[PEN-L:32399] Easterbrook's claims

["F G" <cantthinkofahandle@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

I followed the link posted by Lou where Easterbrook review's Singer's new
book:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2001/0211.easterbrook.html

Much of the article is not worth responding to, since it argues that
"globalization" is good without bothering to define it.  However, I was
interested in the following claims:

"And he notes that the main effect of NAFTA, denounced by the
anti-globalization left as a tool of corporate oligarchs, has been the
creation of relatively high-paying jobs in Mexico"

I've read in several places that this not true or at least misleading (in
particular in a book on NAFTA written by Mexican economist Alberto Arroyo
and others), that many new jobs do not provide benefits and are of a
precarious nature, and there continues to be high unemployment.  Also the
real minimum wage is down from 1993.  Anyone know more about this?  I
suppose it depends partly on the meaning of "relatively high-paying", and
how many jobs have actually been created.  As usual, it also needs to be
argued that things could not have been better without NAFTA.

Also:
"Average incomes there [in the developing world] almost doubled from 1975 to
1999; even if you subtract for oil-enriched developing nations with
unusually high GDPs per capita, global average income rose"

(Don't know about the data, but if you exclude India and East Asia, I
suspect the story is much worse)

and:

"(And the endless "widening gap between rich and poor" in the United States?
This is an artifact of the huge rise in legal immigration in the last two
decades. Factor out the low incomes of the newly arrived foreign-born, and
the gap between rich and poor Americans is shrinking. But that's a story for
another day.)"

Any comments on this?  Note that the massive rise in immigration is at least
in part due to global inequality and third world regression.

-Frank G.


_________________________________________________________________
Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE*
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail