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"Free Trade" Kills Jobs

image from www.aflcio.orgDespite promises that free trade agreements would increase job creation in the U.S., close to 700,000 jobs have been lost as a result of the passage of NAFTA in 1993, according to a new study by Economic Policy Institute senior economist Robert Scott.

According to the analysis, if NAFTA had not been enacted, tariffs on goods passing between the two countries not eliminated, and important features of Mexico's social welfare state not eradicated in 1994, U.S. trade with Mexico would have supported approximately 1.5 million jobs in 2010 in the U.S.

That number came in at just under 800,000 last year, however. In other words, on average more than 40,000 jobs in the U.S. have been lost each year since the passage of NAFTA due to the growing trade deficit with that country.

The study further noted that "[e]ven if increased demand in other sectors absorbs all the workers displaced by trade (an unlikely event), job quality is likely to suffer, as many non-trade-related industries … pay lower wages and have less comprehensive benefits than trade-related industries."  MORE

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