US Politics Mega-thread - Page 8636

Between 2017 and 2026, when most of the adjustment to the TPP occurs, the costs to workers who will be displaced, both from unemployment and lower future wages will amount to about 6 percent of the benefi ts estimated by Petri and Plummer. Over this period the TPP will have an average benefi t-cost ratio of 18:1. After 2026, when the economy will have almost fully responded to the TPP, the adjustment costs fall to far less than 1 percent of overall benefi ts, implying that the Petri-Plummer estimates of benefi ts in 2030 are basically unaf-fected by adjustment costs. For the full adjustment period Petri and Plummer consider (2017–30), the benefi ts are more than 100 times the costs.

Harvard economist Robert Z. Lawrence says that the model used by the Tufts researchers "is simply not suited for credibly predicting the effects of the TPP" and argues that the model used by Petri and Plummer is superior.[23] Lawrence argues that the model used by the Tufts researchers "does not have the granularity that allows it to estimate variables such as exports, imports, foreign direct investment, and changes in industrial structure. As a result, its predictions ignore the benefits to the TPP economies that occur through increased specialization, the realization of scale economies, and improved consumer choice."[23] Lawrence also notes that the model used by the Tufts researchers finds that the TPP will cause GDP to fall by 5.24% in non-TPP developing countries, such as China, India, and Indonesia, which Lawrence is highly skeptical of: "It is not believable that a trade agreement of this magnitude could cause the rest of the world to plummet into recession."[23] Harvard economist Dani Rodrik, a well-known skeptic of globalization, says that the Tufts researchers do "a poor job of explaining how their model works, and the particulars of their simulation are somewhat murky... the Capaldo framework lacks sectoral and country detail; its behavioral assumptions remain opaque; and its extreme Keynesian assumptions sit uneasily with its medium-term perspective."[22]

Morin and Baumier of the Canada Research Chair in International Political Economy (writing for the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development) argue that while the TPP contains an impressive number of environmental provisions and a wide range of environmental protection areas, very few of these standards are innovative, most of which being copied from previous US agreements, and that the TPP missed an opportunity to be an original and progressive contribution to the environmental agenda. However, the TPP is innovative in its utilization of a combination of the American and the European approaches in environmental protection. Indeed, in doing so, the TPP became much more detailed and specific than regular US agreements while being legally more enforceable than European agreements.

In 2013 when TPP was still being negotiated, Sierra Club's director of responsible trade, Ilana Solomon, argued that the TPP "could directly threaten our climate and our environment [including] new rights that would be given to corporations, and new constraints on the fossil fuel industry all have a huge impact on our climate, water, and land."[87] Upon the release of a draft of the Environment Chapter in January 2014, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the World Wide Fund for Nature joined with the Sierra Club in criticizing the TPP.[88] After the announcement of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) on 25 September 2015 and the finalisation of the TPP a week later, critics discussed the interactions between the SDGs and the TPP. While one critic sees the TPP as providing a mixed bag of benefits and drawbacks to the SDGs,[89] another regards the TPP as being incompatible with the SDGs, highlighting that if the development provisions clash with any other aspect of the TPP, the other aspect takes priority.[90] The Friends of the Earth have spoken out against the TPP.[91][92]
The White House has cited supportive statements from the World Wildlife Fund, the Nature Conservancy, the Humane Society, the Wildlife Conservation Society, Defenders of Wildlife, International Fund for Animal Welfare, World Animal Protection and other environmental groups in favor of the TPP.[93][94] The Peterson Institute for International Economics argues that the TPP is "the most environmentally friendly trade deal ever negotiated."[95] In regards to ISDS, PIIE analysts note that there is little evidence of constraints on environmental policies resulting from ISDS litigation.[96]