CEI Adjunct Fellow Fran Smith, coauthor of the new CEI study “Free Trade without Apology,” talks about the recently passed free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea. The agreements will lower tariffs and other trade barriers between the U.S. and the other countries, and are expected to reap billions of dollars of economic benefits. The agreements also contain a number of trade-unrelated provisions, such as labor and environmental standards. These erode our trading partners’ sovereign lawmaking power, and are best avoided in future agreements.
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Congress is likely to take up stalled free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea when it returns from its August recess. Adjunct Fellow Fran Smith talks about the good and bad parts of the agreements. Billions of dollars of economic benefits are offset by trade-unrelated provisions, such as labor and environmental standards. These erode our trading partners’ lawmaking sovereignty. An increase in trade adjustment assistance also seems likely. This gives money and training to workers who lose their jobs because of international trade.
CEI Adjunct Fellow Fran Smith talks about the EU-Korea free-trade agreement that takes effect next year, and why the U.S.-Korea FTA stalled, to the economy’s detriment. Fran also talks about NAFTA’s impact on jobs, and why imports are a good thing.
As the European Union signs a trade pact with South Korea, U.S. manufacturers are calling on policymakers to approve the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement or risk losing a greater share of that lucrative export market to its competitors. U.S. goods producers note that already the EU is ahead of the U.S. in exports to Korea, and the EU trade agreement will heighten that disparity unless the U.S. ratifies its own trade pact:
The European Union (EU) will implement its FTA with Korea early next year. As a result, European manufacturers will see tariffs removed on nearly every product they export to Korea – while American manufacturers continue to face tariffs averaging nearly 12 percent. This will be a significant blow to American manufacturers — one that we can ill-afford in this economic climate. This is not an idle threat – the EU is not only a significant competitor to the United States in manufactured goods exports to Korea, they are actually ahead of us. (See chart.) With this FTA, they will reap the benefits of zero tariffs, stronger protection for investments, and the removal of myriad non-tariff barriers.
President Obama has promised to push for the U.S.-Korea FTA in mid-November. With all the talk about doubling exports in 5 years, the Korea trade pact should be on the top of his action list.
It looks like things may be moving – slowly — on the trade front. The U. S. Trade Representative has published a notice in the Federal Register asking for comments on the pending U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement.
The United States Trade Representative (USTR) is assessing how and to what extent the free trade agreement (FTA) between the United States and the Republic of Korea (Korea) signed on June 30, 2007 makes progress in achieving the applicable purposes, policies, priorities, and objectives of the Bipartisan Trade Promotion Authority Act of 2002 (”TPA Act”) (19 U.S.C. 3801 note) as set out in section 2102 of the TPA Act and carries out the provisions of the May 10, 2007 Congressional-Executive Agreement on Trade Policy.
Comments are due September 15, 2009. And, of course, comments have to be compiled and evaluated. Then, the implementing legislation for Congress to consider has to be submitted. All this, of course, is happening in an environment of increased skepticism about trade, plus an overloaded Congressional agenda, with massive health care and energy bills, not to mention the restructuring of the financial system.
Here’s some information published by CEI on the U.S. Korea trade agreement.
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