No Action on TRADE Act

http://www.economyincrisis.org/content/no-action-trade-act

With a flurry of activity on the trade front, America’s best chance to drastically alter the failed policies that have decimated the economy, the TRADE Act, has been put on the backburner.

The Trade, Reform, Accountability, Development and Employment Act, or TRADE Act, is a bill sponsored by Senator Sherrod Brown and Representative Mike Michaud that would force lawmakers and administration officials to reexamine the nation’s failed trade policies.

The bill would require the Government Accountability Office to conduct a comprehensive review of America’s major trade pacts including the North American Free Trade Agreement, the World Trade Organization and the Central American Free Trade Agreement. That review must be conducted before Congress and would be allowed to analyze any new or pending trade pacts. In addition, the GAO would be asked to set guidelines for what could and could not be included in future trade pacts.

The TRADE act would require all future trade pacts to include environmental and labor standards, food and product safety measures, human rights protections, currency anti-manipulation rules, federalism safeguards and national security exceptions.

More at the link --