Disadvantages of Free Trade for Canada: For every upside, there is a downside, and this certainly is the case for free trade in Canada. The successes listed above, also appeared in the United States and Mexico, which impacted our country. For every job that was created for them, some were lost elsewhere. Ontario, in result of jobs created elsewhere,:
Lost hundreds of thousands of good manufacturing jobs. Those jobs went to States in the U.S. where unions are made weak by legislation, and to Mexico where unions are made weak by free trade zones where union rights are virtually nonexistent. Formerly Canadian products can now be made in low wage states, where unions are virtually banned, and there are no inconvenient social protections like occupational health and safety rules, or public health care, quality education, or decent social assistance rates; and then these products can be sold back into Canada without tariffs or any kind of barriers.
Admittedly, during NAFTA 's first nine years, employment in Canada grew by over 19% but this period of Canadian job gains under NAFTA should be set against the prior, six-year period, of heavy job losses under CUFTA. Between CUFTA and NAFTA, from 1988 - 1994, Canada lost 334,000 manufacturing jobs, equivalent to 17% of total manufacturing employment in the year before CUFTA came into effect. In 2002, Canada was “marked by a superficially impressive increase of 560,000 jobs in Canada, but 40% of them were part-time and another 17%
A quarter of Canadian jobs rely on trade directly, when you add indirect jobs, almost half of Canadian jobs rely on trade. There is a lot of jobs that rely on Trade and when you limit trading by not signing NAFTA, there will be less trade thus fewer jobs. So having free trade increases the trading volume and it creates the need for more jobs and keeps unemployment rate low. The termination of NAFTA could see up to 100 thousand job loss in a two-year span with many more being heavily affected. The Conference Board of Canada predicts that if NAFTA was terminated, 85 thousand jobs would be lost in the first year and then the following year would see a loss of 6 thousand jobs and then be adding up to 91 thousand jobs lost in two years. This is also due to the decreased investment that would occur into Canadian businesses since the security NAFTA gave to Canadian Businesses to the American market would be gone. Having a secure access into the American market allows for accessibility to more consumers, without this it is hard for a Canadian business to expand its company. The lack of secure access to the market hinders the ability for Canada to attract investments causing troubles in expansion due to the tariffs that would be
Despite dire predictions of American jobs flowing to Mexico, the U.S. economy has grown significantly since the implementation of NAFTA. The Canadian and Mexican economies have thrived as well.
With trade increasing in Canada, on the one hand, it increases the demand for more people to do the work, which means that more people get a job and have more money to spend on goods that are imported from other countries. On the other hand, Canadian companies in different divisions from automotive, to energy, to agriculture(www.theglobeandmail.com) have to hire more people that are able to work because there are more products that should people to deal with between trade and with Canadian companies are becoming more profitable, it has more money to hire more people. For example, jobs are increased in the area of transportation in order to get the products to the stores. According to the fact, the agreement has helped produce over 1.8 million new jobs for Canadians at first 5 years of NAFTAs existence (www.nafta.ca). However, NAFTA makes huge damage for the Canadian automotive industry because with a stronger automotive union, every year will require higher wages, which slows process and makes it inflexible and expensive (www.international.gc.ca). Although NAFTA hurts the auto industry in Canada, it brings more benefits to Canada because it decrease the unemployment and improve the Canadian economy and condition of
The North American Free Trade Agreement, commonly known as the NAFTA, is a trade agreement between the United States, Canada and Mexico launched to enable North America to become more competitive in the global marketplace (Amadeo, 2011). The NAFTA is regarded as “one of the most successful trade agreements in history” for its impact on increases in agricultural trade and investment among the three contracting nations (North American Free Trade Agreement, 2011). Supporters and opponents of the NAFTA have argued the effects of the agreement on participating nations since its inception; yet, close examination proves that NAFTA has had a relatively positive impact on the economies of the United States, Canada, and Mexico.
Investopedia.com states, “free trade is the economic policy of not discriminating against imports from and exports to foreign jurisdictions. (Buyers and sellers from separate economies may voluntarily trade without the domestic government applying tariffs, quotas, subsidies or prohibitions on their goods or services.)” In the previous decade, one of the many controversial subjects in the Canadian economy included whether or not it was beneficial for our federal government to eradicate free trade or open it up to other nations. During my research, I discovered that free trade agreements between Canada and other nations were not as beneficial as they may have seemed for they were often business and market oriented.
Canada’s economy was once solely reliant on the exportation of raw materials, such as furs and timber, to Great Britain and Western Europe. Aside from this exportation of raw materials, Canada was largely agricultural in nature. By the time of Confederation, fifty-percent of labour remained agriculturally based (Krahn, Lowe, Hughes, 2008). Changes occurred around 1900; the industrial era replaced the once mainly agricultural and small-scale local production of times past by way of new technologies in the form of electricity, steam powered engines, railways, water wheels, etc. These tools allowed for the re-organization of work from piecework and compensation, based on individual output, to one of large manufacturing plants, high-production, specialized workers, and hourly pay. This industrial era has now morphed into one of new technologies and new careers; careers based in services. The dominance of a service-based economy is prevalent as around 75% of all employment in Canada was in services circa 2005(HRSDC,
Besides a relatively non-competitive business environment, Canada?s labour force also lacks the competitive mindset. Structural employment remains high, which is partly due to the existence of social assistance and unemployment insurance systems. Work incentives are low under the protection of the employment insurance program, which indirectly contributes in a higher than the desirable unemployment rate. Furthermore, unions and other similar groups do not promote many incentives for workers to stay competitive in the workplace by continuously learning and improving productivity. Countries that have been most successful in cutting unemployment are those that have improved
Canada is currently sitting at a population of over 30 million people and is ranked 11th in the world in terms of exports (Canada: Economic Freedom, 2017). The economy in the country seems to be thriving very well with many skilled workers and plenty of jobs for most individuals in the civilian labor force. For the most part, Canada has always done pretty well in terms of having a successful economy. Starting in the early 50s Canada was thriving primarily off of the waterways unlike today the country thrives off selling petroleum, cars, and other things other countries need and want. Although this shift from a farm based economy too much more industrialization did not happen until after the Great War, it wasn't until the 1920s until Canada
An important part of managing the economic status of a nation is to manage the methods in which goods and services are imported and exported into and out of the country. Because of differing resources, labor costs, and government support of industry, fiscal policy sometimes includes placing a tariff on imported goods in an attempt to level the economic playing field.
Clearly NAFTA has led to widespread job loss, with more than 200,000 U.S. workers certified as NAFTA casualties under just one narrow government program. Since the 1970's, there has been a steady trickle of
Free trade is exchange of goods and commodities between parties without the enforcement of tariffs or duties. The trading of goods between people, communities, and nations is not an innovative economic practice. Nations are however the main element within a free trade agreement. By examining free trade through three different political ideologies: Liberal, Nationalistic, and Marxist approaches, the advantages and disadvantages will become apparent. Theses three ideologies offer the best evaluation of free trade from three different perspectives.
Free traders promoted NAFTA with the belief that the transfer of low skilled jobs from the North of the continent to the South would bring about a diverse selection of cheap consumer goods. NAFTA would allow the free flow of goods, investment and services within North American to flourish.4 Despite the heated opposition to the liberalization of trade the Canadian government agreed to the trilateral agreement in 1994. Tariff
Free Trade is the ability to trade goods and services without barriers, and for prices to rise naturally through supply and demand. In theory, Free Trade was a way to break down the barriers between countries, banishing taxes and allowing prices to be naturally set through supply and demand. According to the World Trade Organization, this gives the poor countries the opportunity to specialize in the production of goods that derive from their environment and natural resources with the capacity to sell those same goods to the western world, while being able to buy back goods that may not produced in their native country. This idea is to be beneficial to all; however, the rich become richer while the poor remain poor.
”Free trade policies have created a level of competition in today's open market that engenders continual innovation and leads to better products, better-paying jobs, new markets, and increased savings and investment” (Denise Froning). Though Free trade plays a huge role in the economy today because of what and where it is used. Free trade allows for traders to trade across national boundaries and other countries without government interference. Meaning that traders have very few regulations that allow for them to do this without the government intervening. Free trade makes things for traders much easier and also allows for many more jobs in the US, such as exporting jobs, or jobs in the auto industry and plants. Though there are many
With free international trade a lot of jobs will be created in the country, especially in industries of manufacturing and services which can absorb the unemployment that created by restructuring as firms down their workforce.