NAFTA Be Damned: Mexico And Canada Show Little Interest In Balancing Trade With US

Never going to happen. It won't be cancelled. More "Art of the Deal" tactics from the sitting President. US firms cannot hit 85% production content targets, the business is too global these days. The negotiators will keep discussions going until there is a deal to be signed.

Car companies are global so the US doesn't have much pull in this situation.

Actually, that's wildly incorrect. The USA has tremendous pull and could easily b-slap Mexico and Canada into submission.

Folks in America are being played to make it seem like "everyone's against us."

US automakers set up business in foreign countries (e.g., Ford, an American company, setting up factories in Canada), and then when those Fords roll into the US, some folks in the US would have you believe they're "Canadian" cars, and cry how the "Canadian" auto industry has a "trade imbalance" with the US.

Some Americans fall for this and call it unfair. Meanwhile, the Canucks know they're working for the Americans, and they just shake their head at the absurdity of the accusations. You want to end this? Then pass laws that compel American companies to do ALL their work in the continental US. No need for NAFTA (that's sarcasm, BTW).

The practice of setting up shop in foreign countries is not unique to American business. Counting these products as foreign imports, and then blaming the foreigners rather than blaming the domestic companies that work this way... well... that's a different matter.

Essay #347

If they don't want to balance trade then I say kill them economically. Put a 25% tariff on every Mexican built car and Mexico will cave in a nanosecond. Mexico is the keeper of the two partners.

One must remember that Mexico and Canada are two of our largest customers as well. A tit-for-tat series of tariffs would only serve to cause problems for BOTH SIDES.

THe fact is - costs of vehicle production are not that different in Canada than in the USA. It is in Mexico where labor costs are more controlled with less Union resistance.

@MD The big 3 have more than a few in Congress and the Senate in their corner, if not their pocket. A tariff like that would never, ever happen. This is also why NAFTA will continue on. There is no industry that wants it to radically change. Just a nip and tuck here and a tweak over there. Evolution, not revolution. Trillions of dollars of trade are at stake and will not be disrupted.

Crushing Canada economically would be insanely easy.

Having an imbalance is not morally acceptable when handling American taxpayer money. It has to end and the days of welfare to Canada and Mexico terminated.

I just can't help but roll my eyes at folks who want to roll the clock back -- to protectionism, cronyism, tariffs, trade barriers, and closing down their borders to immigration -- when the rest of the world, the progressive parts, are doing the opposite.

Gotta agree with CANADIANCOMMENTS. In spite of the bluster and rhetoric, I don't believe NAFTA is going away. While the Alt.Right-ers and their prez are working hard to shift America into reverse (back to the "Glory Days"), there are a lot of people, and some Big Businesses, who understand that America is not an island unto itself. Wealth comes from commerce. Commerce comes from relationships. Mind you, you could go the MDarringer way, and prefer conquest over relationships. Invasion followed by seizing resources is another way of building one's own wealth.

Now that the impotent and ignorant Kenyan turd is long gone, the forceful and skilled President Trump will correct the damage done by the corrupt Bill Clinton administration and supported by the hate America Kenyan turd administration.