I was tear-gassed protesting free trade. Now that Trump’s tariffs may signal the beginning of the end of globalization, do I get to say, “I told you so?"
thing that was actually bad about free trade was that some very non-democratic, non-free countries abused it, monopolized manufacturing of entire industries and bribed us with very cheap products about it so we didn’t mind very much … It seems like we hoped that if we provided them a good economy, freedom would follow.
That’s what we were protesting. It was clear that production would move to overseas sweatshops. We pushed the idea of fair trade: where countries would lower tariffs on trade partners that enforced similar labour and environmental laws. The intent was that we wouldn’t externalize shitty labour practices, instead, workers in those market would join a middle class similar to Canada’s.
That’s what we were protesting. It was clear that production would move to overseas sweatshops. We pushed the idea of fair trade: where countries would lower tariffs on trade partners that enforced similar labour and environmental laws. The intent was that we wouldn’t externalize shitty labour practices, instead, workers in those market would join a middle class similar to Canada’s.