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Did this happen with the Canadian entry into the US market? Nope..You are once again fear mongering based upon speculation.
U.S. Drivers can RUN IN CANADA!!! This is what i've been trying to make you understand. That's called reciprocation!!!!! Geezus..don't you understand that? I've run freight as far as Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia. There are adequate rest stops, truckstops, fuel points, hotels, safety issues, i can sleep at my customers yards without worrying about getting hijacked....and the freight coming back pays good.
Where is the reciprocation in this deal for U.S. truckers if we can't do any of those things in Mexico?
One thing the anti-union trucking bosses never want to talk about is this: Both Roadway/Yellow and UPS are union and they consistantly make the top 10 of the most profitable trucking companies.
Gee, I thought unions were bad for business?
There's an old axiom in the trucking business when it comes to drivers: You get what you pay for.
Exactly. Besides, this guys is talking like Teamsters like the Roadway guys make up the majority of truckers, which is simply nonsense. The LTL union guys and OTR union guys are a small part of over the road trucking. Most 48 staters are just non-union, low wage grunts trying to get by.
And if a union trucking company is inefficient, they go out of business. Remember CF?
Let's back up here a minute and take a look at what this is all about.
On the face of it, it's simply a matter of abiding by a legally ratified threaty and that's true. But, what was behind the agreement in the first place? Is there any logical reason for free and unimpeded cross-border trucking? Who gains by that and what do they gain? What does John Q. Public gain from it?
It's simple: The issue is corporate profitability. The ONLY thing we gain is reduced cost and higher profits for those companies which utilize Mexican production plants. Let me explain why:
Before NAFTA, I drove a truck and often picked up sesame seed in the state of Baja California del Norte at Mexicali. I couldn't go down into Baja, to the growing area to pick it up myself, so I'd take the trailer into Mexico and drop it in a Mexican Customs impound lot. A Mexican driver would come and get my trailer, take down there to load, then bring it back to that same lot. When notified that my trailer had returned, I'd go down there, get it and bring it back through Mexican and US Customs.
Since that Mexican truck cost about as much to operate as mine did and, since a Custom's Broker was needed to do the paperwork whether he went to get the seeds or I did, the only difference in cost was basically the wages of the Mexican driver. That added a little, a VERY little, to the cost of transporation for the buyer (a major bakery supply company in Dallas) which they would have to pass on to their customers. That's how cross-border trucking was conducted all along the border. I also sometimes delivered to a customer in Tiajuana and the process was the same.
Under these new rules, that additional cost would be eliminated and the bakery supply company's customers might get their bags of sesame seeds for a few pennies less or, more likely, the supply company would generate slightly higher profits by the exclusion of that Mexican driver.
So far as I can see, that minor reduction in cost is the ONLY reason to allow the free transit of each other's trucks. Service and delivery times were not affected because I couldn't have gotten into Mexico and out any faster, even had I done the whole job myself.
But, the REAL profit motivation for allowing Mexican trucks up here comes AFTER the border is crossed and that's to be found in the relentless downward pressure on transportation costs as US truckers are forced to compete with Mexican wages. A Mexican operator, free to haul freight within the United States, can deliver any load cheaper than a US carrier simply because of their wage and benefit structure and US carriers will have to lower their wage and benefit package to match the freight rates the Mexican's can offer.
US businesses knew that better than most when NAFTA was negotiated and that's why this provision is in there. Who cares if it's bad for America or bad for American drivers (the giant carriers won't mind as they'll just replace higher cost American drivers with cheap, foreign drivers, which they're already doing), so long as profit margins increase?
Oh...and take a guess just who it was that negotiated NAFTA, and ALL those "free" trade agreements? That's right...corporate functionaries, invited to the party by the Bush/Clinton/Bush administrations as so-called "stake holders."
THAT'S what is really happening.
Excellent Post
You certainly understand what is going on.
The Government uses the greed of corporations and cheaper labor as a tool to normalize and slowly implement their one world order.
Many Americans having been saying close the border, but the government and big business's appear to be going full steam ahead in the opposite direction regardless of what the people want.
They want a seamless North American Union then followed by a seamless one world government.
Mexican trucks will NOT be allowed to operate on a "point to point" basis within the US just as Canadian trucks. This is propaganda and is untrue. It is scare tactics used by the Unions and other protectionists who don't understand the agreement.
They will only be allowed to deliver Mexican goods originating in Mexico to the US They will be allowed to load freight destined to Mexico, and I find nothing wrong with this just as we allow the Canadians to do the same thing with regard to Canadian bound freight.
The sky is not falling here.
Filthy Corporate lobbyists will amend that in time when there is more money to be made.
The argument will be that it will make it more efficient in the long run and will claim that they will pass the savings on to the buyers, when in reality it will pass the 100 million payouts to the CEO's pockets.
Take of your partisan glasses poppy. Did I suggest it started with Obama, no, however, it is his administration pushing it now.
I've always been against. Unlike you, I do not cling to a party.
Suggest you listen to stillkit and the others on this who know the road on this one. Keep in mind that when the trucks in the US do not run you have less than 3 days of food/medicine on store shelves and about 24 hrs. or less of gasoline at the pumps in major metro areas. Find a way to make that partisan.
IMHO Free Trade is an unobtainable ideal. We will have Free Trade when our trading partners have the same labor, environmental and operating costs as ours. Until them our workers and our companies operate at a severe disadvantage. That is exacerbated when we try to compete with a third world kleptocracy like Mexico or a state capitalist terrorist like China. The very concept of Free Trade with these and many other countries is an absurdity. Free Trade as we practice it does not raise everyone's standard of living it only brings the well paid worker down to the depths of his enslaved brethren. This eventually causes the local and then the worldwide economy to fail to the cost of the financiers as well as the workers.
We need to stop being a Free Trading fool in a world of hard core mercantilists. Just about everyone in the word protects all or part of their domestic market. It is past time we did so as well. We need fair and open trade across a level playing field where price differentials caused by low wages, lax environmental standards and government subsidies and protective measures are eliminated. The world will then have the incentive to raise workers wages and living conditions and stop the rush to the bottom.
I suggest the US make the Mexican trucker’s access to the US roads dependant on the Mexican government returning the US border region to a state of Law from its current criminal battleground. From a personal basis I would never drive a truck into Mexico or even be a border region tourist under present conditions. I am too old for another war.
I own my own company and have been in the business for 30 years. I am not afraid of the Mexicans. This is all fear mongering.
I don't know of one O/O trucker who would dare let their equipment go into Mexico. It is far too corrupt and the Mexican truck stops are not what we are used to here in the US. Neither is the law. The Federales are so corrupt one can't even drive 50 miles into Mexico without having to bribe them. US trucks do NOT want to go to Mexico. So what if a Mexican truck will be allowed to deliver within the US? The cost of insurance and the operating authority, meeting the US safety standards will drive up the cost of the Mexican carriers and will equalize the costs. Mexican drivers may operate for lower wages but so what? Who the hell is anyone to control wages?
This is merely fear mongering to scare the uniformed in the US to a knee jerk reaction against free trade. It is only the protectionists and the Unions who are running scared here. True honest business men will rise to the challange and compete with Mexican truckers and we will even use them to send freight to Mexico from the US. Too bad if the US wages can't meet the same levels as the US trucker, that's business and capitalism and if you don't like it too bad because it is reality of the economic system in the US.
This will make US companies more competitive since if the lower wage of the Mexican driver will drive down operating costs for US companies. It will make them more competitive since they will be able to save money on shipments to Mexico. Why are you so afraid of competition?
It is only unions and the uniformed are spreading fear and loathing over the issue. I heard these tired old fears when the Canadians entered the US market. We have been working with the Canadians for years now and it hasn't decimated the trucking industry in the US. Wake up.
And please suspend the insults....it only shows how reactionary and little you understand the situation in a free trade market.
And this right here reveals your true agenda which is inline with the globalist agenda and not what is best for America and its people.
Filthy Corporate lobbyists will amend that in time when there is more money to be made.
The argument will be that it will make it more efficient in the long run and will claim that they will pass the savings on to the buyers, when in reality it will pass the 100 million payouts to the CEO's pockets.
ONce again I will refer you to the Canadian agrement and nothing of the sort has happened. I have history on my side you merely had wild speculation. "Filthy coporatists" indeed...please...
As Clintons NAFTA Task Force Chairman, William Daley was instrumental in getting the legislation passed.
So it looks like Obama will have a destrucitve globalist as his chief of staff.
Nice connecting of the dots.
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