I'd be interested to know whether the FTAA is your preference over world talks. Ultimately regional agreements and world agreements can't both work, right?

Well, theoretically, they would be completely compatible, because ideally all free trade agreements would be just that: Free trade, with no restrictions. That's not how it happens, of course.

I'm not that concerned about regional agreements, especially because they don't seem to be all that viable (as witness the failure of the FTAA). When they happen, as with NAFTA or the Common Market, they have good effects. And given that NAFTA and the EU exist side-by-side with GATT/WTO, I think there's no particular problem at this moment.

Read a really good article in Foreign Affairs a couple years ago about how bilateral and regional trade pacts work against the trade interests of the US, since they play into the trading strengths of our trading partners (whose good are concentrated in one market) while ignoring ours (dispersion of goods and services across many markets). It was a really good read. I also did not see any provisions in this agreement that would adequately deal with dislocations of local markets or ensure sound environmental or labor practices.

"ensure sound environmental or labor practices"

First, this is not really high on the U.S.'s list of priorities, and with justification; second, those practices will become accepted as trading partners become richer; and third, when the U.S. does try to require sound environmental practices--i.e., not letting China produce as much CO2 as it wants under Kyoto--people get all huffy.

Foreign Affairs is a good magazine, but its economic writing is usually about par with the books on trade they sell in airport bookstores. Clyde Prestowitz, for instance, shouldn't be listened to by anyone at this point.

Free Trade is a fine and dandy theoretcial construct.

Unfortunately, labor does not have the same freedom of movement that industry has. I disagree that a US company should be free to hire workers overseas at a lower rate, as long as the other country has a lower level of public infrastructure investment, environmental regulation, and lower cost of living.

In short; I'm not Free to move to India to enjoy a much lower cost of living and take a lower-paying job at IBM. Until I have that Freedom, giving Corporations that freedom, is a one-sided deal, stacked AGAINST the middle class of the US. Ultimately, it will hurt American companies, because when they destroy the American middle class, there will be nobody left to sell their products to.

It's a noble goal, to bring equality and prosperity to other countries, but there are so many other trade issues to be settled first, that as it's being done today, it equates to a "race to the bottom" - which will undobutedly end in disaster for the vast majority of participants.

"First, this is not really high on the U.S.'s list of priorities, and with justification;"

They're high on my list though ;), especially after seeing cities in China that are choking to death on their own industrial expansion. When you can enter a city in the morning with a white dress shirt on, walk around all day, and by the time you leave it's gray, there are serious issues. I don't think Americans would be all that worse off paying an extra $.10 for a shirt to prevent such catastrophes.

Having both visited and lived in such cities, I share your concern. However, to what extent is this America's (or Europe's or Japan's) problem? Surely the larger problem is that China's government and economic planning is nonresponsive to the people it governs, not that Western consumers are making a good deal. And given the choice between living in Xi'an or living in the farms outside Xi'an, I think that it would be rational--even at the cost of one or two years of life expectancy--to head on into the big cities.