U.S. Trade Policy

Todd Tucker of Eyes on Trade live blogged it.  See his post for some basic details, or watch the video here.  I'll just mention a couple points (a rough transcription, not verbatim) that struck me as interesting. First, Senator Grassley expressed concerns about the possibility of incorporating labor

From remarks made today: Now, I know that trade policy has been one of those longstanding divides between business and labor, between Democrats and Republicans.  To those who would reflexively support every and any trade deal, I would say that our competitors have to play fair and our agreements have

Dan Ikenson of Cato notes the following from Congress Daily: Speaking at the USDA Annual Outlook Forum, [USTR Ron] Kirk said members of Congress “are more open and receptive” to the idea of creating a trans-Pacific agreement because it could be written from scratch. The Trans-Pacific Partnership comes “without any

From a soon to be published interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek: In an effort to make U.S. exports more attractive, Obama set a year-end objective for persuading China to allow the value of its currency to rise. “My goal over the course of the next year is for China to

From a Q & A session between Obama and some Republicans: REP. ROSKAM: - ... And on the job-creation piece in particular, you mentioned Colombia, you mentioned Panama, you mentioned South Korea. Are you willing to work with us, for example, to make sure those FTAs get called? That's

Fair to say, Obama’s trade policy has largely been indiscernible during his first 100 days in the Oval Office. It appears that the exigency from the financial crisis and his original anti-trade position in the campaign has complicated the setting of a clear future trade agenda. More recently, however,

H.R. 496, the "Trade Enforcement Act of 2009", introduced by Reps. Rangel and Levin, would shift some trade power from the President to Congress.  It would create an "Office of the Congressional Trade Enforcer," whose purpose is "to ensure compliance by trading partners of

I have seen a lot of concern expressed about the bad things that might happen to trade policy now that the Democrats are in charge.  Here's a more positive view, from Robert McMahon of the Council on Foreign Relations, writing in Newsweek: Some analysts, however, see an opportunity

... to U.S. trade policy.  It is not clear exactly what this change will look like, but no doubt we will spend a lot of time on this blog talking about it. Here are some of the issues I'll be watching for: --  What will a NAFTA renegotiation