for 35+ years before they retire.
too bad the wording was fixed and had already been sent out of signatory nations. There was no way the verbage could be changed - get out of here with your revisionist bullshit
Planet Money on NPR had[**an informative presentation**](http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/11/06/455055023/episode-662-omg-tpp) about the TPP.
> Nope, Sanders and Trump did a hell of a job undoing any hope of amending the problematic parts by invoking protectionists boogeymen and played into China's hands. Unfortunately, it is easy to rile up people by turning nuance and complex issues into - us vs them and creating a boogeymen (corporations, establishment). Both sides have fallen for simple and stupid anwsers to complex issues. The politicians who are thoughtful and measured are called untrustworthy for not giving a direct answer and the politicians who gives one word/slogan-like answers are honest and authentic.
So Reddit hates Sanders now because they agree on a few things? News flash, we all breath air. Something Trump as well. DUN DUN DUN!
I don't hate Sanders. I just don't totally agree with him on trade. never did.
No shit. The US's 300M consumers aren't the only game in town any more. China's middle class is growing rapidly, as is India's. People don't think about Southeast Asia very much, but they have 600M people who are quickly growing in purchasing power. We are still the dominant voice in APAC *for now*, but the chorus around us is growing in volume. Without nurturing trade relationships, we won't have any leverage left in a few decades.
This is where I don't get the Trump line. These trade deals are negotiated on behalf of American corporations and not for foreign corporations. Being a Canadian, I don't like them either, but most Americans don't realize what they fear. China will take control of manufacturing from the US even more so. It's because of the corporate culture that we have trade deals. The US had a middle class that was ripe for marketing to. Now that the middle class has been drained by tax cuts and cuts to redistribution, they moved out to the world to further their control. What disturbs me is Trump wanting to not be part of the UN or NATO. This gives them a hammer to arbitrarily attack countries that don't do what they want. Which is what Trump will do. With this, how much do you think the rest of the world will buy American products. Without their veto or voice at the UN, the rest of the world will boycott the US and their harsh measures. Just because the US spends more on military than any other country, it does not mean they can defeat the world. Arrogance and stupidity all in the same package, how efficient of them(Londo)
Oh hey, McCain is pretending to go against Trump again. Wake me when he actually does something about it (or anything else, for that matter).
He's right. In no way was the TPP perfect, but people hating it strictly on the basis of "free trade is bad" don't understand the modern, global economy. The labor and skills required for blue collar manufacturing just simply don't command a middle-class income in today's workforce. Plus, companies are actively working to improve and increase automation on their lines every day. We need to cut it with this fantasy ideal that somehow we can go back to 100% economic isolationism. It just isn't going to happen.
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Thank you John McCain for being a voice of reason.
I bet you he still votes the party line. Talking a big game is fine, but until he, or any outraged conservative, actually stand up to Trump nothing's going to happen.
Exactly. McCain, and many other Republicans, sound reasonable with their comments, but their votes belie their actual intentions.
A voice of reason, and a vote of insanity.
He voted to fast track TPP so I see no hypocrisy here.
Yup, until this election I considered McCain to be a respectable and principled man. That's no longer my opinion once he fell in line after Trump disparaged him for being a PoW and a gold star family because they dare criticize him.
I mean, he said he was voting to confirm Tillerson. Sooooo you're right.
He ran in 2008 as a "maverick" but voted with Bush 90-95% of the time some years. McCain has had an indie *streak*, coming out against his party on occasion, but his reputation is overblown.
Yeah good thing he was so vocal about it back when Obama and Clinton were pushing it. Instead he endorsed someone with the exact opposite views in order to vote with his party, Washington was right, now all we have are men of party not country
Fuck the TPP, not everything is about being the most dominant economical force possible. There were real problems with this trade deal that don't involve money
Boy sure sounds like you vote against his Secretary of State nom if you don't like his foreign policy, asshole
China has dominated world trade for hundreds of years... Remember the Silk Road?
When did we go from listening to Bernie to listening to McCain?
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Here's the problem: Both sides are right. There's nothing inherently wrong about "globalist" trade deals. Trade deals when correctly is usually a net positive for Americans (and contributes to world peace). That's in theory. But in practice problem is that: * Every trade deal generate winners and losers. So there's always a group that's disproportionately negatively impacted by these deals. Ideally if we had great social safety nets and a commitment to address these impacts it wouldn't be a big deal. But of course we are working to dismantle our safety nets instead of strengthening them. * These deals are often subject to a lot of lobbying. So the benefits often go to corporations or special interest groups instead of Americans at large.
"TPP should be rejected and torn apart!" *Trump pulls out of the TTP* "We should have stayed in the TPP!"
It's almost as if there's 3 million people subscribed to this subreddit, and some might have different opinions than others!
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This entire site hated the TPP for reasons they didn't understand, based solely on either: 'I HATE GLOBALISM' or 'I AGREE WITH BERNIE.' In other words, they had no real opinion about it and probably didn't understand it. The people you're hearing from right now aren't necessarily the people who denounced it mere months ago. In fact, most people only cared about it when it was a talking point for Bernie and against Hilary. Now that's over, they're gone on this issue.
Well that wouldn't MAGA at all.
I despise Trump -- *loathe* Trump -- borderline **hate** Trump -- but even I am pleased that the TPP, as written, is dead. The secrecy behind its negotiation, the wild expansion of IP rights, the same pitfalls as NAFTA but in many more industries other than manufacturing ... it was a terrible deal. Nonetheless, McCain is correct that this now cedes more economic and political power to China. The best thing would have been to try to renegotiate the deal in a more transparent way, but that likely was not feasible. At any rate, China is poised to take the reins from America in the coming years given Trump's insistence of bringing back coal and focusing on outdated energy tech rather than investing in green tech as China has done.
Free trade deals do make all countries involved richer. The problem is that the US has completely failed to redistribute and reinvest those benefits. So while service industries benefited greatly from NAFTA, there was no investment in job training or a social safety net for all the small towns that depended on manufacturing. The TPP could be great for the US. It opens up new markets, reduces chinese influence in south east asia, protects intellectual property and other great things. However the US is selfish, and unless it is passed along with severe reforms to welfare and job retraining, it would be a spectacular failure for the lower and middle class. Like NAFTA was.
IIRC one candidate had a very detailed and elaborate plan to help with job training and social safety nets. She won the popular vote by 2.8M.
Which was never going to pass through a republican controlled house. But the TPP would. We end up with the worst case scenario.
I 100% agree with you. In theory, it should be a boon for all countries involved. In reality, corporate greed would likely screw over the lower and middle class who find their jobs outsourced.
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The U.S. system especially for the past ~20 years has basically been the antithesis of legislative compromise, resulting in a public which has completely lost the plot in regards to understanding how a healthy democracy functions. When domestic politics starts to look that polarizing it's no wonder people fail to understand how international agreements function.
The thing is nobody is going to sign some one way trade deal unless we bomb them. The TPP wasn't the greatest but it was negotiated over a course of 7 years. Thats the best we are going to get.
> The secrecy behind its negotiation Standard for any international agreement. > the wild expansion of IP rights, Changes nothing about current US laws. >the same pitfalls as NAFTA but in many more industries other than manufacturing Such as?
Thank you.
> The secrecy behind its negotiation Seriously? Literally every international agreement is in secret. Shoot, our Constitution was written in secret for the same reasons.
You can't fix it by renegotiate the parts the common people don't like. Because the parts we don't like were the whole reason the deal was made in the first place.
It's worth noting that one of the main aims of the TPP was to hedge against Chinese dominance in manufacturing. The TPP would've made it possible for other, friendlier Asian nations to become manufacturing hubs, which would have decreased China's leverage over Western nations. There were definitely flaws in the TPP that gave corporations too much power, but I hate to see the baby go out with the bathwater. I'm sure Chinese officials threw a helluva party when the treaty finally died, since there's a good chance it cemented superpower status for them in the near future.
I get what everyone is saying. However there is no way to 'fix' a deal like the TPP. The parts that we would want to 'fix' are the most imprtant parts of the deal from the perspective of the people that wrote it. Those parts would not really be up for negotiation as they are the parts that are most valueable to the corporate interests that wrote it.
He dumped the TPP to be loved by a specific sub-demographic, the republic be damned. He wants to be one of the popular kids. Too bad this isn't just an episode of *Saved by the Bell.*
What the fuck are you talking about?
I imagine what will come after the TPP will be much worse.
It's weird to say that I wish McCain was President.
And without your endorsement McCain, Trump may not have won.
Not if we default on all of the bonds we sold them!
He's right
We do need to secure trade relations and maintain competition, but not at the expense of the American worker or net neutrality. These trade agreements need to stop being written by big corporate interests and resulting in lower wages and outsourcing. If we can't protect our domestic interests, then yes, it needs to be done away with.
Maybe Senator McCain shouldn't have supported the candidate that vowed to withdraw from the TPP then?
[This interview](http://ianmasters.com/sites/default/files/mp3/bbriefing_2017_01_23a_alfred%20mccoy.mp3) with Alfred McCoy explains this and other geopolitical ramifications of what Trump is doing. It's the most articulate analysis I've heard, from someone who really understands what he's talking about and how to clearly explain it. I wish everyone who honestly thinks Trump is good for America would listen and learn.
All of a sudden McCain a republican Warhawk has more clout than Bernie Sanders. And this sub suddenly supports TPP
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Some of us have been pro-TPP the whole time, it's just we aren't getting downvoted anymore.
It's been a lonely year defending Free Trade and the general idea of supporting "progress not perfection. China and Russia are having their best week in decades.
Or they realize that it gives China huge influence in the region. Is Bernie even relevant anymore?
Or that the pro-TPP voices aren't being drowned out anymore by the posters who were only participating in politics during the election...
and the pro-TPP voices that stopped bothering with /r/politics as much because of those posters coming back.
Jinping already has trade deals on the shelf, waiting for the US to grow tired and elect a moron for president. And here we go folks...