So how do countries in Nafta manage to have a single market without losing sovereignty? If we could have a proper answer and not a fudge please. There would be an outcry in Canada if the Canadians had laws from the United States which overuled Canadian laws like we have from Brussels.
The reason is that NAFTA is essentially a more primitive version of the EU. We tend to speak about "free trade" as if it's just something you establish with a treaty: draft a document which gives countries free trade with each other, sign it, and suddenly everything's perfect. In reality free trade doesn't work like that, it's more like a scale in which you start off with eradicating tariffs and end up with having complementary regulatory systems that allow goods and services to move uninhibited across a market.
The further you go with free trade the greater the economic benefits, but the deeper you go the more you have to co-operate on negotiating joint-regulations and pooling sovereignty. If the EU were like NAFTA then we wouldn't have to pool our sovereignty in the same way, but we'd also have to write off a significant chunk of our prosperity that we currently get from being part of the world's largest single market.
The end goal of the free trade movement is economic integration. The EU is further along than NAFTA is, but they both have the same goal. The end result is the elimination of the borders that were created and enacted at the end of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s and creating a single unified global market. I don't have an opinion on the EU, but if the UK wanted to be a state or states, umm I'd have no problem, I'd actually have no problem with any territory or area that wished to join the US.
We're pretty awesome and welcoming just come on in!! :-)
If the EU were like NAFTA then we wouldn't have to pool our sovereignty in the same way, but we'd also have to write off a significant chunk of our prosperity that we currently get from being part of the world's largest single market.
Any actual evidence that we get any more prosperity from being in a Customs Union like the EU rather than a Free Trade area like NAFTA.
Seems there are an awful lot of claims flying around with precious little to back them up.
Apart from it being a bit of a trek over to the states. Are there any real problems with becoming a state within the USA, rather than becoming a state in the EU?
The UK becoming part of America would never happen and I doubt most Americans would ever want something like that to happen, including this American. Besides, the cultures are way too different and our states don't see themselves as countries.
I'm sure they would actually. A major economy wanting to join them would be fantastic, especially as we would need to use their currency and abide by their laws!
I know it won't happen as we have enough problems integrating with the EU but the US have surprising good growth compared to Europe.
No of course not, What it does represent is a countries values that are so incompatable with ours that it would be impossible to marry those two up. The fact that such education is not illegal in America, shows how different we are.
I love the USA but some parts of its political and education systems are as backwards as ****.
PS. I am typing on a Taiwanese based phone, running a British processor. On a customised American Operating system developed by someone who studied at the University of Helsinki.
There is a lot more American about your device than either you know or care to admit.
The vast majority of the technology we use today and the mediums they are used on were developed by America.
The reason is that NAFTA is essentially a more primitive version of the EU. We tend to speak about "free trade" as if it's just something you establish with a treaty: draft a document which gives countries free trade with each other, sign it, and suddenly everything's perfect. In reality free trade doesn't work like that, it's more like a scale in which you start off with eradicating tariffs and end up with having complementary regulatory systems that allow goods and services to move uninhibited across a market.
The further you go with free trade the greater the economic benefits, but the deeper you go the more you have to co-operate on negotiating joint-regulations and pooling sovereignty. If the EU were like NAFTA then we wouldn't have to pool our sovereignty in the same way, but we'd also have to write off a significant chunk of our prosperity that we currently get from being part of the world's largest single market.
NAFTA is not a union with the ultimate goal of forming a country, it is just a simple trade agreement.
The American concept of "freedom" is rather different to the British concept of freedom. Erm your history is rather inaccurate. America didn't enter the war based on churchills presuasive techniques. America entered the war after the Japanese bombed the **** out of one of its harbours. Even then America didn't declare war on Nazi Germany.
Umm...the Americans didnt just fight the Japanese....and without American support in which many thousands of American soldiers were killed, the Normandy landings would probably never have happened.
Any actual evidence that we get any more prosperity from being in a Customs Union like the EU rather than a Free Trade area like NAFTA.
Seems there are an awful lot of claims flying around with precious little to back them up.
What you're requesting evidence for here is the idea that removing barriers to trade generates economic benefits. That's generally taken as a given in mainstream economic debates and I think going off into a debate about protectionism versus free trade is a bit of a tangent - though feel free to make that argument if you must.
The general point is that the EU has eliminated more barriers to trade than NAFTA has, but the implication of that is that we have to pool sovereignty to a greater extent. If we're to argue it's not worth it then fine - that's a legitimate argument that people are free to make. What we can't do however is claim that we can get all the benefits of free trade that we get from the EU, but also refuse to pool our sovereignty on things like compatible regulatory systems. The two things are part of the same equation - you can't have one without the other.
NAFTA is not a union with the ultimate goal of forming a country, it is just a simple trade agreement.
Neither is the EU. Far too often in these debates we avoid talking about what the EU actually is and start arguing about some future scenario involving superstates. It usually relies on the undeniably vague phrase "ever closer union", or quoting Jean Monnet (who died in the 70s, need we be reminded).
Nowhere in the treaties does it say that the ultimate goal of the EU is to form a single country. Indeed even with greater integration in the eurozone that notion seems completely implausible at present and is only supported by a tiny group of isolated politicians like Guy Verhofstadt and Andrew Duff. Judge the EU by what it is, not some fantasy about superstates.
What you're requesting evidence for here is the idea that removing barriers to trade generates economic benefits. That's generally taken as a given in mainstream economic debates and I think going off into a debate about protectionism versus free trade is a bit of a tangent - though feel free to make that argument if you must.
If you haven't got any evidence then simply say so - trying to patronise other posters doesn't further your argument I'm afraid.
The general point is that the EU has eliminated more barriers to trade than NAFTA has,
How so? - what barriers has the EU eliminated that a Free Trade deal (EFTA for instance) has not?. How exactly has an external tariff barrier of between 5 and 9% improved our prosperity given that the majority of our exports are to countries outside the EU?
If you haven't got any evidence then simply say so - trying to patronise other posters doesn't further your argument I'm afraid.
I'm sorry, but that's pretty laughable. If you want to argue that removing trade barriers doesn't have economic benefits - i.e. you want to argue against one of the fundamental assumptions made by every large western economy - then the burden of proof is on you. Using the tired old "spend an hour explaining economic orthodoxy to me or you don't have a point" argument is a complete and utter nonsense.
How so? - what barriers has the EU eliminated that a Free Trade deal (EFTA for instance) has not?. How exactly has an external tariff barrier of between 5 and 9% improved our prosperity given that the majority of our exports are to countries outside the EU?
Incompatible regulatory systems are a barrier to trade. There isn't much point, for instance, in eliminating tariffs for a particular export if that product is then inadvertently banned from sale in the target market. That's essentially the purpose of the single market - it eliminates technical barriers to trade so that exports can move freely across the market rather than being inhibited by incompatible regulations. Even the single market, 20 years after it was finished, still hasn't eliminated all barriers to trade. Less extensive free trade agreements like NAFTA simply don't eliminate trade barriers to the extent that the EU does.
We're not discussing external tariffs - which are a completely separate issue. It's not a discussion about whether the EU is the best thing ever, it's a discussion about why NAFTA's brand of integration doesn't provide the same benefits as European integration. NAFTA members have their own external tariffs and NAFTA itself has developed a limited system of external tariffs. Just mindlessly throwing anti-EU soundbites around in the hope that one sticks isn't an argument.
Apart from it being a bit of a trek over to the states. Are there any real problems with becoming a state within the USA, rather than becoming a state in the EU?
This is one of the most ridiculous threads I've seen in while.
The EU isn't and never will be a country. It's 27 (soon to be 28) independent countries working together.
Why would any nation want to join the USA? I can't think of anything worse. :eek:
America entered the war after the Japanese bombed the **** out of one of its harbours. Even then America didn't declare war on Nazi Germany.
The US declared war on Germany four days after Pearl Harbor.
That said, they didn't actually do anything about it until nearly a year later.
The US (and the Right in the UK) likes to go on about the US saving Europe -- but it can equally be said that Russia taking the brunt of the German force in the early part of the War saved everyone ultimately, including the USA. Without Russia, Germany would undoubtedly have quickly overrun the UK, and the USA would have had no ally in the UK, fighting Japan.
The US declared war on Germany four days after Pearl Harbor.
That said, they didn't actually do anything about it until nearly a year later.
The US (and the Right in the UK) likes to go on about the US saving Europe -- but it can equally be said that Russia taking the brunt of the German force in the early part of the War saved everyone ultimately, including the USA. Without Russia, Germany would undoubtedly have quickly overrun the UK, and the USA would have had no ally in the UK, fighting Japan.
Russia gets far too little credit IMO.
BIB.Not actually sure which way round, but I think that Japan/Germany declared war on the USA then the USA responded, totally agree about the effort by Russia .
No, but it makes more sense to be in union with shared cultural traditions than in one based on merely geographic proximity.
But the USA has much less in common with the UK culturally than is often portrayed. The USA is made up of predominantly European and African stock; the UK makes up only a minority of that. Their culture is as much Spanish, Portugese, German or Irish as it is English or Scottish -- and is much more socially conservative and religious in its heartlands.
I see far more parallels between the Brits and Northern Europeans than I do between the UK and the USA. The fact that we share a common language is immaterial.
I see far more parallels between the Brits and Northern Europeans than I do between the UK and the USA. The fact that we share a common language is immaterial.
Absolutely right. The USA is very different to the UK.
Comments
Er, you have to ask it first.
Anyway, I'm not aware of any lazy French Farmers.
See grassmarket's link, helps protect the UK from predatory trade dumping practices
You say that...
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/18/us/18legal.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
The end goal of the free trade movement is economic integration. The EU is further along than NAFTA is, but they both have the same goal. The end result is the elimination of the borders that were created and enacted at the end of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s and creating a single unified global market. I don't have an opinion on the EU, but if the UK wanted to be a state or states, umm I'd have no problem, I'd actually have no problem with any territory or area that wished to join the US.
We're pretty awesome and welcoming just come on in!! :-)
Any actual evidence that we get any more prosperity from being in a Customs Union like the EU rather than a Free Trade area like NAFTA.
Seems there are an awful lot of claims flying around with precious little to back them up.
The UK becoming part of America would never happen and I doubt most Americans would ever want something like that to happen, including this American. Besides, the cultures are way too different and our states don't see themselves as countries.
No, most us wouldn't.
Most states actually have a 70 or 75 mph speed limit on highways.
And if those "1 in a hundred adult males" committed a crime then they should be punished.
Uh, no.
There is a lot more American about your device than either you know or care to admit.
The vast majority of the technology we use today and the mediums they are used on were developed by America.
NAFTA is not a union with the ultimate goal of forming a country, it is just a simple trade agreement.
Umm...the Americans didnt just fight the Japanese....and without American support in which many thousands of American soldiers were killed, the Normandy landings would probably never have happened.
What you're requesting evidence for here is the idea that removing barriers to trade generates economic benefits. That's generally taken as a given in mainstream economic debates and I think going off into a debate about protectionism versus free trade is a bit of a tangent - though feel free to make that argument if you must.
The general point is that the EU has eliminated more barriers to trade than NAFTA has, but the implication of that is that we have to pool sovereignty to a greater extent. If we're to argue it's not worth it then fine - that's a legitimate argument that people are free to make. What we can't do however is claim that we can get all the benefits of free trade that we get from the EU, but also refuse to pool our sovereignty on things like compatible regulatory systems. The two things are part of the same equation - you can't have one without the other.
Neither is the EU. Far too often in these debates we avoid talking about what the EU actually is and start arguing about some future scenario involving superstates. It usually relies on the undeniably vague phrase "ever closer union", or quoting Jean Monnet (who died in the 70s, need we be reminded).
Nowhere in the treaties does it say that the ultimate goal of the EU is to form a single country. Indeed even with greater integration in the eurozone that notion seems completely implausible at present and is only supported by a tiny group of isolated politicians like Guy Verhofstadt and Andrew Duff. Judge the EU by what it is, not some fantasy about superstates.
If you haven't got any evidence then simply say so - trying to patronise other posters doesn't further your argument I'm afraid.
How so? - what barriers has the EU eliminated that a Free Trade deal (EFTA for instance) has not?. How exactly has an external tariff barrier of between 5 and 9% improved our prosperity given that the majority of our exports are to countries outside the EU?
I'm sorry, but that's pretty laughable. If you want to argue that removing trade barriers doesn't have economic benefits - i.e. you want to argue against one of the fundamental assumptions made by every large western economy - then the burden of proof is on you. Using the tired old "spend an hour explaining economic orthodoxy to me or you don't have a point" argument is a complete and utter nonsense.
Incompatible regulatory systems are a barrier to trade. There isn't much point, for instance, in eliminating tariffs for a particular export if that product is then inadvertently banned from sale in the target market. That's essentially the purpose of the single market - it eliminates technical barriers to trade so that exports can move freely across the market rather than being inhibited by incompatible regulations. Even the single market, 20 years after it was finished, still hasn't eliminated all barriers to trade. Less extensive free trade agreements like NAFTA simply don't eliminate trade barriers to the extent that the EU does.
We're not discussing external tariffs - which are a completely separate issue. It's not a discussion about whether the EU is the best thing ever, it's a discussion about why NAFTA's brand of integration doesn't provide the same benefits as European integration. NAFTA members have their own external tariffs and NAFTA itself has developed a limited system of external tariffs. Just mindlessly throwing anti-EU soundbites around in the hope that one sticks isn't an argument.
This is one of the most ridiculous threads I've seen in while.
The EU isn't and never will be a country. It's 27 (soon to be 28) independent countries working together.
Why would any nation want to join the USA? I can't think of anything worse. :eek:
So, you're an anglo-supremacist?
No, but it makes more sense to be in union with shared cultural traditions than in one based on merely geographic proximity.
The US declared war on Germany four days after Pearl Harbor.
That said, they didn't actually do anything about it until nearly a year later.
The US (and the Right in the UK) likes to go on about the US saving Europe -- but it can equally be said that Russia taking the brunt of the German force in the early part of the War saved everyone ultimately, including the USA. Without Russia, Germany would undoubtedly have quickly overrun the UK, and the USA would have had no ally in the UK, fighting Japan.
Russia gets far too little credit IMO.
BIB.Not actually sure which way round, but I think that Japan/Germany declared war on the USA then the USA responded, totally agree about the effort by Russia .
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/december/11/newsid_3532000/3532401.stm
But the USA has much less in common with the UK culturally than is often portrayed. The USA is made up of predominantly European and African stock; the UK makes up only a minority of that. Their culture is as much Spanish, Portugese, German or Irish as it is English or Scottish -- and is much more socially conservative and religious in its heartlands.
I see far more parallels between the Brits and Northern Europeans than I do between the UK and the USA. The fact that we share a common language is immaterial.
No it doesn't. Just because a country just happens to speak the same language as us does not mean we have close connections culturally.
Most people in Singapore speak English but we culturally we have little in common.
Absolutely right. The USA is very different to the UK.