I am not against free trade per se, it has its benefits in expanding markets and bringing our world together. When people are trading with each other and making money, they are much less likely to wage war on each other. However, we should not uncritically accept free trade deals.
Continue readingTag: free trade
Politics, Re-Spun: Cheap T-Shirts Keep Harper in Power
Whenever I read stories about corporations wanting to do the right thing, I never hold my breath. Clothing corporations, the sector where “sweatshops” originates, want us to believe they care. They don’t. Read what nonsense they are trying to peddle to get us off their back for exploiting people so
Continue readingParchment in the Fire: NAFTA at 20: State of the North American Worker
Twenty years since its passage, NAFTA has displaced workers on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border, depressed wages, weakened unions, and set the terms of the neoliberal global economy. By Jeff Faux, December 13, 2013. Foreign Policy In Focus is partnering with Mexico’s La Jornada del campo magazine, where an earlier
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Canada-Europe Deal Not About Trade
I have the following letter to the editor in today’s Prince Albert Daily Herald: Canada-Europe Deal Not About Trade In their letter of Dec. 3, Darryl Hickie and other Sask. Party MLAs back away from his previous claim that the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) between Canada and the
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Wordsmithing 80,000 Jobs
Last week’s federal throne speech stated, “The Government will soon complete negotiations on a comprehensive economic and trade agreement with the European Union [CETA]. This agreement has the potential to create 80,000 new Canadian jobs.” There has since been a subtle but important shift in the government’s wording around that
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Canada’s Trade Deficit with the EU Doubles
On last night’s Lang & O’Leary Exchange, I debunked the claim that the trade deal between Canada and the European Union (EU) will create 80,000 Canadian jobs. The conservative panelists did not even try to defend this figure (see this CBC video, starting at 15:45). As Jim Stanford has previously
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Naomi Klein urges unions to join climate change fight
In a speech delivered at the founding convention of Canada’s new super-union, UNIFOR, award-winning journalist, best selling author and activist, Naomi Klein, urged unions to take action on climate change and stopping free trade. The post Naomi Klein urges unions to join climate change fight appeared first on The Canadian
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Can Canadians Really “Buy Into” Mexico?
A recent investment advice column in the Globe and Mail (by David Milstead, August 3) highlighted some surprising facts about Mexico’s economy. The bullish author suggested Mexico will be a global economic powerhouse in future years thanks to pro-business policy shifts (like the new plan to open up the petroleum
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Will CETA Help Tories… Or Hurt Them??
With Prime Minister Harper making the diplomatic rounds in Europe, media interest has heightened this week regarding the potential free trade agreement which his government is trying to negotiate with the European Union. Several deadlines to reach that deal have come and gone, but the Conservatives are still heavily committed
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: Why Is Harper So Fervent About Free Trade?
Much has been written about the Harper government’s obsession with concluding a variety of trade deals; probably one of the most worrisome in terms of its implications for Canadian sovereignty, jobs, environmental protection and culture is the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) that Canada is pursuing with the European
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Off track betting #nlpoli
That big, ginormous phone-banging-up, trade dispute thingy with evil Ottawa? So not happening any more. "We seem to be back on track. We have alignment," Premier Kathy Dunderdale told reporters on Tuesday at an event announcing fitness grants to community groups. (Read more…)
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: If they, do it is wrong #nlpoli
On Monday, Kathy Dunderdale said it was wrong for the federal government to try and jam her up by connecting the federal loan guarantee on Muskrat Falls to free trade talks, Kathy Dunderdale acknowledged on Friday that she has been connecting the free trade talks to search and rescue. When
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Dunderdale and Dalley tell different trade talk stories #nlpoli
Premier Kathy Dunderdale (via NTV): We’re looking for a ‘carve-out’ on the minimum processing regulations … so they’ll be exempted, and we want access to the European market on a number of our fish lines… Carve out. Hideous jargon for “not going to trade away” minimum processing regulations. Period. Fisheries
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Polozogistics: Nine Thoughts About the Choice of the New Bank of Canada Governor
1. He’s Number Two: Stephen Poloz was widely acknowledged in economic and political circles as the second-best choice for the top job at the Bank of Canada. So the surprise was not that he was chosen. The surprise was, Why Not Tiff Macklem? Will someone please find out and tell
Continue readingThe Ranting Canadian: In grade 9 or 10 French class, we had an assignment to write a…
In grade 9 or 10 French class, we had an assignment to write a page of text in French and accompany it with some graphics. I chose to write about the French Revolution, and for the picture, I cut out magazine photos of Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan and Brian Mulroney
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: A Warning for Post-Mulroney Canada
The Conservative heavens aligned and brought us the magic of Thatcher, Reagan and Mulroney. The Gang of Three then introduced us to the new era of free trade, outsourcing and the wonders of the new, “knowledge economy.” In the new era we wouldn’t toil with our hands any more but
Continue readingThe Ranting Canadian: Jim Flaherty, the most incompetent finance minister in Canadian…
Jim Flaherty, the most incompetent finance minister in Canadian history, released his pathetic 2013 budget on March 21 and almost immediately snuck off to Hong Kong, en route to Thailand. He only stopped in Vancouver along the way – to give a scripted speech to an exclusive audience of Conservative-friendly
Continue readingThe Ranting Canadian: Interview with Glen “the Hamilton Kid” of the Steeltown Spoilers
Interview with Glen “the Hamilton Kid” of the Steeltown Spoilers: The above link is to an interview with Glen “the Hamilton Kid” of the punk band Steeltown Spoilers. Glen talks about his band of course, but he also discusses the economic decline and political destruction of the city he loves.
Continue readingThe Disaffected Lib: It’s Time that Canada Found a New/Old Economy
By the time you’re in your 60s you’ve developed a sense of a certain cadence to life, something like a master Circadien rhythm that regulates life on our planet. Every now and then something happens and mankind skips a quarter or half a beat. That’s what happened in the Great
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Precariously Employed
The other day I made reference in a post to a study showing that half of the workers in the GTA are precariously employed, meaning they have unstable and unreliable employment with no benefits, a reality sharply at odds with the triumphalism of the right over the putative unalloyed good
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