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Wednesday, July 06, 2005
CAFTA kudos go to Coleman
The much-maligned Strib editorial board sided with the Bush administration on CAFTA. The Strib even managed to throw a few kudos to Smilin' Norm Coleman along the way:
For as much as I long for a pastoral existence celebrating vegetable rights and peace, it's clear that we're barreling down the free trade highway at nigh near 90 miles an hour. Perhaps the best that Fair Traders can do is yell "look out" when we approach each cliff.
The sugar question in CAFTA is a great example of the benefits of free trade. We can't grow sugar cane here in Minnesota, but we can grow sugar beets. Sugar cane is far more efficient than the beet, which is only economically viable because of existing import restrictions. The artificially high price of sugar birthed high fructose corn syrup, which is now a staple of the American diet. Yet another unintended consequence.
So, look -- the obvious consequence of free trade with sugar producing countries would be the importing of more sugar at lower prices which should sound the death knell for sugar beet producers. That's politically unpopular, so we've got to promise to keep imports artificially low and to subsidize domestic sugar beet production on the back end.
None of this makes any long-term sense. Better to import the sugar, temporarily tax the profits General Mills makes on each box of sugar frosted fructose flakes, and use the revenues to transition sugar beet growers into an industry that makes long-term financial sense: half of the producers should convert to growing heroin and half should run private prisons. Now that's the American way.
