Well, NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) negotiations have started.
Here's the USA's opening offer: https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/files/Press/Releases/NAFTAObjectives.pdf
Globe and Mail (canadian, left-wing) summary: What the U.S. wants from NAFTA talks
Somebody please find a better summary. I saw a better one yesterday, but can't find it anymore (private tabs on browser in most places, so not in my history).
Opinion on the offer from a Canadian: ya fucking right.
The "WTF is the USA thinking?" part:
Dropping the arbitration clause ("Chapter 19 dispute settlement mechanism" in the article) just won't happen. That was a deal-breaker before, so dropping from the agreement it is a non-starter. The USA probably knows this, but there's a lot of lobbies that want it gone so that the USA (As the "powerful" member of the agreement) can ignore shit at will like they've tried to multiple times with Softwood Lumber, and probably other things too.
The "I don't like it" parts:
The parts about cultural imports/exports (streaming movies) is probably a trap to bring Canadian copyright laws in harmony (ie: worse off) like the USA's are. I think this should go the other way entirely, and have copyright be until death of the artist, or 15 years, whichever is longer (or even "15 years after the original artist doesn't own it" would be neat IMO), not death of artist + 75 years like it is in the USA. There's no profit motive to create if you're dead, and 15 years is enough to (hopefully) not make it worth it to kill the artist to make a derivative work. And yes, under my (theoretical will never happen) system, if you create something at age 30, and die at 70, it IMMEDIATELY enters the public domain. You've had 40 years of copyright already. The 15 thing is so that if you create at 30 and die at 35, your estate has 10 more years with the work. But copyright is a WHOLE other thing.
USA wants access to government/municipal contracts in Canada (and Mexico maybe), but doesn't want the same access back ("Buy American" clauses). Uh, that's kind of one-sided. No.
Also the USA wants their banks to be able to operate in Canada. Even if that goes both ways, it's a bit of a "pandora's box" thing, where will they agree to be regulated according to Canadian Law? In 2008, our banks didn't fail like yours did because they weren't allowed to have so much debt in one place (among other reasons). Hence I think this is a bit iffy.
The "I like it" parts:
I like the idea of ordering up to $800 of stuff online from the USA without tariffs though. Personally, I've always thought it was bullshit that many business things are exempt, but not free trade for ME going back and forth across the border, and now in the age of the Internet, not for that either. So relaxing that I think is great actually. I actually think that if it's for non-commerical purposes, there shouldn't be a limit at all. That gets hard to track, but it shouldn't be difficult to tell who's running businesses and who isn't.
I also like the idea of getting rid of "supply management" up here, but there's no way that'll happen, so it won't be in the agreement, as good as it would be for consumers. That's what some of the dairy stuff is about, if we allowed imports, the whole system up here would collapse. It should collapse, but that's a whole other thing that's more Canada-specific.
Despite my comments about copyright above, I'd like to have that as long as OUR laws didn't need to change. I'd like to access Hulu, USA Netflix (you have more selection), etc. So I want the services, but that's unlikely to happen without the draconian measures your companies probably want on them.
Now as an opening offer? Not necessarily a bad document, as you can negotiate away a number of things less important, but there's NO WAY IN HELL it'll go through as first proposal.
Chapter 19 dispute settlement mechanism
Here's the USA's opening offer: https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/files/Press/Releases/NAFTAObjectives.pdf
Globe and Mail (canadian, left-wing) summary: What the U.S. wants from NAFTA talks
Somebody please find a better summary. I saw a better one yesterday, but can't find it anymore (private tabs on browser in most places, so not in my history).
Opinion on the offer from a Canadian: ya fucking right.
The "WTF is the USA thinking?" part:
Dropping the arbitration clause ("Chapter 19 dispute settlement mechanism" in the article) just won't happen. That was a deal-breaker before, so dropping from the agreement it is a non-starter. The USA probably knows this, but there's a lot of lobbies that want it gone so that the USA (As the "powerful" member of the agreement) can ignore shit at will like they've tried to multiple times with Softwood Lumber, and probably other things too.
The "I don't like it" parts:
The parts about cultural imports/exports (streaming movies) is probably a trap to bring Canadian copyright laws in harmony (ie: worse off) like the USA's are. I think this should go the other way entirely, and have copyright be until death of the artist, or 15 years, whichever is longer (or even "15 years after the original artist doesn't own it" would be neat IMO), not death of artist + 75 years like it is in the USA. There's no profit motive to create if you're dead, and 15 years is enough to (hopefully) not make it worth it to kill the artist to make a derivative work. And yes, under my (theoretical will never happen) system, if you create something at age 30, and die at 70, it IMMEDIATELY enters the public domain. You've had 40 years of copyright already. The 15 thing is so that if you create at 30 and die at 35, your estate has 10 more years with the work. But copyright is a WHOLE other thing.
USA wants access to government/municipal contracts in Canada (and Mexico maybe), but doesn't want the same access back ("Buy American" clauses). Uh, that's kind of one-sided. No.
Also the USA wants their banks to be able to operate in Canada. Even if that goes both ways, it's a bit of a "pandora's box" thing, where will they agree to be regulated according to Canadian Law? In 2008, our banks didn't fail like yours did because they weren't allowed to have so much debt in one place (among other reasons). Hence I think this is a bit iffy.
The "I like it" parts:
I like the idea of ordering up to $800 of stuff online from the USA without tariffs though. Personally, I've always thought it was bullshit that many business things are exempt, but not free trade for ME going back and forth across the border, and now in the age of the Internet, not for that either. So relaxing that I think is great actually. I actually think that if it's for non-commerical purposes, there shouldn't be a limit at all. That gets hard to track, but it shouldn't be difficult to tell who's running businesses and who isn't.
I also like the idea of getting rid of "supply management" up here, but there's no way that'll happen, so it won't be in the agreement, as good as it would be for consumers. That's what some of the dairy stuff is about, if we allowed imports, the whole system up here would collapse. It should collapse, but that's a whole other thing that's more Canada-specific.
Despite my comments about copyright above, I'd like to have that as long as OUR laws didn't need to change. I'd like to access Hulu, USA Netflix (you have more selection), etc. So I want the services, but that's unlikely to happen without the draconian measures your companies probably want on them.
Now as an opening offer? Not necessarily a bad document, as you can negotiate away a number of things less important, but there's NO WAY IN HELL it'll go through as first proposal.
Chapter 19 dispute settlement mechanism