Free Trade: Obama

Now that I’ve posted where both candidates stand on free trade, let’s dissect.
Sen. Barack Obama is saying that he’d “amend” NAFTA and if you go by his debate with Sen. Hillary Clinton in Ohio he’d use the leverage of opting out entirely to get it renegotiated. NAFTA needs tweaking but having NAFTA as is, is still better than having no NAFTA at all. NAFTA wasn’t “oversold” to the American people, it was badly legislated. Saying he’d work with Mexico and Canada to make sure it benefitted “American workers” would probably have to be done in such a way that it would hurt Canadian and Mexican workers so it isn’t likely that either country would be looking forward to renegotiating it. Whether he says he wants to amend or end NAFTA, it isn't likely either happens. His stance on this is most likely far more campaign rhetoric than not. Not even many Democrats in Congress are talking one way or the other about NAFTA. He must continue to say it hasn’t been ideal for North American workers however because people in Michigan and a lot of states in heartland of this country blame NAFTA for most if not all of their economic problems. It may very well be a reason why Sen. Obama has made strides in some Mid-West states.

Mr. Obama says that he’d want to create “flexible education accounts”. This concept sounds intriguing and hopefully he’ll be asked to elaborate on it. One could be reaching but it is possible he is talking about something similar to private health care accounts where a worker can put pre-tax money into it that acts like a savings account which can be used only to pay hospital bills. He may be thinking it should be funded by our federal government. He may think the companies should fund such accounts. He could think the government and the companies should fork out the cash, maybe even the worker as well. The companies in the long run would still save money by having to pay for some or even all of it if the job(s) are being lost due to outsourcing.

“…providing retraining assistance for workers in sectors of the economy vulnerable to dislocation before they lose their jobs” The key thing here is that he recognizes it must happen before the job is lost. If you act before someone looses their job they are far more likely to not end up on unemployment or if they do, not be on it as long as someone that waits to retrain after he/she looses the job. Obviously this is needed but which sectors of our economy does he see as vulnerable? A huge chunk of the United States manufacturing jobs are already gone, the “big three” car companies are still losing money, and most tech support (phone, e-mail, instant chat support) jobs are overseas. There are plenty of sectors left that could stand to outsource.

“He will use trade agreements to spread good labor and environmental standards around the world…” This is what agreements like NAFTA and others are already doing. Now one could fairly and accurately argue that such standards aren’t being met quickly enough, specifically in regards to China. Although it is a slow process, in the end, free trade agreements will achieve this goal as long as governments don't try to retract them. India is actually a prime example as to how much free trade helps raise the quality of living around the world. They've recently reached a point where they feel capable of nuclear power plants; with our help of course. That wasn’t imaginable 15-20 years ago.

Obama is right to point out that better enforcement of trade agreements is needed and that some governments are subsidizing foreign exporters. The United States has removed too many tariffs as some countries we trade with still have tariffs against us. We should be having no tariffs solely with those that don’t impose them on us but work to get tariffs out of the way with every country.

Sadly, or rather typically, Obama hasn't been all that specific about free trade. Some very important questions as to his opinions of free trade and how he'd do things differently need to be answered. This blogger plans on e-mailing his campaign with some questions regarding his stance on free trade, obviously I'll pass on any information given if they actually respond.