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Ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership
The 12-nation agreement would benefit millions of people.
THE OBAMA administration released the full text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement at 4 a.m. on Nov. 5 — and it did not take long for critics to pass judgment. Having previously (and hyperbolically) taken the administration to task for negotiating the 12-nation deal in secret, they promptly denounced the actual text as a job-destroying sellout to corporations that threatens the environment, human rights and health. “In the end the TPP was worse than we thought it would be,” Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) declared, in a news release issued within eight hours of the 4,500-page document’s release.
We do not absorb quite as quickly as Mr. Pocan, but we have now gone through the TPP’s reams of legalese, which, ponderous as they may be, probably bear still more inspection in the days ahead — by the media, interest groups and Congress, which will have to pass the ultimate judgment. Like the critics, we see no big surprises. Where we part ways with them, of course, is in our view that the now-public agreement is, as advertised, a probable net plus for the United States and the Pacific Rim as a whole.
Lost in much of the debate, but eye-glazingly evident in the document’s massive tables, is its central purpose: to slash or eliminate 18,000 tariffs on goods flowing among the United States, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam, New Zealand and seven other countries. This is especially important with regard to Japan, which has never before entertained so much discussion of its notorious protectionism. We would have preferred even greater reductions in Japan’s tariffs, to take effect even more swiftly (though the text does call for absolutely no tariffs on bats, rodents, crocodiles and alligators!). Yet Japan’s acceptance of lower beef tariffs and increased importation of milk and rice represents genuine change that will benefit U.S. farmers even as it helps Prime Minister Shinzo Abe shake up his country’s moribund agricultural sector. . . .
Ratify the Trans-Pacific Partnership
The 12-nation agreement would benefit millions of people.
THE OBAMA administration released the full text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement at 4 a.m. on Nov. 5 — and it did not take long for critics to pass judgment. Having previously (and hyperbolically) taken the administration to task for negotiating the 12-nation deal in secret, they promptly denounced the actual text as a job-destroying sellout to corporations that threatens the environment, human rights and health. “In the end the TPP was worse than we thought it would be,” Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.) declared, in a news release issued within eight hours of the 4,500-page document’s release.
We do not absorb quite as quickly as Mr. Pocan, but we have now gone through the TPP’s reams of legalese, which, ponderous as they may be, probably bear still more inspection in the days ahead — by the media, interest groups and Congress, which will have to pass the ultimate judgment. Like the critics, we see no big surprises. Where we part ways with them, of course, is in our view that the now-public agreement is, as advertised, a probable net plus for the United States and the Pacific Rim as a whole.
Lost in much of the debate, but eye-glazingly evident in the document’s massive tables, is its central purpose: to slash or eliminate 18,000 tariffs on goods flowing among the United States, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam, New Zealand and seven other countries. This is especially important with regard to Japan, which has never before entertained so much discussion of its notorious protectionism. We would have preferred even greater reductions in Japan’s tariffs, to take effect even more swiftly (though the text does call for absolutely no tariffs on bats, rodents, crocodiles and alligators!). Yet Japan’s acceptance of lower beef tariffs and increased importation of milk and rice represents genuine change that will benefit U.S. farmers even as it helps Prime Minister Shinzo Abe shake up his country’s moribund agricultural sector. . . .
