You cant make an omelette without breaking eggs. George Orwell, when confronted with the argument, immediately pointed out that you should ask to see the omelette.
Trinidad is bidding to host the headquarters of the FTAA Permanent Secretariat. Other cities bidding are: Atlanta, Georgia; Cancun, Mexico; Chicago, Illinois; Galveston, Texas; Houston, Texas; Miami, Florida; Panama City, Panama; Puebla, Mexico; and San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Bahamas and 14 other CARICOM nations have promised to support Trinidad and Tobago.
From the Ministry of Trade website: "It is undeniable that Trinidad and Tobago possesses the ideal environment to host this prestigious organization. Our neutrality in the region is a plus, and we can easily be regarded as the "Brussels" of the FTAA, presenting the least threat to the super powers of the region. These factors are reinforced by our strategic position at the convergence point of the Caribbean, linking the English speaking north with the Spanish-speaking south, thus making this country the natural home for the FTAA Secretariat."
What verbage ... as I understand it, free trade is an increase in the flow of goods and services across national boundaries that will improve the average standard of living of people on both sides of a border. Will the FTAA do this? I can hear the eggs cracking...
The above is based in the law of comparative advantage which maintains that, under free trade, people in each country will concentrate on producing or providing those things that can be produced or provided most effectively and inexpensively relative to other countries.
As a result, gains in efficiency, in real income, and in GDP are expected in each country; costs are reduced because investment is spread over a larger market of all the countries in a trade agreement; and procedures, processes, and operations become more efficient due to international competition.
These results of free trade between nations are expected to raise the standard of living in nations participating in a trade agreement. This is the concept of free trade, the concept behind NAFTA, the FTAA's grandpappy, but also a concept debated and, at times, rejected by some economists, particularly those favoring trade liberalization instead of free-trade agreements. Didn't work with NAFTA, ask Mexico.
True free trade between countries is beneficial and rarely complicated, but the FTAA does not promote free trade. It furthers government control of trade, as well as industrial, environmental and taxation regulation. You know what our TT government does with control of money which, if we get even a small piece of the pie, is what it simmers down to. Like bhagi ...
If we look at NAFTA, we can see:
Worker Displacement: Occurs when a worker must acquire different, enhanced, or new skills in order to maintain a present job, or must secure a different job in his or her company. This requires retraining, sometimes at the worker's expense, extended periods of time between jobs, and possibly entering the new job at a level lower than the worker occupied at the previous job. Flour Mills, TSTT, (whenever the Telecom RFP's come out), Petrotrin, Trinmar. Note, the FTAA aint here yet.
Loss of Job: Occurs when the employer is unable to compete in the international marketplace or enhances plant and equipment to compete more effectively, thereby retaining fewer employees for the same productive operations. In short, the employee is discharged from the enterprise. This scenario may occur in those firms and industries that are labor intensive rather than capital intensive. Caroni Ltd, sorry, The Sugar Manufacturing Company to be exact.
Labor intensive enterprises will experience increasing difficulty competing against the relatively lower out of country wage rates. Given this generalization, it is reasonable to say that firms in such labor-intensive industries as furniture, glass products, shoes, and textiles may experience loss of jobs to countries like Suriname and Guyana, if we had such industries here, while such capital intensive industries as chemicals, plastics, metals, pharmaceuticals, petrochemical downstream and telecommunications may be expected to fare well in the FTAA era.
But wait! Wouldn't the US, Canadian, Mexican, Brazilian, Argentine, Venezuelan and Colombian businesses have full access to our Caricom markets? Given our TSTT and US expatriate hegemony, I dont know if this is a good thing. What about Haiti, Grenada or Dominican Republic? *gasp* Cuba?
Loss of Industry: Occurs when firms are unable to compete with foreign competitors because of the lower cost structures of those competitors. In such situations, management may decide to close a firm or to relocate it from its home country to a foreign country and consider the investment in plant and equipment in the home country a sunk cost to be abandoned.
That decision is made easier when the wage rates are lower in the foreign country; when health care cost and pensions are lower; the cost of capital is low; the foreign government provides a welcoming environment that may include favorable tax treatment or government arranged financing; the labor force in the foreign country is attractive, eager to work, well educated, or amenable to training; the foreign country offers a pleasant climate and an improving infrastructure; the foreign country's political and economic structures are stable; and the foreign country offers access, as in the case of CARICOM, to an unsaturated market, and from Trinidad, a gateway to the rest of Latin America. Does it sound familiar yet?
"Trade is a positive-sum game in which all parties stand to gain, and there is no natural limit to the number of jobs that can be created by it", as written by Robert E. Reich.
This does not, however, imply that there will be no loss of jobs in some companies and in some industries as the result of FTAA. Or rises in cost of living, or an influx of migrants seeking the almighty dollar, while the educated seek opportunities elsewhere.
As usual, the rich will get richer and the poor will vote for priapically neutered moguls.
I need someone from the Ministry of Trade and Industry to tell me, the tangible benefits to Trinidad and Tobago, or if my children's university education will make me mortgage my house...for the second time. The first mortgage was taken to pay my ex-wife after she ran away with an expat. She had an American lawyer.
I cant see the omelette, maybe boiled eggs in a dirty wooden cornershop glass case. Right next to the boiled bhagi.
Trinidad is bidding to host the headquarters of the FTAA Permanent Secretariat. Other cities bidding are: Atlanta, Georgia; Cancun, Mexico; Chicago, Illinois; Galveston, Texas; Houston, Texas; Miami, Florida; Panama City, Panama; Puebla, Mexico; and San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Bahamas and 14 other CARICOM nations have promised to support Trinidad and Tobago.
From the Ministry of Trade website: "It is undeniable that Trinidad and Tobago possesses the ideal environment to host this prestigious organization. Our neutrality in the region is a plus, and we can easily be regarded as the "Brussels" of the FTAA, presenting the least threat to the super powers of the region. These factors are reinforced by our strategic position at the convergence point of the Caribbean, linking the English speaking north with the Spanish-speaking south, thus making this country the natural home for the FTAA Secretariat."
What verbage ... as I understand it, free trade is an increase in the flow of goods and services across national boundaries that will improve the average standard of living of people on both sides of a border. Will the FTAA do this? I can hear the eggs cracking...
The above is based in the law of comparative advantage which maintains that, under free trade, people in each country will concentrate on producing or providing those things that can be produced or provided most effectively and inexpensively relative to other countries.
As a result, gains in efficiency, in real income, and in GDP are expected in each country; costs are reduced because investment is spread over a larger market of all the countries in a trade agreement; and procedures, processes, and operations become more efficient due to international competition.
These results of free trade between nations are expected to raise the standard of living in nations participating in a trade agreement. This is the concept of free trade, the concept behind NAFTA, the FTAA's grandpappy, but also a concept debated and, at times, rejected by some economists, particularly those favoring trade liberalization instead of free-trade agreements. Didn't work with NAFTA, ask Mexico.
True free trade between countries is beneficial and rarely complicated, but the FTAA does not promote free trade. It furthers government control of trade, as well as industrial, environmental and taxation regulation. You know what our TT government does with control of money which, if we get even a small piece of the pie, is what it simmers down to. Like bhagi ...
If we look at NAFTA, we can see:
Worker Displacement: Occurs when a worker must acquire different, enhanced, or new skills in order to maintain a present job, or must secure a different job in his or her company. This requires retraining, sometimes at the worker's expense, extended periods of time between jobs, and possibly entering the new job at a level lower than the worker occupied at the previous job. Flour Mills, TSTT, (whenever the Telecom RFP's come out), Petrotrin, Trinmar. Note, the FTAA aint here yet.
Loss of Job: Occurs when the employer is unable to compete in the international marketplace or enhances plant and equipment to compete more effectively, thereby retaining fewer employees for the same productive operations. In short, the employee is discharged from the enterprise. This scenario may occur in those firms and industries that are labor intensive rather than capital intensive. Caroni Ltd, sorry, The Sugar Manufacturing Company to be exact.
Labor intensive enterprises will experience increasing difficulty competing against the relatively lower out of country wage rates. Given this generalization, it is reasonable to say that firms in such labor-intensive industries as furniture, glass products, shoes, and textiles may experience loss of jobs to countries like Suriname and Guyana, if we had such industries here, while such capital intensive industries as chemicals, plastics, metals, pharmaceuticals, petrochemical downstream and telecommunications may be expected to fare well in the FTAA era.
But wait! Wouldn't the US, Canadian, Mexican, Brazilian, Argentine, Venezuelan and Colombian businesses have full access to our Caricom markets? Given our TSTT and US expatriate hegemony, I dont know if this is a good thing. What about Haiti, Grenada or Dominican Republic? *gasp* Cuba?
Loss of Industry: Occurs when firms are unable to compete with foreign competitors because of the lower cost structures of those competitors. In such situations, management may decide to close a firm or to relocate it from its home country to a foreign country and consider the investment in plant and equipment in the home country a sunk cost to be abandoned.
That decision is made easier when the wage rates are lower in the foreign country; when health care cost and pensions are lower; the cost of capital is low; the foreign government provides a welcoming environment that may include favorable tax treatment or government arranged financing; the labor force in the foreign country is attractive, eager to work, well educated, or amenable to training; the foreign country offers a pleasant climate and an improving infrastructure; the foreign country's political and economic structures are stable; and the foreign country offers access, as in the case of CARICOM, to an unsaturated market, and from Trinidad, a gateway to the rest of Latin America. Does it sound familiar yet?
"Trade is a positive-sum game in which all parties stand to gain, and there is no natural limit to the number of jobs that can be created by it", as written by Robert E. Reich.
This does not, however, imply that there will be no loss of jobs in some companies and in some industries as the result of FTAA. Or rises in cost of living, or an influx of migrants seeking the almighty dollar, while the educated seek opportunities elsewhere.
As usual, the rich will get richer and the poor will vote for priapically neutered moguls.
I need someone from the Ministry of Trade and Industry to tell me, the tangible benefits to Trinidad and Tobago, or if my children's university education will make me mortgage my house...for the second time. The first mortgage was taken to pay my ex-wife after she ran away with an expat. She had an American lawyer.
I cant see the omelette, maybe boiled eggs in a dirty wooden cornershop glass case. Right next to the boiled bhagi.
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