THE RECORD
October 23, 2002

Fiat Lux

by Ed Deak

The Mulroney gang learned a bitter lesson from the publication of the text of the US-Canada FTA, that almost cost them the elections of 1988. By the time the NAFTA idea came along they dug out Bill Fox's plan for secret negotiations, later also used by Chrétien, who promised to renegotiate whatever Mulroney already gave away. He even went to President Bush Sr. long before the elections, who simply told him they are not interested in backtracking after all the trouble they went through with the Canadian public when they knew too much. Chrétien listened and shut up, then signed the NAFTA almost in secret without telling people what was in it. Now he is doing the same trick with the FTAA and GATS.

In early December of 1992 our then PC MP David Worthy announced that the CD Howe Institute published a glowing report on the success of the FTA after the first three years and offered to send copies to anyone who asked for it. So I did and Dave sent me Commentary No 37, titled : Were the optimists Wrong on Free Trade? Subtitled A Canadian Perspective written by Daniel Swanen, who since then has been promoted to the position of CD Howe's Chief Economist. The multinationals who pay the bills must love him.

In our society economists are usually referred to as "noted" and "respect-ed", similar to the "reverend" of the clergy, and their so called institutions, like CD Howe and the Fraser are called "Prestigious conservative economic think tanks." In reality the economists are pseudo priesthoods whose university departments should be attached to the theological, or astrological sections and their so called institutions are nothing more than overpaid advertising agencies.
The report written by Swanen 10 years ago, and many more since then, are prime examples of fraudulent accounting, whitewash, doubletalk and statistics twisted to show prepaid results benefiting the customer who paid for them.

The title of the paper alone is textbook propaganda, as are most of these publications, without any substance or merit. By describing the supporters of free trade as "optimists" the negative connotations of "pessimists", "nay sayers", "protectionists" are brushed on the opponents, whereas the proponents are pictured as the optimists who are "eager to compete on the global marketplace." The government of the day enhanced this position by allowing donations by big business and banks to free trade propaganda as "business enhancement" expenses, while donations to the opponents were denied tax exempt status in 1989.

The subtitle of Canadian Perspective suggests sanction by the public and a balanced view, in spite that only 43 percent voted for Mulroney and the FTA. The name of the sponsor is withheld, although the costs must have come out of the public's pocket in the form of tax exemptions.

The paper itself, like all the rest published on the subject, is full of selective accounting, typical of neoclassical economists, who are always touting the benefits and ignore the liabilities, knowing that if the public knew the real facts they'd be kicked out of the universities.

For example on page 2: "While Harris and Cox predicted large gains in overall manufacturing employment, they also foresaw that most labour intensive sunset industries, such as leather, 'miscellaneous manufacturing', some machinery and knitting mills, would suffer large employment losses. Indeed, the study concluded that free trade would force about 6 percent of Canadian workers to move from economic sectors in which they were employed into other sectors, but that large increase in labour productivity would result in rise in overall incomes."

Page 6: "The most important relative gains by US importers of finished products in to Canada, however, have clearly come in the furniture and furnishing, clothing, processed foods and beverages, and miscellaneous household goods categories. These correspond to the "traditional" industries that have been predicted to lose under free trade."

Page 11: "Three years into the FTA the import data clearly suggest that Canada's weakness to open trade were precisely in the areas where supporters and foes alike expected them to be: the more traditional sunset sectors of the economy, many of them labour intensive."

The report is full of such gems of glaring propaganda and doubletalk, trying to persuade the public that all is well. The use of the words like "sunset industries," is designed to persuade that we don't need any more furniture, clothing and leather industries and people who work in them are superfluous.

Remember the glowing predictions how women would be the greatest beneficiaries of free trade, with all kind of imaginary figures thrown into the hat? Well, right from the beginning, women were the biggest losers with whole industries wiped out and the promised increase in manufacturing jobs down the drain without anything to replace them.

It was quite obvious to anyone with the least knowledge of economics and history that the promises of free trade were phony. The Canadian economy started unraveling immediately after the FTA became reality, yet, here was a paid PR hack with an academic title trying to brainwash people to believe that everything was just peachy.

Well, looks like I'll have to give another shot to this subject, but before that, I would like to ask anybody who knows of any proven net benefits of the FTA and NAFTA, benefits we wouldn't have without them in spite of all the hardships they caused, to please drop a line to this paper and tell us what it is? I've been asking this question for years of thousands of people, yet nobody could ever came up with anything.

Copyright (c) 2002, West's International