Candidate Calculator 2008 Election
Free Trade
Summary
Since the end of World War II, the United States has generally supported liberalizing international trade by eliminating artificial barriers to trade, such as tariffs, quotas and subsidies. Countries use these barriers to protect their domestic industries from foreign competition. The United States has pursued trade liberalization primarily through agreements among countries via the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). However, recently the United States has negotiated country-to-country free-trade agreements, such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Mexico and Canada. Agreements like NAFTA eliminate almost all trade restrictions among the countries in an agreement.
Yes: Support Free Trade
The net affects of free trade agreements are marginal on the U.S. economy and job market., and the claims about free trade damaging the manufacturing sector of the U.S. economy are false. In fact, 2006 was a record year for output, revenues, profits, profit rates, and return on investment in the manufacturing sector. Because the U.S. economy is so large, free trade with individual nations has a much more powerful impact upon the nations that the United States trades with than on the United States. So why advocate free trade? Because free trade is an immensely powerful foreign policy tool. It helps ensure American world influence, and world economic stability and world peace.
Through free trade, the United States can greatly improve the economies of its trading partners with a small net benefit in its economy. This is far cheaper than sending subsidies to foreign countries. Furthermore, countries that trade with the United States are far more likely to support its global policies, for fear of having the trade cut off. Through free trade, America can also promote democracy and American values. The more interconnected the United States becomes with other nations in beneficial ways, the more likely they will adopt American values and points of view.
Along the same lines, the more economically interconnected nations become, the more they have to gain from promoting world economic stability and world peace. As has long been noted, it is a preferable and more effective foreign policy to send goods to other nations, than to send soldiers.
You support this or similar arguments.
No: Against Free Trade
Free trade hurts the U.S. economy, costs the United Sates jobs and is bad for the environment. Free trade encourages industries to relocate outside of the United States where labor is cheaper, and then the United States loses jobs. Furthermore, by removing trade protections, foreign countries can more easily sell their products in the United States, creating a larger trade deficit that hurts the U.S. economy and also causes loss of jobs. Additionally, manufacturing is the most likely industry to move facilities outside of the United States to countries were environmental protections are weaker.
Free trade also has negative political and security repercussions. Free trade agreements among individual countries come at the expense of multinational trade agreements, such as through GATT and the World Trade Organization. As a result, rather than creating a level playing field worldwide, rival trading blocks will develop, centered on the United States, the European Union and Japan.
You support this or similar arguments.
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Additional Information
| Pro | Con |
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| Economic Policy Institute |
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