Several organizations came together Monday night in Fisk Hall to discuss with students and community members the Free Trade Area of the Americas and encourage them to participate in upcoming protests against the FTAA.
Rose Trejo, a member of the International Socialist Organization, said the FTAA would expand the North American Free Trade Agreement to Central and South America. She argued that currently, NAFTA abuses workers’ rights and harms the environment.
Trejo said globalization can be harmful. Allowing free trade across borders makes it possible for companies to abandon American workers and expand in countries where they can find cheaper labor, she said.
Trejo said NAFTA doesn’t improve working conditions but actually leads to unemployment, lower wages and job instability. When General Electric moved to Mexico, Trejo said, the company paid its workers an average of only $6 a day.
“People who work here for GE make $18 an hour,” she said. “You can see how much more profit they’ll be making and how much they’ll be exploiting the workers over there.”
Trejo said the FTAA is against tariffs and non-tariff barriers, which include public health laws and environmental laws. The organization also allows corporations to sue governments if a law threatens their profits or reputations, she said.
Apollo Quiroz, president of a Chicago branch of the United Steelworkers of America, represents 22 companies. Two have moved to Mexico and have left workers without jobs, he said.
“They take (their corporation) to Mexico where they can pay one-third the price of what they pay a person here,” he said. “That’s the greed of the corporations.”
Quiroz partly blamed these problems on corporations and the government but also said people who don’t vote to change laws share responsibility. He urged students to think of their own job stability and where they might be in 10 years.
Aaron With, a member of Northwestern Students Against Sweatshops, drew a link between the FTAA and sweatshops. Free trade agreements provide an environment in which corporations can abuse workers’ rights without having answering to their host country, said With, a Weinberg sophomore.
Carl Schoby, an Evanston resident, described the FTAA as “NAFTA on steroids.”
“You have workers being ground down on a daily basis, child labor and even slave labor,” he said. “Those aren’t desirable by-products.”
