Details Emerge on Big Biz Role in Trade Talks
In an eye-opening piece on how high-level politics play out behind the closed doors most of us never got to peek behind, National Journal reporter Chris Frates tracks the plays and the players who put together the just-passed, job-killing Korea, Colombia and Panama trade deals.
For those who don’t believe the power and influence of Big Business , Frates’ story will change their minds. It tells the story of how the business community secretly influenced the trade deals. He writes:
Far outside the public eye, the business community essentially acted as a shadow party to the bilateral talks. Industry lobbyists worked both governments for information, pushed to keep the talks alive, and offered solutions to clear roadblocks and find a middle ground. The industry groups didn’t all have the same agendas—some considered the Colombia pact a must-have priority, while others worried that fights over Colombia and Panama could jeopardize passage of the far bigger deal with Korea. But the business groups formed a united front in pushing for all three deals simultaneously…Almost all of the maneuvering took place in secret, and few of the details ever spilled into the public.
Click here for a longer excerpt from the story (subscription needed for the full article.)
Report: Colombia ‘Action Plan’ Fails to End Violence, Improve Workers’ Rights
Colombia’s Labor Action Plan that was billed as a major step to ending violence against trade unionists and protecting the right of workers to come together in unions “has failed to achieve improvements on the ground for Colombia’s working families,” a new AFL-CIO report finds.
As a result, workers who wish to better their lives by forming a union and bargaining collectively continue to be the victims of threats and violent acts, including murder. Moreover, Colombian law continues to provide broad avenues to deny workers the ability to exercise their most basic rights.
With Congress expected to vote on a free trade agreement with Colombia this month, the AFL-CIO has distributed the report—”The Ineffectiveness of Colombia’s Action Plan”—to key lawmakers. Click here to download the report.
The action plan was agreed to between Colombia and the United States in April in hopes of swaying opponents of the trade deal. The Colombian government said it would issue new laws, regulations and other measures aimed at ensuring workers’ rights, stopping the violence against trade unionists and bringing those behind the deadly violence to justice. But there was nothing in the action plan that required Colombia to show improvements in workers’ rights and a reduction or end to the violence before a trade agreement could be approved.
Workers Take to Capitol Hill to Stop Korea, Colombia and Panama Trade Deals
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Virginia Hewitt has seen firsthand how bad trade deals kill good jobs. Hewitt worked for 14.5 years at the Salina, Kan., Hawker Beechcraft plant building private jets. But little more than a year ago, she and most of the nearly 600 Machinists (IAM) Local 7090 members saw their jobs shipped to Mexico.
“I know about bad trade deals. I had to leave my house, sell my things and move to Georgia because of bad trade deals.”
Hewitt was one of the more 200 union members who came to Capitol Hill today to tell their home state lawmakers to vote “No” on proposed trade deals with Korea, Colombia and Panama. They told their senators and representatives Congress needs to focus on job-creating legislation like President Obama’s American Jobs Act, not job-killing trade deals.
The rally was part of the AFL-CIO’s mobilization to stop the trade agreements that included today’s National Call In Day to tell Congress to stop the trade deals. (There’s still time: Call your member of Congress at 1-800-718-1008. You also can send your message via e-mail by clicking here.)
According to the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), the Korea trade deal will cost 159,000 U.S. jobs while Panama routinely tramples workers’ rights and shelters money launderers and tax dodgers.
Craig Ashford, a member of IAM Local 1414 in San Mateo, Calif., says the United States should not reward a nation like Colombia where more trade unionists are killed than any other nation on the globe with special trade privileges.
Trumka: America Faces Historic Decisions that Will Shape Our Future
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America is facing historic choices that will shape our economy, our society and our democracy for decades to come, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said today.
Speaking at the prestigious Brookings Institution, he said, “Our nation does not have a debt crisis. We have a jobs crisis.”
America isn’t broke. Our nation’s basic promise—an ever-rising, ever-widening prosperity—is being broken.
It is being broken by three decades of a contradictory economic strategy based on low wages and consumption, he said. As a result, the rich have gotten much richer, the poor have gotten poorer and those left in the middle are struggling to hang on. U.S. trade policies have decimated our nation’s manufacturing base and our tax policies promote inequality.
AFL-CIO: No Colombia Trade Deal Until Violence Ends
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The violence against workers is continuing in Colombia despite the labor action plan that President Juan Manuel Santos agreed to in April. Until that violence ends, the United States should not approve the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said.
In a letter today to President Obama, Trumka also says Colombia is suppressing the rights of indigenous people and the country’s minority Afro-Colombian community.
Documentary: CAFTA Led to Workers’ Rights Violations in Honduras
Ever since it was passed five years ago, the Central America Free Trade Agreement-Dominican Republic (CAFTA-DR) has led to an increase in unemployment, violations of worker rights and discrimination against women in Honduras, according to an about-to-be-released documentary.
In late July, members of the advocacy group STITCH hosted an all-women’s labor solidarity delegation to Honduras to assess the impact of CAFTA-DR on women in the region. During the 10-day delegation, participants met with women union leaders in various industries, including women in the textile and banana sectors, as well as women leaders from the Honduran National Resistance Front.
Report: Trade Deficit with China Costs 2.8 Million Jobs
The U.S.-China trade deficit has eliminated or displaced nearly 2.8 million jobs, mainly in manufacturing, following that country’s entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, according to a study released today. View an interactive map of jobs lost throughout the United States here.
“Growing U.S. trade deficit with China cost 2.8 million jobs between 2001 and 2010” by Robert Scott, EPI’s director of trade and manufacturing policy research, finds that all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico suffered jobs lost or displaced as a result of the growing U.S.-China trade deficit.
The report cites illegal currency manipulation as a major cause of the trade deficit. Unlike other currencies, the Chinese yuan does not fluctuate freely against the dollar, but is artificially pegged in order to boost China’s exports.
WTO Upholds Obama’s Tire Industry Relief Decision
The World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) Appellate Body yesterday upheld President Obama’s decision based on U.S. trade law to provide relief for American tire industry workers against surging imports from China of passenger and light truck tires.
In September 2009, Obama became the first president to enforce U.S. trade law when he imposed tariffs to protect domestic workers against a surge in tire imports from China. The original complaint came from the United Steelworkers (USW), and Obama’s decision led to a rebound in the tire industry.
U.S. Ratchets Up Pressure on Guatemala to Enforce Labor Laws
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The Obama administration is ratcheting up the pressure on Guatemala to enforce its labor laws. Yesterday, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) announced it was moving forward with arbitration against Guatemala for violating fundamental labor rights under the Dominican Republic-Central American Free Trade Agreement (DR-CAFTA).
Arbitration would be the third step in the process outlined under the DR-CAFTA, to compel a nation to enforce its labor obligations under the agreement. Last May, the United States requested a meeting of the Free Trade Commission—which includes ministers of the member countries—when consultations failed to resolve the dispute. The commission met last June.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka applauds the decision, saying it protects workers’ safety and voices. Read his full statement here.
Don’t Pass Colombia Deal Until Real Changes Are Made
The AFL-CIO remains strongly opposed to the proposed U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement “until Colombia takes sustained, meaningful, and measurable action to change the culture of violence that plagues those who work to better their lives,” AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said in a letter to Congress yesterday.
Although the administration of Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos has abandoned the heated, anti-union rhetoric of his predecessor and has engaged in apparently good-faith efforts to improve the environment for working men and women, Trumka says, Colombia is still the most dangerous place in the world for union members.
The 51 trade unionists killed in 2010 represented an increase over the murders of trade unionists in 2009 and 17 have been killed in 2011, including 10 just since the announcement of the Obama administration’s “Labor Action Plan,” in April.
