A couple years ago, then US Trade Representative Ron Kirk explained why the negotiating text of trade agreements like the TPP needed to be kept secret: because if the public debated it, the agreement probably wouldn’t be approved. He used, as an example, a failed trade agreement where the text had been public. Beyond the “small sample size” problem of this explanation, the much more troubling aspect is the obvious question of recognizing that if public debate would kill the agreement, perhaps it’s the agreement that’s the problem and not the public.

The current trade talks are against the interests of the public in every country they apply to.  To try to tell us that increased trade will improve the income of all is economical  with the truth.  Business is improving, for instance, in the United States but only to the benefit of top management and, sometimes, the shareholders.  Wages for the people who do the work stay stubbornly flat and unemployment too high.  An Epicurean answer?   We should tell these lords of the earth that we will support TTP if they sign a second trade agreement:   hire more people, improve wages, increase the minimum wage and peg management incomes for five years;  only then will we allow our governments to ratify these agreements.  Is this ever going to happen? No!  Is it fair and Epicurean?  Of course.