*A2: IMPACTS (TPP IS BAD)*

*A2: IMPACTS (TPP IS BAD)*

TPP Bad - General

TPP will tank the economy globally, undermine democracy and degrade the environment

TPP is for mega-corporations that undermine democracy and degrade the environment

So-called "trade" deals that profit mega-corporations will not change that extractive thinking. It will only reinforce it. If this Government was supportive of small-c it would encourage high-value enterprise and ban GMO trade to protect our environment and economy. It would not allow mega-corporates to sue our democracy. It would protect the principles of democracy where any enterprise operates within the laws as decided by the people, not the reverse. That is not democracy; that is oligarchy. And it would make open those TPP clauses to which unethical commercial entities have access. The fact that it failed to do any of these things is a disgrace. Mr Foss, your claims of environmental gain are empty spin.

TPP trades people for corporate profits

TPP Bad – Economy / General

TPP tanks U.S. economic independence and feeds corporate interests

TPP is NAFTA revisited, costing hundreds of thousands of jobs

Broughton doubts the pending Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, of which many details are still unknown, will be any different. “Obama promises that the TPP will be different from NAFTA, that it will improve workers' standards by having enforceable mechanisms in those countries like Vietnam and Malaysia, but that has yet to be seen and I am skeptical frankly that those provisions will be in there,” he said. The AFL-CIO Labor Union blames NAFTA with the loss of as many as 700,000 U.S. jobs since it went into effect in 1994. 

TPP Bad – Economy / Manufacturing

Manufacturing is resurging now and jobs are coming home. TPP makes it cheaper to keep jobs offshore

TPP will collapse the U.S. manufacturing base

Ever since the massive labor dislocations unleashed by NAFTA, the first anxieties over any trade agreement inevitably concern the possibility of lost jobs — particularly among the blue-collar workforce. And in terms of jobs and wages, United Steelworkers president Leo Gerard has warned, the “TPP may be the final blow to manufacturing in America.” The TPP reportedly includes rules of origin for at least some critical products, such as automobiles, that are even weaker than the standards set by NAFTA, which itself was no prize for U.S. manufacturing. These rules would enable products assembled primarily from parts made in “third party” countries that are not subject to any TPP obligations, such as China, to enter the U.S. duty-free. (So much for the TPP being a bulwark against Chinese economic expansion.)

TPP will sway firms to go offshore

Perhaps what is most worrying, though, is the potential that TPP, or any trade agreement, could slow the reshoring of American jobs, especially in some fields such as auto-parts manufacturing, which states in the South such as Tennessee and South Carolina are competing to attract. “We had this period in time where there was this rush to China and Asia, well that’s kind of ended,” Hopp said. “The pendulum is just sitting in the middle now. Small effects can knock individual firms one way or another.” It may not be a “giant sucking sound” but the TPP could lead to another sound entirely — that of silence in the manufacturing plants of the U.S.

TPP Bad – Economy / Manufacturing

U.S. manufacturing will suffer under TPP

But trade agreements, at their heart, create winners and losers, and the TPP will likely create some U.S. manufacturing losers at a time when economists worry that the country is becoming too service-oriented. Fine wines and beef products made in the U.S. that currently have high tariffs in foreign countries might do well under the TPP, but agriculture doesn’t create many good jobs in the U.S. Automakers, on the other hand, could suffer. The TPP could take tariffs off of foreign-made small trucks, which are currently the big profit makers for the domestic automakers, said Art Schwartz, a former GM negotiator who is now president of Labor and Economics Associates. The deal may also make it more difficult for unions—especially the United Auto Workers—who are negotiating contracts with the Big Three: If automakers can say they have to outsource to compete, unions will have less leverage.

TPP Bad – Economy / Small Businesses

Greater Asian competition means small businesses will lose global markets under TPP

TPP will kill off small businesses

According to international reports, the TPP involving the US, Malaysia and other Pacific countries would phase out thousands of import tariffs as well as other barriers to international trade, establish uniform rules on corporations’ intellectual property, and open up the Internet. The agreement comes amid strong opposition from rights groups and segments of the business community who said the pact would kill off small businesses, drive wages down and shoot prices of medicines up.

TPP Bad – Economy / No Free Trade

TPP will not substantially advance free trade

First, the idea that the TPP is a massive advance for free trade is nonsense on its face. The Post asserted that the 12 countries in the TPP account for 40 percent of world GDP. While that sounds like a big deal, the United States already has trade deals with most of the countries in the TPP, including Canada, Mexico and Australia. For these countries, there are few, if any, formal trade barriers to eliminate. These countries account for 82 percent of the GDP of touted by the Post. Most of the rest of the GDP is from Japan. The formal trade barriers between Japan and the United States are already low in most areas, and where substantial barriers exist, they are not likely to be removed quickly as a result of the TPP. For example, the U.S. is supposed to phase out its tariffs on trucks imported from Japan by 2045 — three decades from now.

TPP is a power grab by major corporations under the mask of trade

“Disgusted, but not surprised,” is my response to The Columbian editorial board’s opinion of Oct. 19, “An appetizing outcome?,” which sings praises for the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal. Has the paper’s board been having a drinkfest with the likes of Councilor David Madore, Port of Vancouver commissioners, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the World Bank? Those of us who have been around the block are not fooled by this major piece of corruption that uses dishonest “scales” while hypocritically retaining the outward facade of patriotism. By “scales” I mean that the TPP has been drafted in secret largely because it has little to do with trade and everything to do with enhancing corporate sovereignty over public governments. Its “Investor-State Dispute Settlements” clause is fraudulently manipulative (via legal-language hocus-pocus) in elevating mere corporations to the status of “corporate states,” putting them on a par with nation states; taxpayers will be forced to compensate should corporate investors see any restriction on “expected future profits.” Thus, this is a power grab, pure and simple, with “trade” only being used as a mask.

TPP Bad - Environment

TPP allows corporations to bypass all environmental regulations and undermine safety

Beyond incentivizing offshoring, the TPP’s investor-state provisions would enable transnational corporations to challenge environmental laws, regulations, and court decisions in international tribunals that circumvent the U.S. judicial system — and any other country’s judicial system. That gives foreign corporations a powerful new tool to attack public safety regulations they claim impact their bottom line.

The TPP is toxic for the environment

TPP gives corporations the right to kill, holding governments and the environment hostage to regulatory suits

Exactly. It’s a little bit more graphic, because they had the picture of what it did to your lungs. It worked. People started—you know, stopped smoking. Not everybody, but smoking was reduced. Under the provisions of this, TPP-like provision, Philip Morris can sue Uruguay for the loss of their expected profits as result of the regulation. In other words, the view is, they have the right to kill people, and if you want to take away that right, you have to pay them not to kill. Now, we carved—that provision was carved out, but all the other areas were left in. So they were talking about climate change regulation. We know we’re going to need regulations to restrict the emissions of carbon. But under these provisions, corporations can sue the government, including the American government, by the way, so it’s all the governments in the TPP can be sued for the loss of profits as a result of the regulations that restrict their ability to emit carbon emissions that lead to global warming. If this provision had been in place when we had discovered that asbestos was bad for your health—you know, under the current provisions, asbestos manufacturers have to pay for the damage that they’re doing. They pay billions and billions of dollars. If the TPP had been in place, we would have to pay the asbestos manufacturers for not killing us. It’s outrageous.

There are too many red flags. TPP is an environmental disaster

TPP Bad - Environment

Free market trade liquidates the environment

Once, a neo-liberal economist spoke with conviction that said "the free market provides the best environmental solution". It is amazing that they teach economists that rubbish. If you are of a big-c mind, without connection or ethical concern for your local place, or your local community, then the "rational" thing to do is to pillage and move one. Those educated in forest and soil management know this. Finance will trump ethics and our children's future if you let it. If short-term profit is your creed, take ownership of the public common for your own ends, privatise gains to be made and socialise costs, to make deals with short-term commissions. And liquidate natural systems that cycle slowly - destroy the forest, driftnet the ocean, and hoodwink the Solomon Islands chief out of his valuable forest for hollow promises.

TPP Bad – Big Pharma

TPP causes massive suffering by increasing medical costs

Millions of people will lose access to vital medical care

http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/10/22/the-tpp-priority-1-of-us-multinational-corporations/, ACC. 10-30-2015

TPP Bad – China/India Economies

TPP steals billions from the Chinese and Indian economies

TPP Bad – Taiwan Conflict

Straining cross-straits relations is inevitable under TPP

TPP Bad – U.S. Hegemony / Leadership

TPP “free trade” causes resentment and undermines U.S. leadership

TPP Bad – A2: Boosts US-China Relations

TPP won’t improve U.S.-China relations

TPP is overtly confrontational with China

TPP Bad – China Containment / War

Despite rhetoric, TPP is meant to contain China and risks war

China hates the TPP. It shifts the economic balance in Asia against them, which drags down their economy

First, the TPP shows the United States and Japan exercising leadership, stepping out ahead of the global community in their willingness to negotiate a new set of rules and obligations. This dynamism presents challenges to China. It creates the possibility that the future rules for the global economy will be written under predominant U.S. influence, in the same way that the current rules have been. That makes China extremely uncomfortable, and it also pressures China to come up with alternatives that will be attractive to its neighbors while also serving its own interests. Second, the TPP shifts economic balances and alliances within Asia. The TPP greatly increases the likelihood that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will carry through on Japanese economic reforms, therefore making economic revival there more likely. The TPP will pull Vietnam (especially) and other signatories economically closer to the United States, and thus reduce Chinese economic preponderance. Given that South Korea is likely to quickly join in any completed TPP agreement, these shifts can have a long-run economic impact on China.