Political Quotes

“Madam President, today new U.S.-China trade deficit figures from April show a 34-percent increase since March. Last month our trade deficit with the world's second largest economy was more than $24 billion. I remember about a dozen years ago when the Senate and the House approved PNTR--permanent normal trade relations--with China. Around that time the bilateral yearly trade deficit with China was barely $10 billion. Today, just for last month, it was $24 billion. It has persistently and consistently been over $200 billion a year in recent history. This kind of trade deficit keeps our domestic companies on the defensive. It means workers in Ohio, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, throughout the Midwest, and across America are prevented from unlocking their potential. Our manufacturers are still the most productive in the world. Our workers are the most skilled and the most productive in the world. Their productivity continues to go up and up and up, in part because of globalization; however, their wages have been stagnant. That is part of the price our country has paid for globalization. Our workers can't compete when China cheats. How can we win the future when our manufacturers can't win contracts because China doesn't play fair? In many ways China and so many of our trading partners practice trade according to their national interest. Yet we in the United States practice trade according to some economics textbook that has been out of print for the last 20 years.…”