Talk:North American Free Trade Agreement

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Infobox

Can a Wikipedian skilled in making infoboxes make one (an infobox) for this article. The flag, name, population, GDP, etc. of the bloc could be included. Chiss Boy 13:21, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent suggestion. I got us started :-) --Iliaskarim 00:35, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Potential Flag Replacement? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:NAFTA.png (please someone with more skill than me make a better one, but the gif sucks pretty bad)Clperez390 03:24, 4 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Brintain joining NAFTA

During 2000-2002, some British politicians, particularly on the right, showed an interest in joining NAFTA, as an alternative to the European Union, which, through conformity in many social, welfare and economic aspects, was seen as restrictive to British interest. Being a key member in the latter bloc, there was much opposition to this move.ref: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2633/is_5_14/ai_66155090 I have deleted this paragraph because the article used as a reference is written by "Phil Gramm (R-Tx.) is Chairman of the U.S. Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee." and does not cite in any part of the article a single British politican, except for the ambiguous "One colorful opponent". Moreover, although we should not judge external sources, this article is full of lies, for example, any EU state can leave the European Union whenever it wants (Greenland chose to leave the Union when it got its partial independence, for example), even though it's not clear how could it be done and nobody wants to do it. If someone finds a better reference, include this part again. Sdnegel, 12:11, 17th June 2007 (UTC)

Date NAFTA was signed: to the anonymous user

Please review your concepts. NAFTA was signed in 1992, it came into effect in 1994. It couldn't have been signed in 1994 since it came into effect right on 1 January 1994. Obviously it cannot come into effect before it is signed, unless it was mysteriously signed at 00:00 on 1 January 1994, which wasn't the case. If you have any doubts, please review the following articles [1], [2] (this one by the US gov't), and finally from the NAFTA's webpage itself [3]. Please stop changing the date. NAFTA was signed 11-17 December 1992, not in 1994. --Alonso 05:02, 8 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In response to Alonso, the recorded vote on H.R. 3450, the North American Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act, was passed on December 8, 1993, and became Public Law No 103-182, in the U.S. Senate. See the Library of Congress website.-R. Ketah-Roxas.

EZLN, EPR, cut wages, Crisis of 1994, poverty and the rest, why is there not a single mention of this anywhere?

I've read through this whole page, and while yes it has been expanded, quite alot too, there is a major lack in information about opposition to it. The whole thing goes on and on about the successes, and profits, but very little on impact and the less optimistic, yet very real effects of NAFTA. And its not that there small, its just that there ommited. And suspiciously about Mexico.

These include:

The poverty rate which although steady from 1984 to 1994 at 34% fell to 65% (some even put it as high as 75%

controversial rewriting of Article 27 of the Mexican constitution

The Mexican crisis of 1994

Drop in wages (20%+ in some areas)

AND OF COURSE: the EZLN rebellion in Chiapas. (Also note, one could add the EPR conflict with this as numerous declarations of theirs cite NAFTA as a key point of their movement)

Again, the are numerous arguements against so many parts of the agreement which arent even touched on here, it really gives a strong POV appearance to the whole article when so much important issues and facts arent mentioned. I'd like to know other peoples thoughts on the matter and if they would like to assist me in adding and changing portions of it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Red Heathen (talk • contribs) 00:16, 31 January 2007 (UTC).[reply]

The question is not whether there is or isn't criticism of NAFTA (in fact an well-referenced criticism section should be added to this article), but whether some of the issues mentioned above are true, or happen to be related to NAFTA at all.

For starters, poverty rates have indeed fallen; as the article accurately portrays, and as it can be confirmed both by the World Bank 2004 report [4] (from 42.5% in 1995 to 26.3% in 2000 and decreased 7% between 2000 and 2004 to 19.3%) .Whether that is attributable to NAFTA or not, that is another matter (and a normative statement, unless a proper econometric analysis has been done). But the fact remains, poverty has indeed fallen, so we can't say poverty increased much less because of NAFTA.
References 2 and 3 point out that there is absolutely no relation between NAFTA and the 1994 crisis (occurring less than a year after the treaty had come into effect), but to a depletion of the national reserves accompanied by an overvalued peso. (See: this publication by the Institute of International Economcis, p. 8 to 11 for reference). If there are economists that argue otherwise, and a reference can be provided, then, by all means, we should add that information. Until so, and based on the references available, we cannot claim there is a relationship between the 1994 crisis and NAFTA.
Same source pages 45 shows an increase in real monthly income per worker comparing pre-NAFTA (1987) to 2003; real wages of maquiladora workers are 96.5% those of 1994, and those of non-maquiladora workers are 94.8% those of 1994. Nonetheless, the decrease is attributed to the crisis, given that since 1997 maquiladora real wage earnings have grown 28% [p. (which means that real wages do not follow a decreasing path, but had a sharp decrease caused by inflation, and then have experienced constant growth, which, arguably, imply that NAFTA didn't cause a fall in real wages [and some have argued NAFTA propelled recovery from the crisis]). Obviously, nominal wages are higher in any case. Same article shows that maquiladora real monthly income increased 15.5%.
Regarding EZLN, we should definitely mention that they oppose any sort of free trade agreement and globalization.

--the Dúnadan 00:50, 31 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

"Branch plant economy" problem

In the "Controversies" section of this article, it says that "Some politicians have opposed free trade for fear that it will turn countries, such as Canada, into permanent branch plant economies." However, in the last paragraph of the branch plant economy article, it says the exact opposite: "[...]the North American Free Trade Agreement...may bring branch plants to an end." Which is it? Foxmulder 01:32, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Text removed from "Chapter 11" section

I've removed the following text (which required a citation anyways) as a comment was added to the article today which contradicted it.

"It has been a longtime fear of some Canadians that this provision gives large U.S. companies too much power ^{[citation needed]}. There was one case where a natural gas company in Nova Scotia which pumped from Sable Island wanted to sell cheaper gas to residents in the neighboring New Brunswick (both Canadian provinces), but threats of a lawsuit over Chapter 11 stopped these plans.^{[citation needed]} ( this argument can't be from NAFTA, it's not a international dispute, they did build a pipeline and the issue might of been selling to Maine, USA, I live in the moncton area and they do sell gas here)"

I'll leave it up to the regulars as to how you wish to address this. --Ckatz^chat_spy 02:28, 21 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Comment

Disappointing. NAFTA is a causing a major loss of manufacturing jobs in the US, and most of those workers are having to resort to low pay jobs. Everyone I talk to feels negative about NAFTA, so I question those poll results for the US. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.44.28.129 (talk • contribs)

You are entitled to your opinion and to question the results. But if you want to improve this article, it is better if you provide solid references besides your own opinion and the feelings of others. --theDúnadan 02:02, 5 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Mexican Farmers

How does this line,

An influx of imports has lowered the prices for Mexican corn by more than 70% since 1994.

copied from #Impact on Mexican Farmers, relate to the recent news about famine and rising food prices because of the high demand of corn in biodiesel and ethanol? [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]

It might need to be edited with an updated figure, as it seems Mexico would really like low prices right now.

--User:Krator (t c) 23:25, 18 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Mexican Consumers would like lower corn prices, but what Mexican Producers want is a fair trading practice... What is happening is that the USA heavily subsidizes Corn production, driving small Mexican Farmers out of business. So we have come to the point where a relatively minor shortage of american corn has led to a very large price increase for tortillas in Mexico. 148.240.253.118 21:01, 9 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I fully agree with the above comment. I think FAIR has published some papers regarding the American subsidies and its effects on Mexico. They could be used as a source to insert the above statement in the article. --the Dúnadan 00:52, 10 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've tagged the section as it seems to contradict itself. The second line states that the price of corn went up, while the fourth suggests prices dropped. It may be a matter of tweaking the wording, but I'll admit I don't know enough about what the actual situation is to do the repair myself. (It seems to have changed back and forth a few times recently.) Thoughts? --Ckatz^chat_spy 22:01, 14 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

US Immgration table

Do we really need the US immigration table in this article? NAFTA is not only the US, you know. While it is related to the US, we could put a table about Mexican FTAs that includes NAFTA, or about Canadian politics. My point is, it takes so much space, and I find it unnecessary. A link from US immigration to NAFTA and viceversa could be useful, but the table gives the impression that NAFTA is all about the US and all about its immigration issues. --theDúnadan 16:35, 19 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I agree it should be deleted. In addition, I don't believe that any of the information on the history of immigration between Mexico, Canada, and the United States is necessary in this article except for possibly the 2-3 sentences that actually state anything about NAFTA's effect on immigration. The information should either be linked as See Also or moved to a new article if one does not exist. --Iliaskarim 01:37, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

good job

this article is good just giving props to all that worked on it--The brown curse 22:23, 25 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Flag

They should learn how to merge flags. The NAFTA flag looks like the second place in a kids drawing contest.

Chapter 11 Contradiction

The last paragraph of the Chapter 11 section reads thus:

"Further, it has been argued that the chapter benefits the interests of Canadian and American corporations disproportionately more than Mexican businesses, which often lack the resources to pursue a suit against the much wealthier states."

The article itself is explained above like this:

"This chapter has been invoked in cases where governments have passed laws or regulations with intent to protect their constituents and their resident businesses' profits. Language in the chapter defining its scope states that it cannot be used to "prevent a Party from providing a service or performing a function such as law enforcement, correctional services, income security or insurance, social security or insurance, social welfare, public education, public training, health, and child care, in a manner that is not inconsistent with this Chapter."

Isn't this information the opposite to what it should be? I thought that the article favours Mexico rather than Canada and America because the Mexican government has some additional protection against Canadian and American companies that wish to sue them. On the other hand, Canada and America may have some claim to defense against a Mexican company suing them, but isn't this much less likely given that Mexico can't always afford to sue Canada or America, as the article itself states? Forgive me if I just haven't seen something which is obvious, but this confuses me.