Blame ills on NAFTA not the NMI

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has helped new entrepreneurs start their own US-based businesses and has become “a gateway to the American dream”, according to a recent AP news article.

“Five years after it started tearing down trade barriers between the US, Canada and Mexico, NAFTA has become a survival-of-the-fittest test for businesses and farmers. “Big, innovative producers that have adapted to changing market conditions have prospered. Smaller producers sticking to old methods sometimes have been trampled.

“For labor, it’s been more of a toss-up. New jobs have been created; old jobs have been lost.

“Those who opposed NAFTA and warned, like Ross Perot, of a ‘giant sucking sound’ of US jobs moving to Mexico say time has proven them right. Advocates say the benefits have outweighed the drawbacks.

“Both sides use statistics to support their case. The AFL-CIO estimates between 300,000 to 400,000 American jobs have gone to Mexico since 1994”.

Essentially, the NAFTA agreement, US labor unions say, has moved jobs south to Mexico. “Companies that have moved more of their operations to Mexico since NAFTA include Zenith Electronics Corp., Nintendo of America, Mattel, Sara Lee Knit Products, Vanity Fair Mills and Pendleton Wooten Mills.”

“Luring business to Mexico is the lower cost of labor. While the wages for production workers in the US have grown steadily, those of Mexican workers have fallen, after adjustment for inflation, since the 1995 economic crisis. Mexico’s minimum wage is only $3.40 per day. The minimum wage in the US is, in comparason, $5.15 an hour.”

“NAFTA advocates say the treaty didn’t cause the the jobs to leave the country. They say companies looking for lower wages can just as easily take their plantsto such other low-wage countries as China, India or the Dominican Republic”. Said US Ambassador to Mexico Jeffrey Davidow: “What is affecting American workers is the process of globalization”.

It is ironic that it was the Clinton Administration who pushed hard for the approval of the NAFTA Agreement in Congress. Even more ironic is the Clinton boys’ lamed claim that our garment industry here has caused the loss of American jobs when in fact the very agreement championed by their embattled boss has forced such exodus.
If I may reiterate how federal policy on finished garment products from the NMI have changed from an all out encouragement that we employ the benefits of Headnote 3-A to a wasteful confrontation where US Department of Interior’s Office of Insular Affairs has seen fit to use US mainland taxpayers money to lobby against the NMI.

This federal flip-flop on policy is the most unstabling and discouraging factor for investors planning to establish businesses here. The fatal effect has forced current investors too to rethink whether to infuse more of their hard earned investments here or head out the door to more stable investment venues in nearby Asian countries. I’ve seen this happen and have heard their expressions quizzing which way the ball would bounce on a vicious agenda to takeover these islands. I can guarantee most would instantly shut their doors and join the Luggage Brigade relocate to places where labor is cheap.

As this vicious agenda continues, I recently saw a press release from the US Department of Interior lambasting the NMI about labor reform. But then, it’s an article so designed to distort the truth on our dedicated efforts and accomplishments in this area to which one can easily detect the masterful job of evil spinmasters. Who was it that said Clinton has surrounded himself with spinmasters who now can’t figure out how to save their boss from the impending trial in the US Senate on perjury and obstruction of justice?