Specter Bill Would Add Tool in Fight
Against Harmful Trade Practices
U.S. Senator Arlen Specter (D-Pa.) has introduced legislation that seeks to help domestic manufacturers by enforcing trade remedy laws. The Unfair Foreign Competition Act of 2010 provides a private right of action for domestic manufacturers injured by illegal subsidization or dumping of foreign products into U.S. markets.
Senator Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) are cosponsors. The bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Finance.
“Job creation and job retention in this country depend, in large part, on our ability to enforce existing trade laws,” Senator Specter said. “This legislation would give an injured industry the opportunity to seek reliable enforcement in federal court so that we can stop anticompetitive, predatory trade practices which steal jobs from our workers, profits from our companies, and growth from our economy.”
“Unfair trade practices have shipped Pennsylvania jobs oversees and increased our trade deficit," said Senator Casey. “One of the best job creations strategies is to make foreign governments play by the rules and create a level playing field for American workers.”
Senator Brown said: “If we’re going to create manufacturing jobs, we need to start enforcing trade law. American manufacturers can compete with anyone – but they need a level playing field. This bill would prevent a flood of unfairly-subsidized imports from shuttering our factories.”
The Unfair Foreign Competition Act of 2010 would allow petitioning parties to bring a civil action in a U.S. district court for an injury finding in lieu of a determination by the International Trade Commission (ITC). Allowing petitioners to choose between the ITC and their local U.S. district court for the injury determination would give injured domestic producers the opportunity to serve as private plaintiffs in seeking enforcement of trade remedy laws. The nonpolitical venue would also alleviate the potential for inconsistencies and partisanship in enforcement remedies.
The legislation comes as China continues to engage in trade and market-distorting practices in violation of WTO rules and U.S. laws. By allowing countries like China to ignore international trade rules, the U.S. has lost countless manufacturing jobs and has a skyrocketing trade deficit. The latest trade numbers indicate that imports from China have exceeded U.S. exports by a staggering $208.6 billion.
Senator Specter has a long record of advocating for stronger enforcement of U.S. trade laws for domestic industries. He has testified in front of the International Trade Commission (ITC) on 14 separate occasions on behalf steel and labor, arguing that unfair trade has negatively impacted the entire steel industry - which employs over 20,000 workers in Pennsylvania - and sent thousands of jobs overseas. Senator Specter introduced similar legislation in 1999 and 2007.
A copy of Senator Specter’s floor statement on the bill is attached.
About the Unfair Foreign Competition Act of 2010:
· Allows petitioning parties in an antidumping or subsidy investigation (or 5-year sunset review) to elect to bring a civil action in a U.S. district court for an injury determination.
Election to bring action in district court would be in lieu of a determination by the International Trade Commission (the “ITC”).
The district court would apply the same standards in determining an injury (required by WTO).
The ITC staff would compile a record on which interested parties may file a brief or make oral arguments before the court.
An order issued by the district court would be appealable to a U.S. Court of Appeals.
The civil action may be brought in a judicial district where a manufacturing facility, sales office, or headquarters is located.
Time constraints (similar to those of the ITC) are placed on the court to issue determinations. Time extension is available.
The legal standard for determining dumping or subsidy margins B which is established by the Commerce Department B would remain unchanged.
from Senator Specter's office
Senator Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) are cosponsors. The bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Finance.
“Job creation and job retention in this country depend, in large part, on our ability to enforce existing trade laws,” Senator Specter said. “This legislation would give an injured industry the opportunity to seek reliable enforcement in federal court so that we can stop anticompetitive, predatory trade practices which steal jobs from our workers, profits from our companies, and growth from our economy.”
“Unfair trade practices have shipped Pennsylvania jobs oversees and increased our trade deficit," said Senator Casey. “One of the best job creations strategies is to make foreign governments play by the rules and create a level playing field for American workers.”
Senator Brown said: “If we’re going to create manufacturing jobs, we need to start enforcing trade law. American manufacturers can compete with anyone – but they need a level playing field. This bill would prevent a flood of unfairly-subsidized imports from shuttering our factories.”
The Unfair Foreign Competition Act of 2010 would allow petitioning parties to bring a civil action in a U.S. district court for an injury finding in lieu of a determination by the International Trade Commission (ITC). Allowing petitioners to choose between the ITC and their local U.S. district court for the injury determination would give injured domestic producers the opportunity to serve as private plaintiffs in seeking enforcement of trade remedy laws. The nonpolitical venue would also alleviate the potential for inconsistencies and partisanship in enforcement remedies.
The legislation comes as China continues to engage in trade and market-distorting practices in violation of WTO rules and U.S. laws. By allowing countries like China to ignore international trade rules, the U.S. has lost countless manufacturing jobs and has a skyrocketing trade deficit. The latest trade numbers indicate that imports from China have exceeded U.S. exports by a staggering $208.6 billion.
Senator Specter has a long record of advocating for stronger enforcement of U.S. trade laws for domestic industries. He has testified in front of the International Trade Commission (ITC) on 14 separate occasions on behalf steel and labor, arguing that unfair trade has negatively impacted the entire steel industry - which employs over 20,000 workers in Pennsylvania - and sent thousands of jobs overseas. Senator Specter introduced similar legislation in 1999 and 2007.
A copy of Senator Specter’s floor statement on the bill is attached.
About the Unfair Foreign Competition Act of 2010:
· Allows petitioning parties in an antidumping or subsidy investigation (or 5-year sunset review) to elect to bring a civil action in a U.S. district court for an injury determination.
Election to bring action in district court would be in lieu of a determination by the International Trade Commission (the “ITC”).
The district court would apply the same standards in determining an injury (required by WTO).
The ITC staff would compile a record on which interested parties may file a brief or make oral arguments before the court.
An order issued by the district court would be appealable to a U.S. Court of Appeals.
The civil action may be brought in a judicial district where a manufacturing facility, sales office, or headquarters is located.
Time constraints (similar to those of the ITC) are placed on the court to issue determinations. Time extension is available.
The legal standard for determining dumping or subsidy margins B which is established by the Commerce Department B would remain unchanged.
from Senator Specter's office
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Comments
As population density rises beyond a critical level, per capita consumption begins to decline. This occurs because, as people are forced to crowd together and conserve space, it becomes ever more impractical to own many products. Falling per capita consumption, in the face of rising productivity (per capita output, which always rises), inevitably yields rising unemployment and poverty.
This theory has huge ramifications for U.S. policy toward population management (especially immigration policy) and trade. The implications for population policy may be obvious, but why trade? It's because these effects of an excessive population density - rising unemployment and poverty - are actually imported when we attempt to engage in free trade in manufactured goods with a nation that is much more densely populated. Our economies combine. The work of manufacturing is spread evenly across the combined labor force. But, while the more densely populated nation gets free access to a healthy market, all we get in return is access to a market emaciated by over-crowding and low per capita consumption. The result is an automatic, irreversible trade deficit and loss of jobs, tantamount to economic suicide.
One need look no further than the U.S.'s trade data for proof of this effect. Using 2006 data, an in-depth analysis reveals that, of our top twenty per capita trade deficits in manufactured goods (the trade deficit divided by the population of the country in question), eighteen are with nations much more densely populated than our own. Even more revealing, if the nations of the world are divided equally around the median population density, the U.S. had a trade surplus in manufactured goods of $17 billion with the half of nations below the median population density. With the half above the median, we had a $480 billion deficit!
Our trade deficit with China is getting all of the attention these days. But, when expressed in per capita terms, our deficit with China in manufactured goods is rather unremarkable - nineteenth on the list. Our per capita deficit with other nations such as Japan, Germany, Mexico, Korea and others (all much more densely populated than the U.S.) is worse. My point is not that our deficit with China isn't a problem, but rather that it's exactly what we should have expected when we suddenly applied a trade policy that was a proven failure around the world to a country with one fifth of the world's population.
If you‘re interested in learning more about this important new economic theory, then I invite you to visit my web site at http://PeteMurphy.wordpress.com.
Pete Murphy
Author, "Five Short Blasts"