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from the not-surrendering-to-corporations-for-now dept.
Common Dreams reports
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said [August 25] that the U.S. Senate will not vote on the 12-nation, corporate-friendly Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) this year, buoying progressive hopes that the trade deal will never come to fruition.
[...] McConnell told a Kentucky State Farm Bureau breakfast in Louisville that the agreement, "which has some serious flaws, will not be acted upon this year".
Common Dreams also reports
Germany's Vice Chancellor and Economic Minister said that the controversial Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) has "de facto failed", admitting that negotiations between the U.S. and E.U. have completely stalled.
"Negotiations with the U.S. have de facto failed because, of course, as Europeans, we couldn't allow ourselves to submit to American demands", Sigmar Gabriel told the German news station ZDF [1][2] in an interview that will air at 7pm German time [August 28], according to Der Spiegel. [1]
"Everything has stalled", Gabriel said.
[1] In German [2] Content behind scripts
Reported by BBC, in English.
In 14 rounds of talks, the two sides had not agreed on a single common chapter out of 27 being discussed, Mr Gabriel said. "In my opinion the negotiations with the United States have de facto failed, even though nobody is really admitting it," said Mr Gabriel.
He suggested Washington was angry about a deal the EU struck with Canada, because it contained elements the US does not want to see in the TTIP.
(Score: 2) by schad on Monday August 29 2016, @02:24PM
The only problem I have with these trade deals is when they're not between "equals." Which, unfortunately, is usually the entire point of them.
If the stable, developed economies of the world -- US, Canada, UK, Germany, France, the Scandihoovians, Japan, etc. -- if they all want to get together and make a free-trade agreement, I'm fine with it. You don't save a lot of money by shifting production from one country to the other unless there's a true natural advantage (e.g. maple syrup is, and always will be, cheaper to produce in Canada). And I think we want countries to focus their efforts on producing things where they have a natural advantage, rather than wasting resources trying to grow rice in a desert (for example).
But please stop trying to include, on the same terms, unstable or developing countries/regions like Mexico, Eastern Europe, China, India, and arguably even "south Western Europe" (Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal). We can negotiate trade agreements with those countries, but the rules have got to be different.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Monday August 29 2016, @10:21PM
I live in one of these "equal" countries, a stable wealthy (by world standards) democracy.
Unfortunately, we have nothing to offer in these "negotiations" because we export milk and tourism.
Tourism's fine, we have a unique offering and people from around the world love to visit.
Dairy products are a real problem because our totally professional, unsubsidised farmers have to compete against US, Canadian and European dairy farmers who live off subsidies.
The Canadians were particularly difficult in the TPP negotiations, they didn't even try to negotiate, they are going to continue to subsidise dairy farmers, and they don't care.
Much like the Japanese rice farmers. It makes no economic sense to grow rice in Japan, but there is some nationalist argument for doing it, so they're going to continue to subsidise it.
Here in New Zealand we view farms as businesses. They need to make a profit to survive.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday August 30 2016, @09:00AM
Farm subsidies are a tricky one, because they're bundled up in national security. A bunch of countries (the UK in particular) learned during the Second World War how important it is to be able to produce enough food that you can feed your own people. The farm subsidies don't exist to make the farms useful, they are there to keep them in existence and with skilled farmers so that they can quickly be made useful if it looks as if trade is going to be disrupted.
Note that a complete blockade scenario is not the only kind of threat. Significantly devaluing your currency (for example, as the result of 52% of your population voting to try to kill the economy in a referendum) will also make imports more expensive and can have a similar effect from the perspective of the poorer segments of the population.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 31 2016, @01:13AM
Yes farms are special, people need to eat. Banks are also special, if your banks fail you're screwed, and technology, and weapons, and research for new weapons, and resources - can't be allowed to run out of them, anything high tech - don't want those commie backdoors, medicines, also kitchen sinks, etc.
Is there anything that isn't vitally important should your country be blockaded or trade is otherwise disrupted?
All thats left is rich countries exploiting poorer countries to make useless widgets for the cheapest possible price while not allowing them to move up the value chain or actually compete with the already rich, because 'national security'.