(yellowtimes.com) – During the week of April 15-21, a meeting of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) will be held in Quebec City, Canada. The intent is to expand NAFTA, which includes Mexico, Canada and the US, to the entire North and South American continent with the exception of Cuba. Can’t trade with commies now can we? Except for China, the ”good” commies, where they have free markets but no elections.
I wonder if it would be ok to trade with Cubans if they have elections in Cuba but no capitalism? With a socialist constitution and multiple candidates vying in the one party system for votes, would we trade with them then? Ah fantasies, but better stick to the subject…
As I was saying, the kind of free trade we now ”enjoy” is to be expanded to more 3rd world countries. The same kind of Free Trade which recently killed the Autopact between the US and Canada. A Pact that made Ontario what it is today. To sell cars in Canada, corporations were obligated to make one car in this country for every two cars sold between 1965 and February of 2001. I mean it’s hell for companies to only have to choose between three countries where workers make between one dollar and $25 an hour. Heck, El Salvador has workers for 25 cents an hour. Can you imagine the markup on cars made for 25 cents an hour? I better buy me some of that GM stock while I can!
Seriously, it’s not a good thing. As the founding president of Visa International once said: ”Corporations are undermining the basis of their prosperity by moving work to low wage unregulated countries”. If trends continue, North American consumers won’t be able to buy the products. Sure, we could have price deflation if a given product or service can’t be sold. Then again, the big three automakers slashed their production over the winter in an attempt to match their drop in sales. This decrease was roughly 20 per cent. Analysts are now predicting that buying incentives will be gone by the summer. Given the large production cut, it seems car manufacturers would rather sell vehicles to fewer richer people, and keep their profits per car high, than admit it doesn’t cost that much to make cars in this day and age. They would also rather not cut prices to match the rate at which incomes have decreased over the last 30 years, a rate of approximately 50 per cent.
In 1985, the average age of a Canadian car was six years old. Today it’s 11 years old. If it were not for the introduction of leasing, one could only wonder how much older those junkers would be and how fewer cars would be sold! Now the FTAA talks in Quebec won’t really get anything done as it is only one meeting among many to be held until the deal is due to be finalized some time in 2005. This gives us some time still to kill this third generation of North American Free Trade. Don’t get me wrong, I like my foreign, 15 year-old, 368,000 KM mileage (and it better last another 2 years) car and I’d love to see people in Mexico and elsewhere prosper. And trade, FAIR TRADE, can be a great way to eventually integrate the planet into one big human community, but not at the expense of living standards here. We want them to come up to our level and not be lowered to theirs. Unfortunately, if we have another 20 years of wage deflation against prices, we may just see that happen.
So I’m inviting all my readers to come participate in this meeting and let our leaders know what we think they should be negotiating in Quebec. They are our leaders and since in a democracy the people are the CEO’s, I’m sure they’ll listen. We just need to show up for the occasion. I will be attending and will report on what, if anything of worth, I find there. I will be at the old train station in the lower part of Quebec City on April 21st to participate in the Canadian Union of Public Employees Rally. It will be a peaceful rally, of course, as we fully understand most media are only interested in covering violence, that is if we give them any to report. Unfortunate acts of violence would only take away what little air time our corporate owned media peers grant us. This would in turn limit our media exposure, thus reducing the time needed to focus on those issues the people care so much about.
Hope to see you there! Let’s make it a MILLION protesters this time! — Pierre
Please, send me comments: pcyr@yellowtimes.com
