Candidates’ positions on free trade
Clinton supported the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) as First Lady but voted against the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) in 2007. In March 2007, she told Bloomberg News that, while she still believes in free trade, she supports a freeze, or “a little time-out” on new trade agreements.
Clinton seeks to regulate outsourcing. “Outsourcing is a problem,” she said at the 2007 Democratic Primary debate at Howard University last June. “We have to: end the tax breaks that still exist in the tax code for outsourcing jobs [and have] trade agreements with enforceable labor and environmental standards.”
Obama supports: amending NAFTA; enforcing environmental and labour provisions in trade agreements; and taking a tougher line on China. Regarding NAFTA, he told the Des Moines Register last December, “NAFTA needs to be amended to make sure that labor agreements are enforceable.”
On China, he told the same paper: “Toys cannot come in. We will have our own safety inspectors on the ground for food. We should insist on: labor standards and human rights, the opening of Chinese markets fully to American goods and the fulfillment of legal contracts with American businesses without triggering a trade war.”
McCain opposes subsidies and protectionism. In the 2007 Des Moines Register Republican debate last December in Iowa, he said: “I will open every market in the world to Iowa's agricultural products, and eliminate subsidies on ethanol and other agricultural products. Subsidies distort markets and destroy our ability to compete in the world.”
He added in the Republican debate in South Carolina last month, “I will lower the barriers to products coming into the U.S. in return for any nation that will lower their barriers to U.S. products, particularly our agricultural products.”
Romney supports renegotiating trade treaties with China and other countries and opening up markets to U.S. products. In the Republican debate in Iowa last December, he said: “ We want to make sure people [do not] close their markets to our goods because we can compete anywhere in the world.”
In the Republican debate in Michigan last October, he said: “It's been calculated that the average family in America is $9,000 a year richer because we have the ability to sell products around the world. I want to make sure that the American worker gets a fair shake. We need to make sure that the Chinese begin to float their currency and protect our designs, patents and our technology.”