Marcy Kaptur: “Last week marked the 20th anniversary of NAFTA's going into effect. The North American Free Trade Agreement was a…”

“Last week marked the 20th anniversary of NAFTA's going into effect. The North American Free Trade Agreement was a hard-fought fight here in this Congress with a very close vote. In 1994, when it narrowly passed under a rule not allowing amendment, called Fast Track, America was promised that NAFTA would be a great jobs boon for our country and our economy. Exactly the reverse has happened. The NAFTA promises made have all been broken. First, on jobs: the administration at the time promised that NAFTA would initially create 200,000 new jobs. In reality, America has now lost, after 20 years, about 1 million jobs related to NAFTA's impact, and the old sucking sound actually happened. Our jobs were off-shored, sucked away. More than 680,000 American jobs have gone to Mexico alone. Yes, that great sucking sound continues to happen. About 60 percent of the jobs lost, of the million jobs lost overall, were lost to Mexico in the manufacturing sector. These were middle class jobs that came from places like Cleveland, Toledo, Pittsburgh, Chicago and Buffalo, and the list goes on. They were good paying jobs in our country that had provided living wages, medical benefits, and employer contributions to retirement programs. America was also promised that NAFTA would fuel dynamic trade in tearing down trade barriers and creating trade surpluses for our country which means that we actually would export more than we imported with jobs created as a result.…”