Here’s an excerpt from an ad that appeared in the print edition of Politico today, paid for by the owners of apparel factories in Madagascar and one of their American investor partners. We have blogged about this seemingly obscure issue already many more times than you, our patient readers, may have wanted, but we see this as one of those rare, clear opportunities for the US to do good by first doing no harm. And yet US leadership seems blithely set on a course of action that will punish vulnerable textile workers and their families without touching the fortunes of the political elite responsible for Madagascar’s current predicament.
President Obama: Please don’t harm one half million of the poorest people in Africa.
Your advisors have recommended that you decertify Madagascar as a beneficiary country for benefits under the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA). This action will revoke the duty free treatment for products such as trousers, t-shirts and sweaters produced in Madagascar next year—re-imposing steep US import taxes as high as 32% on a polyester t-shirt. This action will make garments produced in Madagascar uncompetitive with similar products made in China — which already produces 100 times more apparel for the US market compared to Madagascar.
We ask you to consider the human tragedy of an action that will wipe out 100,000 good jobs in the Madagascar apparel sector created under AGOA. Surely there is a way to send a strong message to feuding politicians in Madagascar — without punishing innocent workers and their families who have nothing to do with the disputed control of Government. Your advisors will tell you that they are doing this to help people in Africa.
We respectfully disagree.
While we hope that the continued destabilized situation in the Government of Madagascar is hopefully only temporary, we know that the exit that results from AGOA decertification from the country of our American retail customers will be permanent.
Over 28,000 of our employees signed a petition to President Obama asking him to save their jobs. A copy of that letter can be viewed at www.gefp.com.
10 Comments
This situation is disturbing on many levels. One that particularly annoys me is the idea that somehow decertifying Madagascar from AGOA, i.e. raising tariffs, could somehow be a moral act. The bizarre story goes something like this.
1. We put in place 32% tariffs on shirts motivated by parochial (and immoral) concerns for American jobs.
2. We “graciously” suspend those tariffs for to “help” developing countries.
3. We threaten those countries with the re-imposition of those tariffs if they do things that we don’t like.
4. When a “misdeed” occurs we (I hope not) reimpose those tariffs and feel as if we have rightly punished that country, while in fact the only ones who suffer are not those who did the “bad things” but those who are desperately poor in part because we wouldn’t allow them to compete fairly in the first place by our initial imposition of the 32% tariff.
Are we fooling anybody except possibly ourselves?
What about the Chinese government? Are they doing well?This kind of up and down are very harmful for the economy. Without growth no democracy, there is for sure a downside effect to raise the tariffs.
God at the begining works to build the world even the first day .
To loose a job is like to come back to slavery ,please d’ont allow slavery to come again in Madagascar .
The peoples of the world loved Obama for his brown skin and never considered the disastrous impact of his policies—or whatever it is he articulated off of the top of his head. I’ll say one thing for Dubya: nobody ever had to beg him for stuff like this. Had Soros and Obama not manipulated the US economy in September 2009, things would be radically different today.
The peoples of the world loved Obama for his brown skin and never considered the disastrous impact of his policies—or whatever it is he articulated off of the top of his head. I’ll say one thing for Dubya: nobody ever had to beg him for stuff like this. Had Soros and Obama not manipulated the US economy in September 2008, things would be radically different today.
Either way the only person who suffers is the American consumer. The retailer is not going to “eat” the 30% tariff. He passes it on the Joe Q Publicus.
This tax is essentially a tax not on Africans but on Americans. Problem is people are too stupid to see this.
Sorry, as an out of work cabinetmaker, I don’t have a lot of sympathy with workers in Madagasgar…apodoca is right…Obama was elected because people in this country were in love with the idea of voting “for the first black American president”…but paid no attention to any of his prior associations, (terrorists, communists, racist preacher), nor any of his policy positions. We got what we deserve. A Socialist who wants to redistribute the wealth, and remake America into a mirror of Europe.
Obama also slashed funding to AIDS and malaria prevention programs in Africa that Bush had created , these progams had enormous success and Obama decimated them. Got Malaria? Thank a liberal.
“…parochial (and immoral) concerns for American jobs…”
oh yes. parochial and immoral concerns … if your job is not in jeopardy. If you’re an American whose job is being clobbered to send that job to Madagascar, I assure you your concerns all of a sudden don’t seem so parochial and immoral.
You Mutt.
If a union or two want Obama to shut out Madagascar, they are going to be shut out whatever the consequences. Obama is bought and paid for.
Hope and change, baby.
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