Want Democrats to win in 2014 ...

[1StrongBlackMan]

17. I agree, though ...

I doubt the trend will stop anytime in the near future.

Since corporations have no national identity/loyalty, they will seek out low labor cost/low regulatory nation-states to park their production, low tax nation-states to park their cash, and high security/high lifestyle nation-states to park their executives.

IMO, the solution is not a nationalistic "bring 'our' jobs home" effort; but rather, we should be fighting for trade agreements that equalize worker/workplace and (environmental) regulatory protections, globally. If global wages and regulatory schemes were equalized, there will be no benefit to corporations in shuffling labor and production; rather they will make production decisions based on other matrices, such as where the resources and/or end-users are. For example, China will no longer be incentivized to cut and ship lumber in the Pacific Northwest of the US, only to ship it back to China, where processing wages and environmental regulations are all but non-existent. Rather, it would be cheaper and more efficient (i.e., more profitable) to build processing plants where the lumber is cut, or where the lumber will be used. Likewise, Walmart and Apple will no longer be able to use foreign sweat shops to produce their goods and Help-desks servicing US markets will be located in the US.

While the elements of TPP is largely secret, I read (about a year ago) that one of the sticking points in the negotiations is the US insistence on the strengthening of workplace/environmental protections. I wish I could find the link to the article; but since TPP is/was not in my top 10 areas of concern, I read the article and kept it moving.