Let’s talk about trade…
Rep Slaughter is sponsoring or co-sponsoring a couple of pieces of trade legislation ( H.R. 3786 Reciprocal Market Access Act and H.R. 3012, TRADE Act). I’ve been hard on Rep Slaughter with regards to health care - deservedly so I might add - but on the surface these trade bills look like something decent. Of course the devil is in the details and as details are made available we will be there.
Slaughter’s web site has a summary. Here is mine.
HR 3012 - mandates a review of all existing trade agreements. Replaces Fast track negotiation. Puts trade agreement analysis in the hands of the GAO
HR 3786 - Ensure open and fair markets woith some level of accountability if the trading partner doesn’t meet their obligations.
The best part about these bills? Well, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce hates them. What I like is that it puts or at least attempts to put the power of trade back into the hands of Congress with some measurement to determine success.
I don’t like too much centralized power in the hands of the President. It doesn’t matter if that person is George W. Bush where more harm will come than good or Barack Obama where more good will come than harm.
Related posts:
Thanks for posting this– it is good to see that someone in Congress is focusing on it.
And what Louise is proposing looks pretty good.
But I think you can make it simpler, even: free trade with every nation. No tariffs. But there will be five penalties, each of which is 100% of the goods’ value:
* If the originating country does not have equivalent free trade laws
* If the originating country does not have sufficient labor protection and minimum wage laws
* If the originating country does not have sufficient environmental protection
* If the originating country does not have sufficient consumer safety enforcement of manufactured goods
* If the originating country has unfair currency valuation measures in place
By my count, China is five for five. Starting tomorrow, Chinese goods would increase to six times their current cost.
Any country that wishes to participate may– they need only pay some nominal amount ($10M per annum?) to fund the overhead of the GAO certifying their compliance with the four points. Else, they are assumed to be in violation of all five.