Why I defend NAFTA on DU, in four charts

[DanTex]

172. For example, here's a shot at making the opposite case using charts.

First, too look at effects on employment, look at manufacturing, which is the sector most impacted by NAFTA. Surely NAFTA had nothing much to do with the dot-com boom, or employment in finance or real estate or whatever. In this case we find, a few years after NAFTA, manufacturing employment goes down:


Another chart, of jobs exported (not sure how this is measured, exactly) tells largely the same story, which is that a few years after the passage of NAFTA, jobs started heading abroad.


But wait, you argue that despite losses in manufacturing, NAFTA increased employment in other sectors because of demand from Mexico for American goods and services. Comparative advantage and all: theirs is manufacturing, ours is tech and finance. The problem here is that the trade deficit with Mexico increased significantly after NAFTA's passage, meaning that the increased demand from Mexico did not in fact offset the losses:


Do I believe this is the whole story? No. But it does show that you can tell whatever story you want by looking at charts. Of all the charts that either you or I have posted, the only one most likely to really represent an effect of NAFTA is the increased trade deficit. But even there I'm not fully convinced.