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EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

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Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#391

Post by oblio »

repolfx wrote: post #283
matt4077 wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody ever said it wasn’t. See the famous Barnier Diagram from the very start of negotiations: https://goo.gl/images/AqyD7w Note the Canadian flag on the far right (pun imtended). It was one of the options on offer.

No, it wasn't. The EU is not insisting that parts of Canada obey EU law automatically and are effectively different countries as a result, which is what it's currently demanding of the UK. Nor did the EU demand tends of billions of euros from Canada in return for nothing in particular. The EU has actually never been willing to discuss trade deals with the UK, let alone "let's be like Canada". So far it's refused enti…

You do realize that the free trade agreement with Canada covers way, way less than the EU does, even commercially, right? And that the UK wants way more from the EU than Canada wants.

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#392

Post by nmeofthestate »

theoh wrote: post #138
nmeofthestate wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I believe the Common Travel Area is also a key issue as it commits us to open travel through the border which on the face of it seems incompatible with leaving the customs union." No, this happens elsewhere already. Compare Norway - it is in a common travel area with the EU (Schengen), but out of the EU customs union. They're different issues.

Norway's membership of the EEA is a prerequisite for its Schengen membership.

The EEA includes Single Market membership (not 100% perhaps?) but not EU customs union membership.

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#393

Post by FabHK »

webXL wrote: post #334
zeroname wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know where you got this idea, but the argument for comparative advantage has nothing to do with the redistribution of income, nor is there a claim of "fairness" towards each and every individual or interest group. To understand why comparative advantage is an advantage, you must consider the alternative: Economic protectionism. It results in inefficient allocation of labor, because everyone's job is protected…

Perhaps the parent missed something in the yada yada . I'm not sure why people fail to see the benefits of free trade and specialization in their own lives. Just imagine working all day long, out in field, just to put food on your own table! Why would it be a good idea for certain size groups and not others?

Sorry, nobody is denying the benefits of free trade and specialisation, come on. However, there are people that suffer from the changes, and contrary to the ideal world of econ 101, they're not immediately redeployed in a more productive sector etc.

Now the remarkable thing about free trade/specialisation is that we can help those people and still be better off overall. And I'm arguing that in some case we should actually do that.

I'm really not sure what's so complicated about the argument: Economic analysis shows that with free trade a country as a whole can afford more than without (which is insufficient to state that everyone is better off, thus insufficient to state that the country is better off), and using the device of redistribution/compensation you can show that everyone in that country can be made better off.

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#394

Post by webXL »

FabHK wrote: post #393
webXL wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps the parent missed something in the yada yada . I'm not sure why people fail to see the benefits of free trade and specialization in their own lives. Just imagine working all day long, out in field, just to put food on your own table! Why would it be a good idea for certain size groups and not others?

Sorry, nobody is denying the benefits of free trade and specialisation, come on. However, there are people that suffer from the changes, and contrary to the ideal world of econ 101, they're not immediately redeployed in a more productive sector etc. Now the remarkable thing about free trade/specialisation is that we can help those people and still be better off overall. And I'm arguing that in some case we should act…

> Sorry, nobody is denying the benefits of free trade and specialisation, come on.

Then explain the current resurgence of protectionism right now. This redistribution argument has very little to do with trade, and actually undermines it. You don't have to go very far to see the impact automation has had and will have on certain segments of the population, so why are we muddying the waters with the downside of free trade here?

Now I agree with you that those affected by trade (and technological advances), or who are vulnerable should be helped. Since there's always some other threat out there to our collective prosperity, there's really no reason why we can't talk about tax policy, UBI, education at the same time. But we can't kill these geese laying the golden eggs.

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#395

Post by EGreg »

lispm wrote: post #360
EGreg wrote: post #254

UK comes out Japan comes in

Not really. With a free trade agreement Japan is not a member of the EU. Far from it. The UK after Brexit eventually will also get a 'free trade agreement' of some sorts with the EU.

UK comes out

Scotland comes in :)

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/oct/07/nicola-stur...

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#396

Post by NeedMoreTea »

EGreg wrote: post #395
lispm wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. With a free trade agreement Japan is not a member of the EU. Far from it. The UK after Brexit eventually will also get a 'free trade agreement' of some sorts with the EU.

UK comes out Scotland comes in :) https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/oct/07/nicola-stur...

Then half of the NW and NE try to secede to join Scotland. :)

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#397

Post by FabHK »

webXL wrote: post #394
FabHK wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, nobody is denying the benefits of free trade and specialisation, come on. However, there are people that suffer from the changes, and contrary to the ideal world of econ 101, they're not immediately redeployed in a more productive sector etc. Now the remarkable thing about free trade/specialisation is that we can help those people and still be better off overall. And I'm arguing that in some case we should act…

> Sorry, nobody is denying the benefits of free trade and specialisation, come on. Then explain the current resurgence of protectionism right now. This redistribution argument has very little to do with trade, and actually undermines it. You don't have to go very far to see the impact automation has had and will have on certain segments of the population, so why are we muddying the waters with the downside of free tr…

> explain the current resurgence of protectionism

Sorry, I meant nobody is denying the benefits of free trade in this discussion here.

> This redistribution argument has very little to do with trade

But it does. Trade only makes everything better if you do redistribute. That's the whole point. Without redistribution, it's expected and even legitimate that some sectors object to, and reject free trade.

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#398

Post by lispm »

anigbrowl wrote: post #389
lispm wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because it's just a 'free trade agreement' and Japan is not asking for membership in the EU (or EEA)

Labour is tradeable. You should be able to sell your labour with the same freedom others have to sell their goods.

you can trade your labor.

Freedom of movement for people in the EU is something different.

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/factsheets/en/sheet/147/free-m...

https://www.bmi.bund.de/EN/topics/migration/law-on-foreigner...

Since Japan is not joining the EU and also not planning to do so, 'Freedom of movement' in the EU is not part of this (trade) agreement.

Re: EU and Japan create world's biggest free trade zone

#399

Post by wahern »

FabHK wrote: post #356
riffraff wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you forgot the fact that it's coagulated using the insides of a calf's stomach! (although depending on cheese, animal rennet may not be used)

Agree with all of you, which goes to show, exactly, the OP poster's point that fermented foods constitute fairly "constant cultural boundaries" (because evidently there's nothing much objective about me liking cheese and being disgusted by 1000 year eggs!)

It's objective in the sense that some types of food and method of preparation are nearly universally unobjectionable, notwithstanding tastes. For example, few people around the world would ever find raw vegetables or vegetables boiled in a soup disgusting, whatever the vegetable or regardless of whether they liked the taste. For example, most Westerns probably wouldn't be able to tolerate, let alone enjoy, bitter gourd soup. But I doubt it would inspire disgust (i.e. revulsion) in many such people.

Disgusting foods tend to strongly correlate with certain types of preparation, like fermentation, involve animals or animal byproducts, exhibit certain kinds of textures (e.g. soft or mushy), or have certain types of odors (e.g. rancid). That's what I meant by cheese being objectively disgusting--all the characteristics of cheese fall into categories that strongly correlate with disgusting foods.

Obviously each person's particular tastes and preferences are highly subjective. But from an anthropological viewpoint we can make some objective classifications because there are near universal qualitative characteristics of foods that various cultures find disgusting.

Some types of disgust are likely strongly innate rather than cultural, but that's beside the point. For example, for all I know Inuit might be much more likely to find simple vegetable preparations disgusting, so that the objective quality of vegetable soups generally being non-disgusting might simply be an artifact of the dispersal of human populations. But that wouldn't make qualitative classifications any less objective. A factor doesn't need to be innate, it just needs to be common.

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