Customer Reviews

How to Kill a Country: Australia's Devastating Trade Deal with the United States

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Perhaps the passage of a few years since this book came out help show that its fears were overwrought. The overall tone of the book argues that the Free Trade Agreement between Australia and US was deeply unfavourable to Australia. Ok, some passages are soberly stated. But typically in the text, the concerns centred on the hollowing out of the Australian manufacturing base. The main assumption is that this deserved special protection in the face of supposed overwhelming American competition.

Granted, American manufacturers have a home market 15 times larger than Australia's, giving them a deeper economy of scale. But this ignores the idea of comparative advantage. Australia's strength is in its mining and agriculture. As evidenced by the ongoing years of prosperity, compared to the US falling into its deepest recession since the Great Depression. If Australia's manufacturing had shrunk after this book was printed, it was mostly due to competition for labour from the latter 2 industries, especially mining, and the difficulty of competing with other nations' finished goods. Especially China, with a much lower labour cost structure.

On the book's argument that 'Buy Australian' would be replaced by 'Buy American' for government procurement, that was an exaggeration. The actual intent was to offer a neutral environment, where the Australian government tenders would neither favour or disfavour a tender from companies in either country.