Survey finds skepticism about trade's benefits in U.S., Japan, Europe

Trade as we know it only benefits corporations. People, wages, and benefits are not even a factor. In fact less so as corporations shop for the lowest bidders. Hence the continued global sellout of ethics all to make a buck in dealing with China. No one is allowed to question trade. There needs to be a new term where trade means respect and not selling out

The public are right. NAFTA, the first major free trade deal, hasn't nearly lived up to the promises. Wages have stagnated or declined since its introduction, while Mexico lags Brazil and others in the region who opted out of trade deals.

In college, I learned "free trade theory." "Theory" is right, because there's no good evidence it actually works, except for the super rich and China.

"Americans’ skeptical view of globalization “makes all the sense in the world,”"

I fully agree.

NAFTA was a governmental sanction to move jobs out of the U.S. to Mexico. It wasn't the first step in the evisceration of the middle class, just the most obvious. TPP will do the same thing. Even if the jobs don't go to China, they will still leave Japan - for Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia, etc.....

oh man don't get me started on NAFTA. I'm Canadian and I voted for NAFTA but I have not seen the benefits of it as it continue to undermine our economy. I would not vote for it today. Every industry discussed in the 80's that it was supposed to be protected are now gone or sold or dying out. Americans are just as protectionist as ever. And it continues to erode Canadian national identity. Even more silly is our energy agreement under NAFTA, where we agreed to not have a limit on energy exports. Even Mexico was smart enough to say no to that.

Yet the media and public perception is that NAFTA was a good thing. This is the PR game that occurs with any trade agreement. As long as the 1% benefit, countries don't matter and the sheeple fall in line.

Envious of Brazil but it looks like more that they couldn't come to an agreement and as such it was ironic that it worked out for them. I'm glad it has

If companies complain that they can't be competitive and need your money then they are no longer worthy of a country, where ever that is. Let them go, and someone else will fill the void. That's what used to be called the market. Not the tax siphoning subsidy shell game that it is today

Over reliance on imports and burgeoning national debt owed foreign powers have always in the past been indicators of national decline and weakness, often followed by partial of complete loss of sovereignty. However in the past it has always been a case of the more developed nations exporting and lending to the less developed nations. So what happens next?

Simply put, free trade agreements benefit low-wage manufacturing countries like China. They depress wages and hurt high-wage countries with high-end products and economies.

Lol wow. Well this illusion is caused by the rampant socialism infesting the world political class and the propoganda they put out about everything involving economics, so this political class can tax, scam and regulate trade for their own benefit. Add to this the predominantly left wing media constantly protecting the politicians by hiding What they Do by pushing the socialists illusions about business, jobs, wealth and poverty. Basically the governments get in the way for greed and power, this degrades the effect of economies. They then blame business by claiming it is business who was greedy and to ensure people can't move between jobs, or even between countries they put in bc all kinds of block and bans, unions and controls to keep people confused. With all of that effort being done specifically to keep people from knowing reality, it is No surprise a poll would result as this one did.

Free trade is only free when it is FREE. Apples to oranges. America and Canada are wide open. Any foreigner can buy anything. In Japan no foreign company can ever own more than 49.9% of any company. In the Philippines it is 40%. If Toyota America can own 100% of their company but GM Japan can only be allowed to be a minority party- that is racism and not free trade. That is why Italians and Americans etc want no more trade with Japan. They can sell like crazy in China (I am doing that right now) but can never sell anything in Japan because of barriers.

Nonsense.

A foreign company can have a wholly-owned Japanese company. The only requirement is that you have a Japanese resident (Japanese or any nationality) must be a Representative Director.

I did not realize this trick of globalism. when it comes to globalism, we tend to discuss "traditional culture". It is true that unknown people's visit "traditional places" invade their culture because tourist do not know about it. at the cost of the decreasing traditional culture, we believe that globalism absolutely benefits our economy. more or less we have positive image of globalism on economy. the result is not only astonishing but also convincing because we notice about those effect of globalism but we just did not notice at the same time.

The division between developed and developing country views on trade aren`t surprising. Its not quite accurate to say that global trade only benefits the rich. It only benefits the rich in developed countries, true, but it does have real benefits for the poor in developing countries who are given a lot more job opportunitiess generally with higher pay than they otherwise would. Hence their higher evaluation of trade.

The problem is that those jobs for poor people in developing countries come largely at the expense of middle class manufacturing jobs in the developed world and nothing has really been done to replace them. You look at all the succesful American companies emerging these days - Apple, Google, etc - and most of them don`t actually employ more than a few people in America. THey provide millions or billiions to a few and not much to anyone else.

'Fair trade' and 'Japan' should never be used in the same sentence. How many Japanese corporations have been charged with price fixing in recent years? Even the japanese agricultural subsidies system is built on the structure price fixing. Opening up international trade in Japan would have a major effect on unemployment. Firstly because all these people that stand around with red glow sticks, whistles and loud speakers would get canned. Secondly, many of the secondary services like, telemarketing and telephone support for products would be shipped offshore. Japan cannot recover from its economic woes without international trade, but the current structure of the economy cannot support open international trade. Japan's economy is doomed!

Secondly, many of the secondary services like, telemarketing and telephone support for products would be shipped offshore.

I think Japan would be largely immune to this given the language barrier. Its only easy to off-shore those jobs in English speaking countries because of the huge number of English speakers in India and a few other countries.

But Paul Krugman and Laura Tyson say to keep trust in those who know better than us. Krugman recently wrote in his New York Times oped that:

People who keep preaching against the Federal Reserve and Free Trade agreements refuse to take off their tin foil hats and put down their Kool Aid of nationalistic foolishness. The academics and economists know far better what policies will benefit the most of the population.

So we just need to take off our tin foil hats and trust government because the smart people like Krugman and Tyson know far more than we do and will look out after our interests better than we can.

(Yes, there is heavy sarcasm in the last sentence)

Yes indeed. It's amazing that Krugman even has a job. The man is wrong about everything.

People are skeptical because they have seen there are not great benefits for most of the people. Of course this does not mean the politicians will listen as they have to please their corporate backers as they pretend to represent us.

Japan is not immune to many services being offshored. The Bank of Tokyo carries out many technical procedures in India already because of much lower wages.

The fix is in: capital may roam the globe looking for the most abusive labour conditions and week environmental and social protections and sell its commodities anywhere, but labour is not able to freely move so when capital shifts, people are left with no jobs and no investment money, making an unfair relationship even more so.

"In college I learned "free trade theory." "Theory" is right, because there's no good evidence it actually works, except for the super rich and China."

Then perhaps you should request a refund from the institition you received your programming. Free trade happens in many places everyday. You can even watch it on TV("Pickers", "Pawn Stars", and that British car show "Wheeler-Dealers", et al). Where you don't see Free Trade is Everywhere any government has its sticky fingers. Go to a Flea Market/Swap Meet/or any private transaction to experience it directly. I bought my slightly used car quite freely.. It's governments that prevent Free Trade from flourishing, but it still happens every day.

Many people believe that free trade has caused the decline of the American and other developed economies, but this is simply not true.

The American economy of the 50's and 60's was not strong because of trade practices, or any type of politics at the time. It became strong because after the second war, America was the only country which was left unscathed by the second war. Churchill was not reelected after the war, and England embarked upon low-grade socialism, and the eventual nationalization of most of the UK's industries. Japan and Germany were in ashes, China was in the depths of it's revolution, and third-world countries were more or less still living in 19th century conditions.

America's factories, greatly enlarged during the war, were converted to peacetime production. The population exploded, and growth followed. Eventually Japan and Europe recovered from their war wounds, and growth exploded in these places too.

But something else began growing at the same time in America, Europe, and Japan, and this was the welfare state. The size of government increased, along with it's cost. The size of government percentage of GDP has nearly doubled since the end of the war, along with the tax required to support it. By the early 1970's, health and human services (welfare) spending in America surpassed defense spending, and has further increased since then.

Free trade has not caused any decline in the number of jobs, or negatively affected the economies of developed countries. Free trade reduces the cost of goods transported from country to country, and nothing else. Subsidizing a particular industry by taxing or charging a tariff is simply another form of welfare, by forcing consumers to pay more for something than what it would otherwise cost,

The main cause of the outsourcing of jobs and industry is high taxation. In nearly every industry in countries like America., companies pay more in tax than they do for payroll. It is not the price of worker's wages which drives companies away, but tax. America's corporate tax is over 38%. Then there are state and city taxes to pay, as well as licenses and permits. After the government takes their cut, what is left over goes to the company and it's workers.

People are skeptical because they have seen there are not great benefits for most of the people. Of course this does not mean the politicians will listen as they have to please their corporate backers as they pretend to represent us.

Have you seen any benefits? Go to any produce store and you will the benefits, you can get bananas, avacados, or other such goods 365 days per year. Read some ads from magazines from the 50's and 60's, when television companies had to offer financing of 4 to 5 years because a new television cost as much as three or four month's salary for the average person. I much prefer the corporations to politicians, at least the corporations produce things we need or want, and we are free not to buy from them if we so choose.

The last point is that over the last decade more than a billion people around the world have been lifted out of poverty by globalization. Go back about one hundred years ago, and you would find that America was a developing country, with farmers earning barely enough to feed themselves. The cities were full of sweatshops, and factories employed young children because this allowed more machines to be fit onto a factory floor. But in time wages grew, and with the growth in wages, education grew, and things improved fpr everyone. It is absurdly selfish to deny other countries the same opportunities our countries had,

@darnname- nonsense? "Foreign investment restrictions

Are there any restrictions on foreign shareholders?

There are restrictions on foreign shareholders and the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act requires a prior filing to the government of any foreign ownership in certain industries where potentially either:

National security is impaired, the maintenance of public order is disturbed, or the protection of public safety is hindered. There are significant adverse effects on the smooth management of the Japanese economy.

This pretty much includes all of Japan except perhaps Skittles.

Japan is a closed and rapidly shrinking economy. They dug their own hole by these racist laws blocking foreign products and companies. Now they are reaping the whirlwind. Korea and China opened up their markets and are growing at 4 and 7.5% per annum. Japan is now shrinking at 7.1%!!! 2 plus 2 equal 4 in Econ 101.

jokpali, Japan's 7.1% is only QE, and the growths of SKorea and China are also in decline .

Tina, negative 7.1% annualized growth. That means an incredibly fast shrinking economy. China is growing at 7.5% Korea at 4%. Their growth rate is slowing like America but they are GROWING. At good rates also. More than that produces inflation. Japan is in what is known in aviation as a death spiral. In a plane there is only one way out- level the wings, apply full power, and slowly pull back on the yoke. In economics for Japan it means an immediate unconditional opening of ALL markets, then consumers will rush out to buy apples for 5 cents from America instead of 1-200 yen each etc. which will apply full power to the economy by bringing out all that hidden money and start the spending on everything now available at fair prices like other countries have (increasing the velocity of money), and third pull back on the yoke by cutting gov't spending.

I very much believe free trade benefits most consumers and producers.

A notable group of people who don't benefit are those who have Stopped Thinking, have no desire to try to improve to their lives by themselves through providing or creating value for other people, or at some point in their lives give up on making such efforts. Those people who are for give-and-take, except for the giving part. If the entire world consisted of people like that it's certain that we'd all be much poorer.

jokpali, The 7.1% drop is 2nd quarterly estimate in annualized base. It is not finalized GDP of 2014. As you know sales tax hike started at the quarter. The 3rd QE will be much better and more important data to predict Japan's economy.

Tina - Duh!!! The Korean growth figures as well as the Chinese are also annualized growth based on the latest quarter. That's how economics works. If you had to wait to the end of every year for GDP how could you plan? Interest rates, future corporate investment, etc. The bottom line is Japan's economy is sinking like a rock dropped in a pond. China and Korea are slowly rising like helium balloons. There are always chances for miracles like rising balloons being shot by a BB gun, or rocks bouncing off the bottom of a pond back onto shore. But MY money ain't on it.

Globalisation means wages and prices should equalise everywhere. That means big rises in salaries for workers in China, India and other third-world countries. It also means stagnant or falling salaries in developed countries. This is exactly what has been happening over the past 10+ years.

In theory, workers in the west should benefit from lower prices, but in practice companies use tricks such as IP laws (enacted as a result of company bribes to lawmakers), patent and trade mark laws, to restrict cheap imports from other countries. Thus in the west we have to endure both stagnating salaries and high prices, meaning the benefits of globalisation are skewed towards poorer countries and company executives.