|
|
Good news out of Washington is rare. Last week congressional leaders agreed
on a bipartisan bill which, if passed, would for the first time in years give
the president “fast-track” authority when negotiating trade deals. The bill
would be a boost for the prospects of a huge trade deal, the Trans-Pacific
Partnership (TPP), binding America with 11 economies (including Japan but not
China) around the Pacific rim. Now, as if on cue, come welcome signals about the
TPP itself. As Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, prepared to head to
Washington for a much-anticipated trip including an invitation to address a
joint session of Congress (see article), he claimed that America and Japan were
close to agreement over their bilateral terms―on which the whole TPP deal
hinges.
Yet there are two big caveats. First, fast track, formally known as Trade
Promotion Authority, may still fall foul of Congress. Second, Japan may not make
any serious cuts to tariffs that protect its farmers. Those outcomes are more
likely because the Obama administration and the Japanese government have made a
similar mistake: both have been too quick to cast the TPP as a weapon in the
containment of China.
Flanked by Japan and America, the TPP would link countries which make up
40% of global GDP. It could boost world output by $220 billion a year by 2025.
It is supposed to reform difficult areas such as intellectual property,
state-owned firms and environmental and labour standards. It would join
economies―from Vietnam to Australia―that lie at different ends of the spectrum
of development.
But the TPP will not happen without fast track, which forces Congress into
a yes/no vote on any pending trade deal and so avoids the risk that it will be
amended into oblivion. And the passage of fast track faces a lot of scepticism
from Democrats (see article). Some are implacably opposed. Others want America
to have a bigger arsenal with which to fight against unfair traders. Driven by a
conviction that China artificially holds its currency down and destroys American
jobs, Charles Schumer, a powerful senator from New York, is determined that fast
track should include a provision that would make sure a trade deal included
sanctions on currency manipulation.
Attaching a currency-manipulation clause to trade deals is a poor idea,
both because the practice is hard to define and because the addition of such
clauses makes reaching an agreement less likely. But since the Obama
administration has pitched TPP as a counterbalance to an assertive China, Mr
Schumer's demands are harder to ignore.
The same mistaken logic looks set to cause problems in Japan. Mr Abe
committed his country to joining the TPP on strategic grounds―as a counterweight
to China―rather than because he is a born admirer of free trade. When he entered
negotiations, some of his backers thought that, by playing the China card, Japan
would be spared from making real concessions: that America would care more about
a pact that excluded China than about prising open Japan's most protected
markets, particularly rice. Even now, Japan seems to want to keep tariffs high.
The best it may offer is to allow in a fixed quota of tariff-free rice from the
TPP's other members, America included.
If the China-containment logic leads to a minimalist agreement, then the
economic gains from TPP will be slim. TPP's real value is to set high new
standards for world trade, and that demands the boldest possible agreement. And
in the long run the world gains most if China joins. The rhetoric makes trade
negotiations sound like a contest. In fact, it is a battle where the more you
give away the more you win.
|
|
发表于 2017-8-6 16:08:29