“Trade has become a bad word for working Americans for a simple reason: our trade policy has been bad for working Americans. We need new trade policies that put workers, wages and families first.” -- John Edwards

After growing up in Carolina mill towns, John Edwards understands the devastating impact that bad trade policies can have on workers and communities. Even when jobs are not moved offshore, competition from cheap labor overseas holds down wages and benefits in the United States. And with Washington dominated by powerful special interests, it the benefits of our economic and trade policies are enjoyedby increasingly few individuals and multinational corporations. Over the last 20 years, American incomes have grown apart: 40 percent of the income growth in the 1980s and 1990s went the top 1 percent. If all Americans shared in prosperity to the same extent they did 30 years ago, families in the bottom 80 percent would be earning $7,000 more a year. [EPI, 2006; Summers, Furman and Bordoff, 2007]

Today, John Edwards described his “smart and safe trade” policies. Edwards believes that if you give American workers a level playing field, American workers will succeed in the global economy. He will make trade policies help workers as well as corporations, lift up families around the world, and build on other efforts to help American families such as universal health care, fairer taxes, stronger unions, and investments in innovation and skills. First and foremost, he will insist that the gains of any new trade deal be broadly shared, benefiting mostfamilies after considering its impact on jobs, wages, and prices.

Smart and Safe Trade

Be a Tough Negotiator, Unafraid to Reject Bad Deals: The American position in trade negotiations has been formulated behind closed doors with help from corporate lobbyists. Under the “fast track” procedure, Congress could not amend the resulting deals. Not surprisingly, trade agreements include special privileges for corporations, such as strong remedies for commercial rights and unprecedented rights to challenge environmental and health laws, but failed to protect workers. As president, Edwards willpursue trade deals that:

- Make most families better off, considering its impact on jobs, wages, and prices.

- Enforce labor rights -- including the right to organize and bargain collectively and prohibitions against forced labor, child labor, and discrimination – to prevent a global race to the bottom and help build a global middle class.

- Protect the environment, preventing the exploitation of weak or poorly enforced laws and greenhouse gas commitments if necessary.

- Clearly prohibit currency manipulation that puts American businesses at a disadvantage.

Demand a Level Playing Field for Trade: The U.S. Trade Representative is currently responsible for trade enforcement, but often neglects trade deals as soon as the ink dries. As a result, trade violations like subsidies are overlooked, unsafe products enter the country, intellectual property is pirated, and goods are counterfeited. Edwards will assign top prosecutors at the U.S. Department of Justice to the job of enforcing trade laws, including the stronger labor and environment standards he willnegotiate. He will also go after illegal trade subsidies and insist that China and other countries move toward ending manipulation of their currencies, seeking WTO sanctions if necessary.

Eliminate Tax Incentives to Move Offshore: The U.S. tax code encourages multinational corporations to invest overseas by allowing them to indefinitely defer taxation on their foreign profits. In some cases corporations actually receive subsidies to invest overseas through a “negative tax.” Edwards will eliminate the benefit of deferral in low-tax countries, ensuring that American companies’ profits are taxedwhen earned at either the U.S. rate or by a foreign country at a comparable rate. [Grubert and Mutti, 2002; Altshuler and Grubert, 2001; Treasury, 2000]

Revamp Trade Assistance and the Safety Net to Help Dislocated Workers and Communities: Americans today are more likely to lose their jobs and less likely to receive unemployment benefits. For too long, the federal government has stood by while plant closings devastate entire towns. Edwards will fight for these workers and their communities, by modernizing unemployment insurance to cover 500,000 more workers a year and creating a new “Training Works” initiative tied to high-wage jobs.

Ensure the Safety of Imported Food, Drugs and Toys: Food imports more than doubled in the last decade and Americans eat 260 pounds of imported foods a year. Nearly 80 percent of children’s toys are made in China, and recently Fisher-Price recalled almost 19 million toys made with high amounts of lead and dangerous magnets. India and China now supply the United States with more than 40 percent of the active ingredients for pills made here. [AP, 4/16/07; NY Times, 4/30/07; Toy Industry Association, 2007; CPSC, 2007; Washington Post, 6/17/07]

- Enforce mandatory country-of-origin labeling on all food, increase inspections of imported food, and require the Food and Drug Administration to assess foreign nation’s food safety systems.

- Raise penalties for toy safety violations, require independent testing, authorize border detention and inspection of toys in high-risk categories and ensure the independence of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

- Mandate the pharmaceutical industry to quickly implement non-forgeable electronic "track-and-trace pedigrees" to ensure that drugs stay safe at every step in the supply chain -- from factory to store and require sellers to prove that their drugs came from an authorized distributor.