2016 Postmortem
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Clinton: Trump’s policies would ‘start trade wars’
Detroit News:Detroit — Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton said Monday that Donald Trump’s economic policies would run up the national debt, set off trade wars and trigger a stock market crash.
She was referring in part to the Republican presidential front-runner’s call for slapping a 35 percent tariff on Ford Motor Co.’s Mexican-built vehicles because the Dearborn automaker has moved some of its small car production south of the border.
“What little we know of his economic policies would be running up our debt, starting trade wars, letting Wall Street run wild — all of that could cause another crash and devastate working families and our country,” Clinton said in a speech at the Service Employees International Union’s national convention at Cobo Center. “Trump economics is a recipe for lower wages, fewer jobs, more debt.”
Speaking before a friendly organized labor crowd of more than 3,600 registered convention attendees, Clinton took aim at her likely Republican opponent for the White House and called into question the billionaire’s business skills.
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timmymoff
(1,947 posts)
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)sure don't need another.
Baobab
(4,667 posts)blocking us from fixing affordable health care for 22 years.
instead we've been arguing about phony claims - basically we've been manipulated to where we're about to step into a trap, with lies.
God forbid that we actually could have an honest President and Congress and god forbid that we would be able to fix health care.
tonyt53
(5,737 posts)elehhhhna
(32,076 posts)She's married to the shafta from NAFTA
Ron Green
(9,822 posts)in store.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)If you don't trust Clinton. Obama isn't just spitballing OR running for office anymore. Lessons that have been learned from past trade deals should be used of course. The question is what philosophy will create more good jobs and not cause a GREATER loss of jobs.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)perfect for them without NAFTA; China is not a threat; we can provide for free education, health care, increase social security, etc., trading among ourselves; that trade agreements don't help bind countries together; they support Nationalism and America First; Obama is trying to sell them down-the-river; and worse.
runaway hero
(835 posts)If you're (not you the poster) for TPP now, just because Trump is against, you're the kind of political opportunist people are sick of, imo. Trade is the whole basis of Trumps campaign. The TPP has divided the nation.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)To address the political opportunist issue you raise and TPP and Trump. I would be careful in saying what the country wants with regard to trade deals just based on Trumps success and Bernies success in Primaries. The General electorate will not be as clear cut in my opinion. If you said that people want better trade deals or being harder on our trade partners, I would agree. That is Hillary's position, better monitoring and regulation of existing trade deals.
runaway hero
(835 posts)Because Trump is against. I think people are tired of losing their jobs, to slave wages in East Asia. Hillary has no plan to get them back, although that's not really her fault. Because they aren't coming back. But you can see why Trump and Bernie have gotten so much support.
FYI, I'm supporting Hillary, but just looking at people I know, I understand the anger.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)they had Brian Fallon on there who is Hillary's press secretary. He reeled off a lot of great ideas on investment, tax policy to incentivize corporate behavior, claw back on off shored jobs, middle class tax breaks, etc. I am going to try and post more of what he said if I can find it. But she knows how to get the economy working and its not with tariffs.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)It has been proven many times that he isn't telling the truth
He said the TPP "includes the strongest labor standards and environmental commitments in history—and, unlike in past agreements, these standards are fully enforceable."
Yet, no one has been able to show me this part of the law.
He talks about lowering trade barriers with countries that have already dropped barriers.
All the rest we have heard about every trade deal that comes down the pipe. They are never true.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)you would understand it?
I am not advocating for TPP. I am saying that his general views on the necessity for trade and against protectionist tariffs is true.
I have to disagree when you say Obama isn't telling the truth. He is telling some hard truths is more like it.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)show me the enforcement sections
I deal in facts not "Obama said"
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)you are just blindly following what you are told. I'll pass. History shows that would be a foolish idea given past distortions about trade deals.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)And this lefty just showed everyone why they shouldn't listen to the corporate Democrats
they can't back their claims with any facts. All they ever tell us is "it will be different this time".
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)and losing power to do anything but I'll pass.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)Obama was working on the Paris Accord. You can't take trade deals in isolation of what else is going on.
And, there are labor rights protections, although not to our standards. But, it is far better than what the Nationalist, American First types want -- which is nothing since they do not care for foreigners. In fact, as we've seen from Sanders's supporters, foreign workers are viewed as little more than scabs. Truth is, as labor skills advance in poor countries, so will their wages and benefits. And they will import more goods.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)What we see from Clinton/Obama supporters
'Dirty' Industries: Just between you and me, shouldn't the World Bank be encouraging MORE migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Least Developed Countries]? I can think of three reasons:
1) The measurements of the costs of health impairing pollution depends on the foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality. From this point of view a given amount of health impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.
2) The costs of pollution are likely to be non-linear as the initial increments of pollution probably have very low cost. I've always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly UNDER-polluted, their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City. Only the lamentable facts that so much pollution is generated by non-tradable industries (transport, electrical generation) and that the unit transport costs of solid waste are so high prevent world welfare enhancing trade in air pollution and waste.
3) The demand for a clean environment for aesthetic and health reasons is likely to have very high income elasticity. The concern over an agent that causes a one in a million change in the odds of prostrate[sic] cancer is obviously going to be much higher in a country where people survive to get prostrate[sic] cancer than in a country where under 5 mortality is 200 per thousand. Also, much of the concern over industrial atmosphere discharge is about visibility impairing particulates. These discharges may have very little direct health impact. Clearly trade in goods that embody aesthetic pollution concerns could be welfare enhancing. While production is mobile the consumption of pretty air is a non-tradable.
The problem with the arguments against all of these proposals for more pollution in LDCs (intrinsic rights to certain goods, moral reasons, social concerns, lack of adequate markets, etc.) could be turned around and used more or less effectively against every Bank proposal for liberalization.
— Lawrence Summers
Don't feed me that crap that these people care in the least about the foreign workers because they don't.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)They've demonized them and treated them like scabs. Archie Bunker ain't funny anymore.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)He is a globalist and a Wall St. firster
and still no proof, as usual
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)Quit living in the past.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)what is taking so long Hoyt?
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)Read about it here: https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/TPP-Chapter-Summary-Labour-1.pdf
Here's just some examples, and try to keep this perspective -- Are foriegn workers better off with these protections, or no protections as the Nationalists, America First, foreign workers are scabs type want?
In addition, TPP signatories commit to take on a number of first-ever
commitments:
• A commitment to discourage imports made with forced labor, no matter
what the origin of the goods. This addresses a growing global problem
that, according to the ILO, currently affects 21 million men, women, and
children and in industrial sectors generates about $43 billion in illegal
profits worldwide annually. The United States has strong laws prohibiting
trade in goods produced by forced labor, but in many other countries,
more needs to be done to address this global challenge.
• A commitment to put in place laws on acceptable working conditions,
including a minimum wage, limits on hours of work, and occupational
safety and health, which are well established in the United States, but
less so in many other countries around the world.
• Special commitments to protect labor standards in export processing
zones (EPZs). These “EPZs” are special zones in which governments offer
businesses special benefits to establish operations in the zones, such
as exemptions from certain taxes or regulations. In some cases, governments
also lower or provide exemptions from labor laws to attract
investment, leading to poor and deteriorating labor standards. As the
number of export processing zones has grown, the concern about workers’
rights and working conditions in these zones has also increased.
Together, these provisions not only set the high-water mark for labor protections
in a trade agreement, but mark a sea-change from early U.S. FTAs.
TPP provides an opportunity to lock in those gains for nearly 40 percent of
the global economy, bringing us closer to establishing a new global norm
for labor rights in trade agreements. In particular, applying these standards
to Mexico and Canada delivers on the President’s promise to renegotiate
NAFTA.
The Labor chapter establishes broad commitments that require all TPP Parties
to adopt and maintain in their laws and practices the fundamental labor
rights as recognized by the ILO, including freedom of association and the
right to collective bargaining; elimination of forced labor; abolition of child
labor; and the elimination of employment discrimination. It also includes
commitments, again required for all TPP Parties, to have laws governing
minimum wages, hours of work, and occupational safety and health.
Read more at the link. It's better than anything before.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)and now it is open season on labor organizers
What you posted is nothing but a bunch of drivel with no enforcement mechanism. Commitment fairy tales.
Anyone who thinks trade lawyers are going to rule against other trade lawyers in a labor dispute is extremely naive.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)I don't think so. But, then, you don't give a darn about them anyway. Maybe some day our supposedly "International" unions will go into these countries as allowed by TPP. Of course, most of the "international" unions are going to stay where the dues are better.
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)more fairy tale thinking from a Wall St. firster. Sorry, we heard that song and dance routine before and it never comes to light as evidenced by those great labor protections in the CFTA.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)they can still be progressing toward a goal. Heck, how many years did it take the USA to get where we are. Nothing happens overnight and the TPP includes mechanisms for it to happen. Of course, Nationalists want to hold every country to our standards immediately, knowing that the poor foreign workers (scabs) will never get anywhere like that. It's like we've polluted the world for decades, but now we want everyone else to stop polluting, even the poorest countries.
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/01/tpp-mexico-labor-rights/426501/
Mnpaul
(3,655 posts)I'm sure they are glad that you are looking out for their best interests
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)you don't want to talk about how badly these agreements failed in the past.
It will be different this time. 
kaleckim
(651 posts)Explain. The US developed behind the highest industrial tariffs in the entire world from about the War of 1812 to WWII, and was massively protectionist after. James Baker under Reagan bragged about Reagan's industrial protectionism and the US still has the most protectionist agricultural system in the world. In fact, there is a South Korean economist named Ha Joon Chang that has written lots about this. He has shown that no country in modern times has developed behind free trade. All countries used protectionism when developing. Oh, and trade itself isn't a bad thing, because trade can happen in endless contexts. The (largely formerly) radical Latin American countries have ALBA, the Soviet Union had a trade model based on barter and there was the GATT before the WTO, which was radically different. In fact, the developing countries created a set of ideas called the New International Economic Order in the 1970s that called for things like producer cartels (like OPEC) to improve the terms of trade, capital controls, state owned enterprises, etc. You don't have to give away the store to corporations, warp the (largely would be) development of other countries, and destroy working people, in order to trade goods with other countries.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/ha-joon-chang-protectionism-the-truth-is-on-a-10-bill-5334137.html
...This argument is known as the infant industry argument. What is little known is that it was first theorised by none other than the first finance minister (treasury secretary) of the United States - Alexander Hamilton, whose portrait adorns the $10 bill. Initially few Americans were convinced by Hamilton's argument. After all, Adam Smith, the father of economics, had already advised Americans against artificially developing manufacturing industries. However, over time people saw sense in Hamilton's argument, and the US shifted to protectionism after the Anglo-American War of 1812. By the 1830s, its industrial tariff rate, at 40-50 per cent, was the highest in the world, and remained so until the Second World War.
...Britain and the US may have been the most ardent - and most successful - users of tariffs, but most of today's rich countries deployed tariff protection for extended periods in order to promote their infant industries. Many of them also actively used government subsidies and public enterprises to promote new industries. Japan and many European countries have given numerous subsidies to strategic industries. The US has publicly financed the highest share of research and development in the world. Singapore, despite its free-market image, has one of the largest public enterprise sectors in the world, producing around 30 per cent of the national income. Public enterprises were also crucial in France, Finland, Austria, Norway, and Taiwan.
When they needed to protect their nascent producers, most of today's rich countries restricted foreign investment. In the 19th century, the US strictly regulated foreign investment in banking, shipping, mining, and logging. Japan and Korea severely restricted foreign investment in manufacturing. Between the 1930s and the 1980s, Finland officially classified all firms with more than 20 per cent foreign ownership as "dangerous enterprises".
...But, the reader may wonder, didn't the developing countries already try protectionism and miserably fail? That is a common myth, but the truth of the matter is that these countries have grown significantly more slowly in the "brave new world" of neo-liberal policies, compared with the "bad old days" of protectionism and regulation in the 1960s and the 1970s (see table). And that's despite the dramatic growth acceleration in the two giants, China and India, which have partially liberalised their economies but refuse to fully embrace neo-liberalism. Growth has failed particularly badly in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa, where neo-liberal reforms have been implemented most thoroughly. In the "bad old days", per capita income in Latin America grew at an impressive 3.1 per cent per year. In the "brave new world", it has been growing at a paltry 0.5 per cent. In sub-Saharan Africa, per capita income grew at 1.6 per cent a year during 1960-80, but since then the region has seen a fall in living standards (by 0.3 per cent a year).
lie about re-negotiating NAFTA, then in office sign trade deals with Colombia (where more union organizers are killed than the rest of the world combined), a well known tax haven in Panama and South Korea (which has already cost thousands of jobs). Yes, ignore the fact that the US developed behind the highest industrial tariffs in the world for a century and a half, that not a single country in modern times has actually developed behind free trade, that the US has the most protectionist agricultural system in the world. Ignore that the investor state disputes have nothing what so ever to do with "free trade" or that intellectual property components of trade deals and things like TRIPS at the WTO are insanely protectionist, benefit large corporations at the expense of everyone else, and stifle innovation. Also, ignore that everything in these deals regarding capital is binding, but most things regarding labor and environmental standards are not. Throw in that capital is entirely mobile and labor isn't (which violates the key assumption that David Ricardo and Adam Smith had in regards to free trade, that capitalists WOULDN'T transfer factories and production to other countries). Ignore that most European countries also use VAT's.
Also, might help to ignore the actual record of the deals. You know, the millions of good paying jobs that have been lost, the huge power differential it has widened between capital and labor, the fact that these deals have utterly destroyed unions. Obama gets it, so does Clinton, and so do the hundreds of corporations that Obama has had negotiating the TPP.
I lived in China for a bit. When I was there, about six years ago, they were trying to support the creation of their own car manufactures. Now, did China do something like "free trade"? Of course not, because that isn't what countries do when they want to develop. The slapped a 100% tax on car imports, at least in the province I lived in (Guangdong).
Recently at the WTO there was a dispute between the US and India over solar panels. Now, we should be all hands on deck with global warming, right? Well, India had local sourcing laws, which said that a given percentage of solar panels bought by the government would be from Indian solar panel producers. The US challenged this, and India for awhile said that they would challenge individual states in the US that did the same thing. The US won. In Quebec, the city put in place strong anti-fracking laws and fracking companies are using Chapter 11 of NAFTA to sue the government there for profits lost. Yes, Quebec could prove that the fracking could ruin their water and harm human health, but it doesn't matter. That decision would cost a corporation money, so they have to pay that corporation. THAT is what the Clintons and Obama support.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)I supported a different candidate that cycle. I would have to go back and see how he worded it, I seem to recall it was worded weakly. On your other points. You drive the positive sides of protectionism, protecting wages (in your other post in the thread), you point to the cases where it is still policy (agriculture). What I would want to see is that you also explain the downsides to protectionism. I would expect you to acknowledge why it makes sense to protect agriculture. Because like I said and I think you agree, it is complex. More so now than ever, I would think.
I am not an economist, and I may not be in your league as far as knowing all the fundamentals. It seems to me that establishing rules like worker protections that partners need to follow is a good idea. It seems to me that here in the US we can do more to protect our workers and unions in other ways than with tariffs. It seems to me that the warning about trade wars is not just empty scare stuff, but that history shows imposing tariffs has disruptive effects with trading partners.
kaleckim
(651 posts)Protectionism can protect inequitable systems and oligarchies. A famous and well known supporter of the infant industry argument in Latin America, Raul Prebisch from Argentina, admitted that protectionism didn't always work in Latin America. However, he pointed out that it failed (whereas it didn't elsewhere) because it wasn't radical enough. Many countries put in place protectionism and didn't do things like land reform, so the protectionism protected a landed aristocracy. In other words, it needed to be more, not less, radical.
Again though, the trade model Clinton supporters has decimated working people, increased inequality, halted development in other countries and is environmentally destructive. I mentioned a couple of things about investor state disputes, but think about the fact that we now have a trade model that relies on stuff produced across the globe, to be shipped back to developed countries to be bought on credit. How much carbon is emitted when goods produced in China, which could be produced here, are shipped all the way back to the US? The fact is that most of the free trade deals have little to do with actual free trade and are highly protectionist, and they were all (without exception) written by corporations and their damn lawyers.
Clinton backing that trade model is another sign of her corruption, just like banks being her largest donors over the course of her career. I know you might not like hearing that, but that's what I see it as and I don't see a good argument against the idea. Think what you want though.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)Personally, I think it has more to do with tax policy.
EndElectoral
(4,213 posts)BootinUp
(47,165 posts)making stuff up please.
timmymoff
(1,947 posts)TPP the gold standard of trade, but do not comment on the wiggle room she left, : I couldn't sign TPP the way it is currently written." Stop talking about the great results of NAFTA , for that is the past and nobody is hurting from it anymore. This is how out of touch you guys are.
NCTraveler
(30,481 posts)Fuck Trump
Ash_F
(5,861 posts)Dems need to come up with a better strategy to address Americans' feelings on trade.
Maybe instead of tariffs they could require certain wage and safety conditions for foreign workers?
The problem is those sub-par workers' rights are what attract companies in the first place. 
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)through tax policies, carrots and sticks, to incentivize job creation, to de-incentivize off shoring jobs. Claw back of taxes in some cases. They are planning on releasing details soon. Here is a piece from her campaign page on the economy that hints at that:
Impose accountability on Wall Street. Nowhere will the shift from short-term to long-term thinking be more important than on Wall Street. Hillary will defend the Wall Street reforms put in place after the financial crisis—and she’ll go further. She’ll tackle dangerous risks in the financial sector, and she’ll appoint and empower tough, independent regulators and prosecute individuals and firms when they commit fraud or other criminal wrong-doing.
Kall
(615 posts)based on the last 2 decades of those arguments on trade.
BootinUp
(47,165 posts)If you're interested.
https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/manufacturing/
Kall
(615 posts)that Democratic Presidents passed with almost entirely Republican Congressional votes, like NAFTA and the TPP, that facilitated the offshoring of jobs to countries with no seriously enforceable labour standards.
Well, liberals still do but apparently Hillary Clinton supporters do not. It's clear the two are mutually exclusive after all. Watching Hillary Clinton try to deliver a believable answer about how she suddenly became kinda, sorta against the "gold standard" TPP that she spent years selling, while campaigning with Obama who views it as part of his "legacy" should be comedy gold.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)We are not going to make it long-term trading among ourselves. We live in a big world. Time to quit acting like a poker players who hits a big jackpot and leaves. We've taken more than our share of the world's wealth and resources. Yet, Sanders's supporters are basically saying, "screw poor foreign workers." It's kind of disgusting really.
Joe the Revelator
(14,915 posts)Amazing really.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)mind.
Joe the Revelator
(14,915 posts)Jesus Christ, what has happened to us.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)we live in a big world. Time to start acting like it, and quit treating poor foreign workers like scabs.
Joe the Revelator
(14,915 posts)I mean, hold whatever ideals you want, but I think it proves a lot of points about whats going on here.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)Even today, a majority of Democratic voters support the TPP and a majority of Republican voters oppose it.
that Democratic Presidents passed with almost entirely Republican Congressional votes, like NAFTA and the TPP, that facilitated the offshoring of jobs to countries with no seriously enforceable labour standards.
You left out that part.
Scootaloo
(25,699 posts)Joe the Revelator
(14,915 posts)but its the clear truth. Hillary WAY to the right on trade.
840high
(17,196 posts)
Peacetrain
(22,877 posts)or am I mis- remembering things.. if that is true would he be starting a trade war with himself..
hollowdweller
(4,229 posts)bjo59
(1,166 posts)Don't bother to refute that before looking it up.
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)It's insane to catch fish in Alaska, freeze them whole, ship them to China, keeping them frozen rock hard the whole way, process them with cheap labor, then ship them back to the US, once again running the freezers for the whole journey.
The fact that humans do something so very wasteful of Earth's resources tells me that oil is too cheap, for one thing. Currency manipulations to make labor in one country so much cheaper than labor in another are creating absurd profit incentives that harm our world.
I can't say I'd be sad to see the current system blown up.
