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Impact: Trade

How have the Obama administration and the Democratic Congress responded to the twin challenges of continued high unemployment and China's displacing America as the number one trading partner with leading East Asian states? By retreating economically from Asia. The U.S.-South Korea Free Trade Agreement sits unratified in Washington. This policy is remarkable for both its economic and geostrategic folly. Thankfully, U.S. trade policy is undergoing a reset. When he met South Korean President Lee Myung Bak at the last Group of 20 Summit, President Barack Obama advocated reviving the agreement. He hopes to wrap up outstanding issues by the next G20 meeting in November, to be held in Seoul. Still, the path to ratification is not clear. Leading congressional Democrats remain opposed, while Seoul refuses to renegotiate the accord. Ratification is a must. The South possesses one of the world's largest economies and is among the top dozen trading nations. It is a major importer of aircraft, cereals, chemicals, machinery and plastics. Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. A former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is the author of several books, including Foreign Follies: America's New Global Empire (Xulon). More by Doug Bandow The FTA would expand the Korean market for American products. Jeffrey Schott of the Peterson Institute for International Economics reported: "The U.S.-Korea pact covers more trade than any other U.S. trade agreement except the North American Free Trade Agreement" and "opens up substantial new opportunities for bilateral trade and investment in goods and services." Roughly 95 percent of trade would become duty free within three years and most of the other tariffs would be lifted within a decade. Obviously, the FTA does not eliminate all economic barriers in South Korea — just as it does not eliminate all import restrictions in America. Nevertheless, both countries would benefit economically. According to the U.S. International Trade Commission, the elimination of South Korean tariffs alone should add $10 billion to $12 billion to U.S. gross domestic product. Demand for American audio visual, financial and telecommunications services also are likely to increase substantially. The longer-term gain could be even greater. First, South Koreans, like Chinese, remain less affluent individually than suggested by their GDP. Continued strong growth would greatly enhance individual buying power, leading to increased purchases of American goods and services.

SKFTA Passing Will Give Momentum For Other Trade Agreements Like Other ftas and Doha

Donohue 1/6/11(Thomas J., President of the US Chamber of Commerce, Korean Trade Pact is a Welcome Shot in the Arm for US Economy, http://www.uschamber.com/press/opeds/korean-trade-pact-welcome-shot-arm-us-economy, Accessed 7/26/11)

That's why we're pleased the Obama administration has expressed strong support for swift completion of a Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, which would ensure that America has access to this rapidly growing market and a level playing field on which to compete. Congressional Republican leaders have promised to approve not just KORUS but two other pending FTAs - with Colombia and Panama. While more than 90 percent of imports from these countries enter America duty free, most U.S.-manufactured goods face import taxes in the double digits when they enter Colombia and Panama. Our farm products face even steeper barriers. These agreements will end this unfair status quo for American workers, farmers and companies. We urge Congress to approve all three pending FTAs swiftly. Finally, we must revitalize the moribund Doha Round of global trade negotiations. A worldwide reduction in tariffs and trade barriers would provide a worldwide "stimulus," creating jobs, opportunities and higher standards of living around the globe, especially in poor countries. With nearly one in five Americans either out of work or underemployed, we must grab the momentum created by KORUS and act on additional trade agreements. These pacts offer lawmakers a chance to set aside ideology, work across party lines, and advance policies that will create jobs and grow the economy. If America is to restore its economic greatness, the White House and the business community must act in good faith as partners. Trade is an area we can work together and get something done for the American people.

South Korean fta is key to prevent global trade wars

Sang-Keun 6. [Byun, senior columnist of the Joongang Ilbo, “Work for a win-win agreement,” JoongAng Ilbo, Korea, http://www.bilaterals.org/article.php3?id_article=3746]

When the world is making strenuous efforts to realize multilateral trade liberalization centered on the World Trade Organization, the competition over bilateral and regional "mating" seems to be contradictory. Free trade agreements have two aspects. They are steppingstones to liberalization in the sense that countries with identical or complementary goals first enter free trade agreements then ultimately realize global trade liberalization by broadening their scope. On the other hand, "free trade pacts between countries concerned" can be exclusive to others in the short and mid-term periods. The WTO system is seeing a rough going due to the resistance of anti-globalization and anti-liberalization forces. If the WTO system ends in failure, bilateral and regional agreements will become the minimum safety net to avoid trade wars. Therefore, unless a country is closely knitted into a web of free trade agreements, it is bound to be a loner. Although the world’s 11th-largest trading power, Korea is a latecomer in making such agreements. In this regard, an agreement between Korea and the United States is not a matter of choice but one of necessity, and the sooner the better. Some strongly argue that trade agreements should be made with China and Japan first but, despite six previous negotiations, an agreement with Japan is at a deadlock, and China has yet to meet the qualifications to join the World Trade Organization. The United States is our second-largest export market, behind China, and Korea is the seventh-largest trading partner of the United States. For this reason, an agreement between Korea and the United States is drawing attention worldwide as the biggest event in 15 years, since the North American Free Trade Agreement was reached.

Extinction

Copley News Service 99 (December 1, L/N)

For decades, many children in America and other countries went to bed fearing annihilation by nuclear war. The specter of nuclear winter freezing the life out of planet Earth seemed very real. Activists protesting the World Trade Organization's meeting in Seattle apparently have forgotten that threat. The truth is that nations join together in groups like the WTO not just to further their own prosperity, but also to forestall conflict with other nations. In a way, our planet has traded in the threat of a worldwide nuclear war for the benefit of cooperative global economics. Some Seattle protesters clearly fancy themselves to be in the mold of nuclear disarmament or anti-Vietnam War protesters of decades past. But they're not. They're special-interest activists, whether the cause is environmental, labor or paranoia about global government. Actually, most of the demonstrators in Seattle are very much unlike yesterday's peace activists, such as Beatle John Lennon or philosopher Bertrand Russell, the father of the nuclear disarmament movement, both of whom urged people and nations to work together rather than strive against each other. These and other war protesters would probably approve of 135 WTO nations sitting down peacefully to discuss economic issues that in the past might have been settled by bullets and bombs. As long as nations are trading peacefully, and their economies are built on exports to other countries, they have a major disincentive to wage war. That's why bringing China, a budding superpower, into the WTO is so important. As exports to the United States and the rest of the world feed Chinese prosperity, and that prosperity increases demand for the goods we produce, the threat of hostility diminishes. Many anti-trade protesters in Seattle claim that only multinational corporations benefit from global trade, and that it's the everyday wage earners who get hurt. That's just plain wrong. First of all, it's not the military-industrial complex benefiting. It's U.S. companies that make high-tech goods. And those companies provide a growing number of jobs for Americans. In San Diego, many people have good jobs at Qualcomm, Solar Turbines and other companies for whom overseas markets are essential. In Seattle, many of the 100,000 people who work at Boeing would lose their livelihoods without world trade. Foreign trade today accounts for 30 percent of our gross domestic product. That's a lot of jobs for everyday workers. Growing global prosperity has helped counter the specter of nuclear winter.