interesting 'straw in the wind'.....
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From: Sid Shniad
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: TRADE'S IMAGE TAKES BEATING AMONG PUBLIC - Los Angeles Times
Date: Tuesday, June 01, 1999 8:40PM
The Los Angeles Times May 31, 1999
TRADE'S IMAGE TAKES BEATING AMONG PUBLIC
By Jonathan Peterson, Times staff writer
WASHINGTON + America, to put it flatly, has embarked on a trade
war with the most improbable of enemies: itself.
With little fanfare, the once noncontroversial notion of "trade" has
become a battle cry in key Washington circles, a term bristling with
dark associations about personal insecurity in an amoral global
economy. From consumer activists to mainstream Republicans to
family farmers, a diverse army now challenges proposals that once
would have passed without protest.
As a result, priority items on the White House trade agenda have
been shoved into the background, shelved or otherwise shrouded in
uncertainty. To cite a few: expanding the North American Free Trade
Agreement, allowing China into the World Trade Organization, easing
trade barriers with Africa and the Caribbean and increasing the
president's authority to negotiate trade deals.
"The American public no longer believes that trade is good for
most Americans," said Ann Hoffman, legislative director for the Union
of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees. "And that is quite a
watershed."
Ironically, trade fears are flourishing at a time when more
Americans--133 million --are employed than ever, incomes are rising
and the economic boom marches on without letup.
The rosy statistics, however, offer no solace to American workers
in those industries, such as apparel and steel, that are being hammered
by overseas competition.
And beyond that, the critics have gained a potent weapon in the
trade deficit, which has become a monthly reminder that the United
States is being bombarded with goods made by foreign workers, not
Americans. The trade gap hit yet another U.S. record in March and is
on pace to reach an all-time high of more than $200 billion this year.
Trade enthusiasts fondly point to varied benefits of global
commerce, such as lower prices and greater choice for consumers, new
opportunities for exporters and a presumed improvement in relations
among trading partners. But when foreign competition closes the doors
of a U.S. factory, the job losses are concentrated and explosive,
overshadowing the diffuse and undramatic benefits of trade.
"You don't have communities rise up and say, 'Thank you for these
sales of widgets to Malaysia,' " U.S. Trade Representative Charlene
Barshefsky said in an interview. By contrast, she added, "if a [factory]
gate is closed and it says 'Moved to Mexico,' that community is
immediately impacted."
While Americans have always harbored suspicions about foreign
entanglements in general, and organized labor has looked askance at
imports in particular, the breadth of today's backlash against the trade
agenda is something new.
Mainstream Republicans, a traditional bulwark of support for trade
deals, have become increasingly skeptical and are considering whether
to impose quotas on steel imports--a measure that has already passed
the House.
Conservatives and liberals have been offended by WTO rule-
makers, who have demanded changes in U.S. laws regarded by other
countries as trade barriers in disguise. Venezuela and Brazil have
challenged gasoline standards, and India has protested regulations on
shrimp-fishing nets. Organized labor, meanwhile, has been joined by a
swarm of consumer activists, environmentalists and human rights
proponents in demanding that new trade deals cushion the impact on
U.S. workers and even set standards for working conditions overseas.
Entire industries, including paper, have complained that foreign
countries have easier access to the U.S. market than they grant
Americans in their own.
On top of all that, trade is now caught up in a different sort of
politics: Personal distrust of President Clinton has made some in
Congress unwilling to grant him the expanded authority to approve
trade accords that Congress cannot amend, authority that previous
presidents had enjoyed since the 1970s. Support for giving the
president so-called fast-track trade authority has been eroding. It was
only 10 votes behind in the House in late 1997, according to one
informal tally; but when it came up for a vote in October 1998, it lost
by 63.
"I'll never give fast track to this administration ever again," said
Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach), one of the many in
Congress who turned against the proposal after initially supporting it.
The implications of this backlash are significant, according to trade
experts. Foreign countries have become less likely to see the United
States as a leader in global trade policy, and key initiatives, such as a
proposed international treaty on investment, have been derailed. In this
climate, Chile has pushed back hopes of joining NAFTA in the short
term, and countries such as Brazil, Argentina and Colombia have
placed a growing priority on trade talks with Europe rather than the
United States.
Still, U.S. trade negotiators have kept busy, and can claim quiet
progress on information technology, telecommunications and other
global issues. But the White House has become much more wary of
exposing the big trade issues to votes in Congress, where the
administration risks embarrassing defeat.
"You see fewer and fewer issues on the agenda because the
administration realizes it can't win the battles," says Greg Mastel, a
trade specialist with the Economic Strategy Institute think tank in
Washington.
Oddly, two White House victories on trade may have set the stage
for today's impasse. More than anything, congressional approval of
NAFTA in 1993--a dramatic triumph for Clinton--galvanized the
emerging coalition of critics. The White House also was able to prevail
in 1994, when Congress approved the Geneva-based World Trade
Organization to serve as referee in a vastly overhauled system of global
trade rules.
Stung by the losses, labor unions and other skeptics of trade policy
dug in for a long-term campaign to alter the agenda. Even if they had
little in common, they swapped political intelligence, established
Internet sites and orchestrated news leaks to block proposals.
The effect proved devastating. Consider the fate of something
called the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, a proposed treaty that
could have given foreign investors controversial new protections
against national regulations, along with unprecedented rights to sue
governments in closed-door proceedings.
Lori Wallach, a trade analyst working for Public Citizen's Global
Trade Watch, dubbed the measure "NAFTA on steroids," a term
quickly seized upon by critics of various political persuasions. In late
1997, Wallach slipped a copy of a draft version to Senate Foreign
Relations Committee Chairman Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), who was
deeply suspicious of the trend toward global rule-making in trade.
As legend has it, a chagrined Helms asked in a closed session of
his panel: "What's this 180 pages of 'NAFTA on steroids' that some
tree hugger's giving me?"
The proposal has been little heard from since.
Although poll results vary, there is evidence that the American
public's attitude toward trade has grown more dubious in the last few
years. As recently as March 1994, a survey by the Times Mirror Center
on People and the Press found that just over half the public believed
that treaties such as NAFTA would create U.S. jobs, with 32% fearing
job loss. But by December 1998, the attitudes had flip-flopped. A Wall
Street Journal/NBC News poll found that 58% of Americans believed
that trade had reduced U.S. jobs and wages, with cheap imports being
the main villain.
"People are feeling a loss of control in their daily lives, and it
has a
great deal to do with economic globalization in all of its dimensions,"
said Daniel A. Seligman, program director for responsible trade for the
Sierra Club in Washington.
It is not at all clear, however, how well the feelings square with
certain economic realities.
Despite the concerns, most workers do not suffer the layoffs or
shutdowns that are the great fears of globalization. Trade apparently
was one of the factors weighing down wages in the period from about
1979 to 1995, many economists believe. But most of them see it as a
minor factor compared with, say, advances in technology. Similarly,
trade is responsible for painful layoffs in certain industries, such as
apparel and steel, but this is occurring at a time when layoffs overall
are at exceptionally low levels.
"Trade does have some of those [negative] effects--but it's not as
huge as some people would have you believe," said Daniel J.B.
Mitchell, a labor economist at UCLA. "It's not the whole story, by any
means." As a political matter, however, the negative part of the story
resonates loudly with the public and with their elected officials.
Apparel and textiles, for example, have shed 375,000 jobs since
early 1993, according to the Labor Department. There is broad
agreement that many of these jobs migrated to such low-cost environs
as China, Mexico and the Caribbean. The U.S. steel industry, which
has decried a surge in imports from battered economies overseas, lost
12,000 jobs last year. In an attempt to promote the pro-trade case,
Commerce Secretary Bill Daley recently launched a "National Trade
Education Tour" to provide some rare, positive public relations for the
cause.
But as Daley and some business executives made stops in
Massachusetts and Rhode Island, they were greeted by sign-wielding
representatives of Clean Water Action, Alliance to Save Democracy,
Green Party, Public Citizen Global Trade Watch, and labor unions.
Protesters even shadowed Daley in a bus that derided the "Free trade
fat cats."
Later, in an interview, the affable Commerce secretary said he had
"no problem" with the demonstrators.
"We've got to let the American people understand the benefits of
trade. At the same time, those of us who are believers have to
acknowledge ... there are legitimate fears about trade."
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