Dear Max,
Here are a few random thoughts/quick responses.
One obvious issue is what's the relevant counterfactual. The effect of NAFTA is estimated by comparing how many manufacturing jobs there would be (hypothetically) without NAFTA vs. the actual number with NAFTA. What has happened since 1994 is irrelevant. Still, I'd say that +217,000 jobs over 6 years in a booming economy is a pretty damn small increase, and a result of various problems including the Asian crisis as well as NAFTA. On the other hand, I don't think job effects (+ or -) alone are the main issue about trade agreements anyway (I have to agree with Krugman to some extent on this).
Regarding productivity, yes there's a miracle out there. It could be (this is just a guess) that some of it is due to lower-productivity activities moving offshore while higher productivity ones stay here, thus boosting average productivity. But I don't know those numbers (ask Larry?).
It is certainly possible that the economic changes going on (of which NAFTA is only a small part) are raising manufacturing production without increasing jobs--i.e., all the growth in output is from higher productivity. But then, this is a miracle that a lot of workers aren't sharing in, since the alternative more often than not is to end up in lower-paying service sector jobs. I actually agree that NAFTA could be part of a clever corporate strategy for restructuring--I said so in my 1996 EPI book--I just question who benefits from that strategy.
Robert
> Max Sawicky quoted:
>
> >The manufacturing sector lost 341,000 jobs in 1999.
>
> -250,000, Dec 98-99; total job gain, 2.7 million. -101,000, Apr
> 99-00; total job gain, 3 million. Manufacturing has gained 217,000
> since NAFTA took effect.
>
> Manufacturing production was up 4.9%, Dec 98-99; it's up 5.9%, Mar
> 99-00. Manufacturing production is up 39% since NAFTA took effect. If
> NAFTA were damaging the manufacturing sector as much as you say,
> wouldn't that show up in production? Isn't rising output and flattish
> employment another way of describing the productivity miracle
> everybody's been celebrating?
>
> Doug