The U.S. Constitution states that all treaties made under the authority of the United States become supreme law of the land. When our government stymied under pressure from foreign-represented lobbyists and signed the WTO treaty the government effectively sold away our sovereignty. One of the biggest disasters that has come about as a direct result of the WTO was China’s entrance in 2001. Since entering, trade with China has resulted in the loss of over 3.1 million jobs, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Those fortunate enough to retain their jobs witnessed their annual earnings decrease by roughly $1,400. American workers are put in direct competition with one another as more and more employers look to offshore production to nations with lower wage rates.

Jobs losses have affected both white and blue-collar sectors of the economy. Over that time we have lost:
627,700 jobs in computer and electronic products
150,200 in apparel and accessories
136,900 in miscellaneous manufactured goods
153,300 in administrative support services
139,000 in professional, scientific and technical services

In all, those displaced workers lost an average of $8,146 annually – a total of $19.4 billion – as they moved into lower paying jobs. These job losses can be directly attributed to China’s rapidly growing trade surplus with us.

The WTO claims its goal is to provide a hub for industrialized nations to find markets for their producers to sell among the poorer nations of the world – unfortunately, poorer nations do not really have or make anything that consumers in rich nations wish to buy. The anti-free and anti-fair trade policies of the WTO and our free-trade agreements have led to a trade deficit in America of over $5 trillion. This represents the largest unilateral transfer of wealth in the history of humanity.

Our current trade policies will not be able to sustain our country. We are in the midst of an economic recession the likes of which we have never seen. It was caused not by the natural economic cycle, but rather by policies that are both anti-American and hinder real economic growth.

We must remove incentives for American companies to move offshore. We need to negotiate trade with countries on our own, free of lobbyist influence and with zero international control from organizations like the WTO.

Our current method of creating trade agreements with countries forcibly grants them a trading and competitive advantage. We must remove ourselves from the WTO as it enforces trade laws and rulings that counter our own, and counter the interests of America and our industries. Under the WTO’s own charter the United States is allowed to do this.

Fair trade cannot exist as free trade does exist. Introducing international power into our trade policy decisions forces a bias that we are powerless to overcome. Our industries are at the whim of the powerful lobbyists who fight only for certain sectors of our economy, and the WTO, run by internationalists with their own agenda.

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