FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 23, 2015
Contact: Paola Masman, Media Director
202-688-5145, [email protected]
Washington~ Yesterday, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reported that the third quarter growth rate (at 2% annualized) was significantly slower than second quarter growth rate (3.9% annualized) in large part because of the trade deficit.
According to the report: “The deceleration in real GDP in the third quarter primarily reflected a downturn in private inventory investment and decelerations in exports. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased.”
“US trade policy continues to be a drag on growth and job creation,” said Michael Stumo, CEO of the Coalition for a Prosperous America. “The market share of US firms has been reduced, rather than increased, by bilateral and multilateral trade agreements.”
Year-to-date growth is 60% down from 2014, when real GDP increased at a 5% annual rate.
“The Trans-Pacific Partnership will, like past trade deals, incentivize offshoring and reduce the market share of domestic US businesses and workers,” continued Stumo. “Current Congressional opposition to the TPP results from the fact that our trade performance worsened, instead of improved, from past deals. Merely recycling the same past promises is not enough without concretely addressing modern trade problems such as currency manipulation, increased foreign border taxes and subsidies to massive state-owned industries.”
The Coalition for a Prosperous America is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization representing the interests of over three million households through our agricultural, manufacturing and labor organization members.
