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Path: utzoo!watmath!watnot!watcgl!jchapman
From: jchapman@watcgl.UUCP (john chapman)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: free trade
Message-ID: <2518@watcgl.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 17-Sep-85 10:25:56 EDT
Article-I.D.: watcgl.2518
Posted: Tue Sep 17 10:25:56 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 18-Sep-85 05:46:57 EDT
Distribution: can
Organization: U of Waterloo, Ontario
Lines: 36

Throughout the current ongoing public debate about free trade
there seems to be a tacit admission that Canada is in poorer
econic health than the US.  Is this really true though?  I've
done a bit of travelling in the US and they don't *seem* to
have a particularily higher standard of living in general; in
fact their cities have slum/poverty areas which seem a whole
lot worse than anything you can find in major canadian cities.
The other day I heard that the US debt is now approx. $2trillion
How does this compare to canada?  My impression is that the per
capita debt load is far lower in canada.

Another point I'd like to make is that one of the reasons we
have been having such economic problems in the last 10-15 yrs
is precisely because of the large percentage of our exports
that are to the US coupled with the unstable US market/economy.

It was a long time ago but it seems to me my economics teacher
told us that diversity is a much wiser course (don't put all
your eggs in one basket as my mom used to say).  Why don't we
develop our markets & make trade agreements with as many other
countries as we can so as to minimize the effect of any single
country's economy on our own.

Finally, how much political autonomy will we have once 80% or more
of our trade is with the US?  They will easily be able to control
our political policies through economic pressure.



-- 

	John Chapman
	...!watmath!watcgl!jchapman

	Disclaimer : These are not the opinions of anyone but me
		     and they may not even be mine.