Withdrawing Approval Of The United States From Agreement Establishing The WTO

WITHDRAWING APPROVAL OF THE UNITED STATES FROM AGREEMENT ESTABLISHING THE WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION -- (House of Representatives - June 09, 2005)

Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I will vote against this resolution because it is a little too radical for where I am now, but I am tempted to vote for it because of the fa ilure of our current policies and the blindness of those who defend them.

Those who defend our current policies acknowledge that free trade puts pressure on countries to race to the bottom on environmental and labor standards so they can be the low-cost, high-value producer. But the real disconnect is between the theory of free trade and on-the-ground business reality.

Those who defend the WTO live in a world of theory in which business and consumers will buy American goods if they are good values, subject only to the written transparent regulations and tariff laws of their country. This theory is true in the United States where our businesses and consumers are happy to buy. We have lowered our tariffs, we have lowered our regulations and barriers, and there has been an explosion of imports to the United States.

But the theory is false as to China and many other nations. In those countries, their written laws are almost irrelevant; and so we negotiate hard, we open our markets in return for a chan ge of China's written laws, and then we are surprised when changing those laws does nothing to open their markets and the average person in China buys less than 3 cents, I believe it is, of goods and services from America every day.

Why is this? Because their businesses are told orally, do not buy from America unless you get a co-production agreement, do not buy from America unless you get a disclosure of our technology and our manufacturing techniques. So when an airline in the United States goes to de cide which airplane to buy, it does so on economic factors. When China buys, they demand that more and more production be shifted to China. No wonder we have this huge trade deficit and the dollar is certainly in peril.

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