Letter to the Editor: Contact reps about job losses

By Sun Advocate

Dear Editor,
I had the opportunity this weekend to visit with an old friend.
During this visit we were catching up on old times when he told me that he was about to be laid off at the factory he had worked for ten years. I could not understand why a company that is doing so well would close it doors. I was then surprised to here that the company was taking it manufacturing to China.
My friend explained to me that there were a lot of companies that were moving their manufacturing to other parts of the world. When I asked why, he said that the labor in other places was cheaper there than it is in the United States.
I since have been doing some investigating and found that “since the signing of NAFTA in 1994, over three million jobs have been lost due to trade deals and 1.7 million of these jobs were manufacturing” positions (Public Citizen). This was just the beginning of the information that I was able to obtain on trade agreements that our government has agreed to.
The signing of the PNTR has allowed companies to move their manufacturing to China while closing factories in the USA. The job losses in our country have been in the millions. I was able to obtain a lot of this information at back-america.org and tradealert.org, which are very resourceful web sights.
I asked my friend what I could do to help and he said for myself and others to write their Congressmen and Senators and most importantly help support the manufacturing that is still in the USA by purchasing only made in USA products.
I hope that all Americans will want to help support each other.