[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 72 (Tuesday, May 12, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2783-S2785]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 TRADE

  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, at 2:30 this afternoon, the Senate will 
vote on a motion to proceed to the fast-track bill which was recently 
approved by the Finance Committee. I will be strongly opposing that 
legislation.
  In a nutshell, here is the reality of the American economy today: 
While we are certainly better off than we were 6\1/2\ years ago, the 
truth is that for the last 40 years the American middle class has been 
disappearing. The truth is that today we have some 45 million Americans 
living in poverty, and that is almost at the highest rate in the modern 
history of America.
  While the middle class continues to shrink, we are seeing more income 
and wealth inequality than at any time in our country since 1929, and 
it is worse in America than any other major country on Earth. Today, 99 
percent of all new income is going to the top 1 percent. Today, the top 
one-tenth of 1 percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 
percent. In the last 2 years, the 14 wealthiest people in this country 
have seen an increase in their wealth of $157 billion, and that $157 
billion is more wealth than is owned by the bottom 130 million 
Americans.
  How is that happening? Why is it happening? We have seen a huge 
increase in technology, productivity is way up, and the reality is that 
most working people should be seeing an increase in their income. Yet, 
median family income has gone down by almost $5,000 since 1999. How 
does that happen? Why is it that the richest country in the history of 
the world has almost all of its new wealth in the hands of the few, 
while the vast majority of the American people are working longer hours 
for lower wages? How does that happen? Well, there are a lot of 
factors, but I will tell everyone that our disastrous trade agreements, 
such as NAFTA, CAFTA, and permanent normal trade relations with China, 
are certainly one of the major reasons why the middle class is in 
decline and why more and more income and wealth goes to a handful of 
people on the top.
  The sad truth is that many of the new jobs created in this country 
today are part-time and low-paying jobs. Thirty or forty years ago, 
people who maybe had a high school degree could go out and get a job in 
a factory. They never got rich and it wasn't a glamorous job, but they 
had enough wages and benefits to make it into the middle class.
  Since 2001, we have lost almost 60,000 factories in America. When 
young people graduate from high school today, they don't have the 
opportunity to work in a factory and have a union job and make middle-
class wages; their options are Walmart and McDonald's, where there are 
low wages and minimal benefits. Those are companies which are 
vehemently anti-union.
  The sad truth is that we are in a race to the bottom. Not only have 
our trade agreements cost us millions of decent-paying jobs, they have 
depressed wages in this country because companies--virtually every 
major multinational corporation in this country has outsourced jobs and 
shed millions of American jobs. What they say to workers is: If you 
don't like the cuts in health care and wages, we will go to China. We 
can hire people there for $1 an hour.
  Sadly, the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement follows in the 
footsteps of the other disastrous free-trade agreements that have 
forced American workers to compete against desperate and low-wage 
workers around the world.
  Over and over again--and I have heard this so many times, including 
on the floor this morning--supporters of fast-track have told us that 
unfettered free trade will increase American jobs and wages and will be 
just wonderful for the American economy. Sadly, however, these folks 
have been proven wrong and wrong and wrong time after time after time. 
I hear the same language, and what they say proves not to be true every 
time.
  I will mention some quotes from the supporters of NAFTA. These are 
people who were telling us how great the NAFTA free-trade agreement 
would be.
  President Bill Clinton was pushing NAFTA in the same way that 
President Obama is pushing TPP today. On September 19, 1993, President 
Clinton said:

       I believe NAFTA will create 200,000 American jobs in the 
     first two years of its effect. . . . I believe that NAFTA 
     will create a million jobs in the first five years of its 
     impact.

  It wasn't just liberals, such as Bill Clinton, who supported NAFTA. I 
have a quote from the very conservative Heritage Foundation in 1993: 
``Virtually all economists agree that NAFTA will produce a net increase 
of U.S. jobs over the next decade.''
  In 1993, the distinguished Senator from Kentucky, our majority leader 
Mitch McConnell, said: ``American firms will not move to Mexico just 
for lower wages.''
  Were President Clinton, the Heritage Foundation, and Mitch McConnell 
correct? Well, of course they were not. In fact, what happened was 
exactly the opposite of what they said.
  According to the well-respected economists at the Economic Policy 
Institute, NAFTA has led to the loss of more than 680,000 jobs. In 
1993, the year before NAFTA was implemented, the United States had a 
trade surplus with Mexico of more than $1.6 billion. Last year, the 
trade deficit with Mexico was $53 billion. So all of the verbiage we 
heard about NAFTA being so good for American workers turned out to be 
dead wrong.
  What about China? We were told: Oh my God, China will open up the 
Chinese market, and there are billions of people. What an opportunity 
to create good-paying jobs in America.
  Here is what President Clinton, one of the proponents of permanent 
normal trade relations with China, had to say in 1999:


[[Page S2784]]


       In opening the economy of China, the agreement will create 
     unprecedented opportunities for American farmers, workers and 
     companies to compete successfully in China's market . . . 
     This is a hundred-to-nothing deal for America when it comes 
     to the economic consequences.

  In 1999, conservative economists at the Cato Institute said:

       The silliest argument against PNTR is that Chinese imports 
     would overwhelm U.S. industry. In fact, American workers are 
     far more productive than their Chinese counterparts . . . 
     PNTR would create far more export opportunities for America 
     than the Chinese.

  Wow, were they wrong.
  The Economic Policy Institute has estimated that PNTR with China has 
led to the net loss of over 2.7 million Americans jobs.
  Go to any department store in America and walk in the door. Where are 
the products made? China, China, China. They are made in Vietnam and in 
other low-wage countries. In fact, it is harder and harder to buy a 
product not made in China.

  So all of those people who told us what a great deal PNTR with China 
would be turned out to be dead wrong. In fact, our trade agreement with 
China has cost us almost 3 million jobs.
  In 2001, the trade deficit with China was $83 billion. Today, it is 
$342 billion. In 2011, on another trade agreement, the U.S. Chamber of 
Commerce--a big proponent of unfettered free trade--strongly supported 
TPP. The Chamber of Commerce told us we had to pass a free-trade 
agreement with South Korea because it would create some 280,000 jobs in 
America. That is a lot of jobs. It turns out they were wrong again. In 
reality, the Economic Policy Institute recently found that the Korea 
Free Trade Agreement has led to the loss of some 75,000 jobs.
  Now, the Obama administration says, trust us. Forget what they said 
about NAFTA. Forget what they said about Korea. Forget what they said 
about China. This one is different. Really, really, cross our fingers, 
hope to die, this one is really, really different. Yes, it may be true 
that every corporation in America--corporations that have shut down 
factories in this country and moved to China--they are supporting this 
agreement. Yes, it is true Wall Street, whose greed and recklessness 
have almost destroyed the American economy, is supporting this 
agreement. Yes, it is true the pharmaceutical industry, which charges 
us the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs, is 
supporting this agreement--but not to worry, we should trust these 
guys. They really are thinking of the American middle class and working 
families. Trust us when they tell us a trade agreement will be good for 
working people. Yes, we should really trust them. Meanwhile, every 
trade union in America and the vast majority of environmental groups in 
this country are saying be careful about TPP; vote no on fast-track.
  Here is the reality of the American economy. Since 2001, we have lost 
60,000 factories in this country and we have lost over 4.7 million 
manufacturing jobs. In 1970, 25 percent of all the jobs in this country 
were in manufacturing. Today, that figure is down to 9 percent.
  The point is that, by and large, especially if there were unions, 
those manufacturing jobs paid working people a living wage, not a 
Walmart wage, not a McDonald's wage.
  Our demand must be to corporate America--which tells us every night 
on TV to buy this product, to buy this pair of sneakers, to buy this 
television, to buy whatever it is--that maybe, just maybe, they might 
want to start manufacturing those products here in the United States of 
America and pay our workers a decent wage, rather than looking all over 
the world for the lowest possible wages in which they can exploit 
workers who are desperate.
  I was very disappointed that President Obama chose the headquarters 
of Nike to tout the so-called benefits of the TPP. Nike epitomizes why 
disastrous, unfettered free-trade policies during the past four decades 
have failed American workers. Nike does not employ a single 
manufacturing worker who makes shoes in the United States of America--
not one worker. One hundred percent of the shoes sold by Nike are made 
overseas in low-wage countries. That is the transformation of the 
American economy, and it is not just Nike.
  When Nike was founded in 1964, just 4 percent of U.S. footwear was 
imported. In other words, we manufactured the vast majority of the 
shoes and the sneakers we wore. Today, nearly all of the shoes that are 
bought in the United States are manufactured overseas. Today, over 
330,000 workers manufacture Nike's products in Vietnam, where the 
minimum wage is 56 cents an hour.
  I hear President Obama and other proponents of TPP talking about a 
level playing field. We have to compete on a level playing field. Does 
anybody think competing against desperate people who make 56 cents an 
hour is a level playing field, is fair to American workers? Of course, 
we want the poor people all over the world to see an increase in their 
standard of living, and we have to play an important role in that, but 
we don't have to destroy the American middle class to help low-income 
workers around the world.
  In Vietnam, not only is the minimum wage 56 cents an hour, 
independent labor unions are banned, and people are thrown in jail for 
expressing their political beliefs. Is that the level playing field 
President Obama and other proponents of unfettered free trade are 
talking about?
  Back in 1988, Phil Knight--Phil Knight is the founder and the owner 
of Nike--said Nike had ``become synonymous with slave wages, forced 
overtime, and arbitrary abuse.'' Phil Knight was right. In fact, 
factories in Vietnam where Nike shoes are manufactured have been cited 
by the Worker Rights Consortium for excessive overtime, wage theft, and 
physical mistreatment of workers. Today, Mr. Knight is one of the 
wealthiest people on this planet, worth more than $22 billion. While 
Mr. Knight's net worth has more than tripled since 1999, the average 
Vietnamese worker who makes Nike shoes earns pennies an hour. That is 
pretty much synonymous with what unfettered free trade is about. A 
handful of people such as Phil Knight become multi-multi-
multibillionaires and poor people all over the world are exploited and 
paid pennies an hour.
  It is not just Nike and it is not just Vietnam. Another country that 
is part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership is Malaysia. Today, there are 
nearly 200 electronics factories in Malaysia where high-tech products 
from Apple, Dell, Intel, Motorola, and Texas Instruments are 
manufactured and brought back to the United States. If the TPP is 
approved, that number will go up substantially. What is wrong with 
that? It turns out that many of the workers at the electronics plants 
in Malaysia are being forced to work there under horrible working 
conditions. According to Verite, which conducted a 2-year investigation 
into labor abuses in Malaysia--an investigation which was commissioned 
by the U.S. Department of Labor--32 percent of the industry's nearly 
200,000 migrant workers in Malaysia were employed in forced situations 
because their passports had been taken away or because they were 
straining to pay back illegally high recruitment fees. In other words, 
American workers are going to be forced to compete against people in 
Malaysia--immigrant workers there whose passports have been taken away 
and who can't leave the country and who are working under forced labor 
situations.
  So let me conclude by saying this: All of us understand trade is 
good. It is a good thing. But I think most of us now have caught on to 
the fact that the trade agreements pushed by corporate America, pushed 
by Wall Street, pushed by the pharmaceutical industry are very, very 
good if you are the CEO of a major corporation, but they are a disaster 
if you are an American worker.
  It is my view that we have to rebuild manufacturing in America. It is 
my view that we have to create millions of decent-paying jobs in 
America. It is my view that we need to fundamentally rewrite our trade 
agreements so our largest export does not become decent-paying American 
jobs.
  I urge my colleagues to vote no on the fast-track agreement. Let us 
sit down and work on trade agreements that work for the American middle 
class, that work for our working people and not just for the CEOs of 
the largest corporations in this country.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.

[[Page S2785]]

  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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