So a couple months ago when CAFTA was passed, I noticed two things:
- A majority of dems voted against.
- Those that voted for were excoriated here for either breaking the party line, or for disagreement with the actual policy.
I know a bit about economics and pretty much anyone will tell you free trade is the way to go. I think that it's necessary for this community to have an honest discussion about free trade that involves more than knee-jerk responses and bile. Free Trade is the wave of the future; If we just seal off our borders and quit trading, we'll be left behind. So the question becomes one of managing the problems that it does create.
I'll start this discussion in terms of CAFTA, because I saw a lot of dems vote and evangelize against it, and I don't understand why. Here are the reasons I liked it:
- Rising tides lift all boats. When you open up trade, you have a larger market which allows more people to specialize in the things they're best at instead of performing a function because nobody else in your market is doing it. There are short-term losers, but in the long run, everyone gains.
- CAFTA was a small enough expansion that the number of short-term losers are relatively few, coming 10 years after NAFTA and a few years at least before the next AFTA, I think it's providing a good amount of time for the people who's jobs were outsourced to find new jobs, retrain, etc.
- It's an unmitigated windfall for the central american countries who now get unfettered access to the American market along with new job opportunities.
- Recipients of said windfall will now be more economically interdependent with the US. This will improve our sometimes-neglected diplomatic relations with central american countries.
- Bits of pork grafted onto the bill were fairly minimal for this Congress. That's a pretty low bar to clear, but the only thing that struck me as unfair was a small amount of built-in protection for the US sugar industry. Sometimes you have to settle for pretty good instead of perfect.
Here are some of the impressions I got from people against it, and how I feel about them:
1) The Corporations will only pay the central americans $10/day.
--So? If they take the job then it must be better than what they were getting before. They'll start working a line somewhere for crap money, then one of them will move up to line supervisor, and so on until they're opening their own businesses. People are smart. If we let them play on an equal field they're figure something out.
2) I find the idea of a billionaire stockholder paying someone in another country $10/day offensive.
-- Well, fair enough. But I don't believe this is a reason to vote against CAFTA or any other free trade initiative. This is a reason to promote reform on income disparity at home. Economic efficiency arguments are about increasing the total size of the pie, not deciding who gets the biggest slice. That's why we have progressive taxation. Yes, we've been losing that battle at home the last few years. But you don't fight a war against Afghans in Iraq, or so they say.
3) I'm a member of congress in X district and we have a Y plant. I voted against this to protect my constituents.
-- Well, Congressman Z, you made the right choice and that's how representative democracy works. However, free trade will help the rest of the country more than it hurts your district.
4) Unions are important to the democratic party; even though there are economic arguments for free trade, I have the Unions' back. We need these guys to get out the vote!
-- This is a judgement call... I believe more in doing the right thing than in helping a well-organized constituency. YMMV.
5) Teh democrats who voted for CAFTA r traitors and repug-lite!!11!
-- If you believe in hewing the party line over your own judgement, you must have had a lot of respect in Tom Delay as a leader.
I'd like to hear the community sound out the Free Trade issue. If you disagree with me on any or all of my points, go to work typing. Please recommend for visibility so that we can fight this one out -- it's completely unresolved within the party as far as I can see. And please guys, try to keep it civil. You don't enlighten yourself or others by screaming past each other.