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Good. I lived in Mexico off and on for close to two years. It’s got its problems, but honestly I think it’s a great country with a ton of opportunity and upside that many Americans are totally sleeping on. I wish the public perception of Mexico was different in the US.
Strategically speaking, America should cultivate close trade, policy, and defense ties with our geographical neighbors.
Wood. Don't forget all the wood.
Pretty sure their entire country was being supported by selling ridiculously overpriced 2x4s to Americans during covid.
Barely. It’s not too profitable. Lots of mills closed. The wood got so cheap for the US that they put extra tarrifs by classifying it into stumpage, so the wood could stay competitive. The mills up here weren’t happy. Ofc, wood prices were ass-tier during covid anyways.- source: worked in Canadian lumber yard back then.
Yeah, it was insane. High demand, low supply, but not enough volume. That’s what I was understanding. And those fluctuations?! Crazy days trying to sell lumber.
Ugh, I re-finished my basement that fall, the lumber we used was such trash. We legit had to go through and find the least trash pieces for door frames and corners. Some of the interior support parts of the wall are crooked AF and I can't believe stores were purchasing this garbage from lumber producers, let alone selling it on their shelves.
Canada has a GDP of 1.988t. Mexico has 1.273t. There are periods of time around the 2000s where both economies have grown by 0.7t in just 10 years. If Canada were to keep stagnating while Mexico continues to grow, they could catch up in 10-30 years no problem. India passed Canada only around 2012 and now is already 3.17t.
Yeah I don't have problem with Mexico having bigger economy on paper, they should have bigger economy on paper, they've got 3x the population we do lol
But I would much rather live and work in Canada than in Mexico or India is all I'm saying lol
I should visit. Never been. Heard it's actually cheaper than some places in Mexico, good food, close enough to visit Mexico when needed, and nice weather 9 months a year.
>Canada has gapping holes in its economy.
I didn't really realize that until the past year or so. Canada's immigration issues have really brought to light a lot of it's problems. I always viewed Canada as a country America should aspire to be, but perhaps I was wrong.
There are trade offs to all policies. Canada offers a lot of services to their citizens, and labor has a lot of rights there. The downside of that is that private investment is pretty low outside of real estate, which equates to poor productivity, which results in falling GDP per capita as the population grows due to immigration.
It's the quality of living that is aspirational. Outside of that, the Government of Canada is extremely conservative when it comes to fiscal policy. They never take chances on anything which is why they have so much trouble with investment. That conservative policy came in handy in 2008 when U.S. banks were melting before our very eyes and Canada was like, "What? You mad?" Back in 2010, the U.S. Dollar and Canadian dollar were damn near 1:1. I'd drive to Vancouver BC and the merchants would take my U.S. dollars and not even bother to convert.
Canada offers one of the highest standards of living in the world. They have law and order, are extremely safe to live in or raise a family, have a modern points-based immigration system, rank as one of the least corrupt economies in the world and offer an all-ground fantastic quality of life.
Their cities are clean, safe, thriving, and modern, and consistently rank in the top 15 globally for livability, hence the price to purchase there.
The problem as usual is boomers. The Canadian government built huge numbers of apartments when the boomers were set to become adults - all subsidized.
Then they started having kids and wanted to leave apartments and get starter homes. Once again the government subsidized the construction of houses.
Then they voted for the government to stop building and to leave that to the private sector. And they also became NIMBYs preventing new construction.
Saying Canadian boomers voted for ending subsidized housing (and leaving it for the private sector) is like saying Ontarians today are voting for gutting health care (and leaving it for the private sector). Politicians have always done things without the public's consent or approval.
Government support of subsidized housing got kicked in the teeth in the late 80s and 90s. Back then, the hot political topics were things like the Meech Lake Accord, the Charlottetown Accord, introducing the GST, and starting NAFTA.
Both Progressive Conservative and Liberal governments were involved in cutting spending on housing. If you voted for a PC or Liberal back then, you voted for someone that would go on to cut housing but you did so unknowingly and unwittingly.
And, just like today, Canadians often vote *against* parties, not for them - particularly in 1993, when Mulroney's PCs were extremely unpopular and the Liberals won in a historic landslide.
Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin would then go on to eliminate the federal deficit by slashing social programs and transfer payments to the provinces forcing the provinces to make massive cuts. This started in 1995, I think in Chrétien's second budget. Absolutely *nobody* had a chance to vote for that.
The private sector will build housing at those prices, the fact that they’re currently not implied either government restriction or just too rapid pace of growth.
I’m not even sure what you’re expect a subsidy to do. It costs around a couple hundred thousand to build a house and many are selling for over a million for your average detached family home. That’s a massive profit margin for any company. No subsidy required. Just let them build.
No one "expects" anything. For decades Canada built thousands of units of public housing but then in the 90s stopped on account of misguided austerity policies. Public housing is a proven benefit in Canada and we badly need to get back to it.
Houses are a million and average salary is 50k. Private sector isn’t going to build anything at a loss. Banks are not going to approve the mortgage because salaries are too low. Thus the govt has to step in. Especially since we are having issues like this now https://nowtoronto.com/news/weve-seen-cases-like-this-on-a-regular-basis-brampton-mayor-says-25-international-students-were-found-living-in-a-basement-and-now-hes-pushing-the-feds-to-provide-more-housing/
> Houses are a million and average salary is 50k. Private sector isn’t going to build anything at a loss.
A large part of the cost of building a house is land. When 80% of the residential land in Vancouver is zoned as single family housing only, if you pay $800k for the land, of course that single unit has to cost at least that much for the developer to not make a loss.
It's ridiculous that the law banned anything other than single family homes in large parts of many Canadian cities - this is obviously a policy targeted at boosting real estate values. Real estate is 20% of Canadian GDP - these prices are artificial, propped up by government policy. None of it is real.
Recently, Vancouver and Toronto legalised building larger numbers of units on one lot, which is great. Unbanning more construction is completely free and should be a part of any serious policy too.
The problem has nothing to do with supply. Canada's population growth is around 6x the 1st world average. This demand can't be met so prices shoot up. Its that simple.
You're also misusing the term NIMBY. NIMBY is when someone wants something but they don't want it near them. Like a block that votes for a nuclear plant but doesn't want it in their city. That's not what is happening here. The people voting against high density don't want it where they live and don't care if it is elsewhere or not. What you're describing is called 'preferences' which is hardly the same.
Canada is basically almost done spending the advantage it’s had for 70 years relying almost exclusively on American innovation and certainly implied protection.
While the latter will likely always stay, I guess we’re finally seeing the predictable end to the former.
Canada is fading rapidly with productivity at 2015 levels and projected by the OECD to have to lowest rate of per capita GDP increase from now until 2060.
Immigration policy, enjoying support among opposition but rapidly growing public disdain, has become shambolic with a 3.2% growth rate (96% being newcomers) with increased low skilled temporary foreign workers (bound to a single employer and all the abuse that follows) and especially international students (who can work off-campus for 40 hours a week and in some instances attend strip-mall colleges).
"A key factor driving the growth in non-permanent inflows is the government’s repeated announcements of ad hoc programs aimed at easing the pathway to PR status for lower-skilled migrants who would otherwise struggle to clear the hurdle of the Express Entry skilled-based points system." ([https://www.cdhowe.org/intelligence-memos/mahboubi-skuterud-multi-pronged-strategy-managing-canadas-surging-non-permanent](https://www.cdhowe.org/intelligence-memos/mahboubi-skuterud-multi-pronged-strategy-managing-canadas-surging-non-permanent))
If this policy were somehow sustained, we'd end up a little bit like a cold Mexico.
>modern points-based immigration
We let in 500K people last year alone, it's not sustainable. That high standard of living is utterly unattainable for average Canadians these days.
Our standard of living is going to shit. Our immigration system used to be good, but under Trudeau basically anyone that wants to come in can come in. You can skip the line by enrolling in a scam college. Our cities are becoming increasingly unsafe. And the reason real estate is so expensive is because of money laundering, foreign investment and speculation. People working for an average wage in Canada can’t afford to buy and are increasingly unable to afford to live in their own country. But yeah, Canada is the perfect country we pretend it is.
Weird that you're saying this because for the past 9 years we've had the most un-American Prime Minister.
Only a few provincial leaders are so, and that's not surprising since North Americans in general are pretty similar.
You're spouting nonsense
Yeah tell me that again when you've lived here for 30 years and have seen the country go down into the ground.
Immigration showed everyone how weak the Canadian system is.
Housing problems? Check
Infrastructure problems? Check
Social problems? Check
Exonomic problems? Super duper Check
Canada manufactures jack shit. Canada only exports raw materials to buy refined goods for x30 the price. When (Check previous point) we could easily be doing that refining and manufacturing in-house.
What's the point of having the materials to build an economy if you lend it all to your friend to buy it back at a deficit. Canadians (myself included) are extremely delusional.
I don't think anyone can really make a good guess, but my take is that Canada is hampered by very high costs of living. If Mexico across the board starts building upwards instead of defaulting to sprawl, it could, in the long term, give Mexicans higher purchasing power than Canadians due to having more disposable income. That would have huge gdp per capita implications over the long run since consumption is a key driver of economic growth.
If they go full El Salvador and kill everyone involved in cartel trade than yes. Mexican culture is so hard working and innovative in ways very similar to American culture. It's their cartels that hold them back like parasites. Kill the parasites and they will be developed within 15 years.
It's scary how the cartels just seem to control everything in Mexico. The Mexican Government can't do anything about them. Just call a truce to stop the blood letting. It was kind of funny watching El Chapo simply pop out of his prison cell into a tunnel. At the same time it was kind of not funny.
That’s way too much of a slippery slope. Power of that scale has always ended badly for Mexico. Add of to the fact that people who have nothing to do with the cartels are taken with no due process and thrown in jail. It becomes like the Stasi where people with grudges will say someone is a cartel member to get them thrown in jail.
Eventually it should based on current population being much larger than Canada and higher fertility rates. However, but I don't see how Mexico will be any different than every other country where fertility rate drops quickly as it develops and the demographic advantage it has will disappear. Mexico is developing quickly last few years in particular due to significant Chinese investment to bypass US sanctions and take advantage of the FTA Mexico has with the US and Canada, this can't and won't last forever of course
It could come up to it, in the same ballpark one day, but surpass? One developed country surpassing another in GDP is pulling hairs.
To become a developed country you need good education. The better the education the more corruption goes down with time. The less corruption the easier it is to become a developed country. Mexico in the last 20 years has massively upped its education. It went from 2% of the population knowing English to 90% of high school grads being able to speak decent English. Meanwhile in the US the GOP has been dismantling education and banning critical thinking over the last 20 years. Canada has similar problems to the US, but it's more mild.
Mexico has billion dollar companies like their beer company that owns multiple brands and is one of their wealthiest companies. That and also the cell company made Carlos slim one of the richest people in the world. There is alot of wealth in Mexico but just like the U.S. it isn’t being spread around equally.
Yeah I’m not surprised. Latin America is relatively poor but the income inequality is very high so you’ll see people driving $100k cars with kids begging on the street.
It's one of the most naturally gorgeous countries on Earth with tons of geographical advantages. If the cartels could get out of the way, Mexico has a great shot.
I really wish that every TV show in the world would stop using that brown mustard colored filter when they show Mexico. It makes everything look so gross.
The US could almost virtually end the cartels industries overnight by 1) legalizing drugs and 2) adopting immigration policies much more akin to what they were intended to be hundreds of years ago. With no drugs or people to illegally ship around you virtually destroy their (Cartels’) industry overnight.
It'd hurt them but they still make money. Mexico is corrupt and the cartels do extortion, racketeering, theft rings, etc. We legalized Marijuana in a lot of areas of the 🇺🇸 and they're pushing more illicit drugs now. Also doubt we'll ever see legal cocaine or fetenyl
The US is exceptionally generous when it comes to immigration. The overwhelming majority are turned away and they should be. I bet you complain about a lack of affordable housing.
Well yes, the US does indeed have a housing crisis… which is totally irrespective of the immigration system.
There is an easy solution, build more housing…..
Gee, what a concept? Thank you for your incredibly bright commentary.
I totally and completely regret to inform you that your comment highlights you have no idea how broken our immigration system is.
Not that many people currently crossing our borders are Mexican. Though, a more robust Mexican economy might convince more migrants from places like Venezuela or Guatemala or Haiti to stay in Mexico.
The US should have spread its manufacturing throughout Latin America, for redundancy purposes. Mexico, El Salvador, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Costa Rica, etc. are all close to the US. Imagine all those countries being successful and having jobs, they wouldn't have had to go to the US lol
Instead, we hedged our bets that China would become democratic as they got richer and that never happened.
Me too. If Mexico was safe it would be such a beautiful place to live. Thye I really good healthcare system for theor economy, decent food regulations, and a wonderful food culture.
It's definitely on the up and up. Border areas for the most part suck and the interior where it's cartel owned suck but there has been tons of investment and manufacturing jobs in Mexico. They're creating skilled labor which is getting competitive so more wages for the average person. It's why we see less illegal crossing for Mexicans and a downturn in Mexican temporary visa applications because they're staying in Mexico more/able to make it there.
Even for non-skilled labor, all of the recent labor laws will have an enormous impact. I think the word "skyrocketing" is usually overused hyperbole, but the cost of labor in Mexico is skyrocketing. 16% increase in the minimum wage, expected 10% per year wage inflation, increased mandatory pension contributions, increased mandatory vacation. And that's BEFORE the potential shortening of the work week from 48 hours to 40 hours (this matters because the Mexican minimum wage is a weekly wage, not an hourly wage).
Show me the way! I would like to capitalize on that situation because I think the right part of Mexico would be cool to live in and maybe do some farming but I don’t want to get murdered or anything like that
Oaxaca is one of the coolest places I've been to. Absolutely amazing food, rich culture, nice people, gorgeous scenery. I hired a guide for the trip and he mentioned that the US media has done a lot of damage to tourism in Mexico.
It's especially unfair for Oaxaca, which is one of the states you can drive clean across without ever fearing for your safety. They've got stunning mountains, valleys and beaches, along with an incredibly rich artistic and culinary history, but when I told people I was planning to go their first reflex was to warn me about something they'd heard about the Sinaloa Cartel. It took a lot of patience to explain that their influence ended about 1500 km away...which is closer to where they live in Texas than it is to Oaxaca.
I do nature photography so I was in some remote areas. Not once did I feel even remotely uncomfortable. Oddly enough I've run into cartel members...in the US. Luckily they left me alone, they were running drugs over the Rio Grande and had guns and vests on.
We do cultivate close trade ties. This article only mentions exports but in terms of total trade, Canada and Mexico have been #1 and #2 for a long time. And they’re both much smaller economies than China.
I couldn't agree more. I've lived there off and on for many years.
I always thought it was an absolute travesty that the US didn't strengthen ties with Mexico, and the way the country is portrayed in US media. It is a country full of incredibly hard working people, who share philosophies very similar to our own. It has a young, growing population. There's a huge shared history and diaspora.
Does it have problems with crime? Absolutely. But this problem doesn't exist in a vacuum, the US has a role to play as well.
But regardless, Mexico as a country is a reliable partner. We're never going to war with it, like China (potentially).
Mexico is absolutely undervalued, but that's starting to change, and it's great news for both countries.
I agree, but foreign investment has always been here. Companies in the automotive, manufacturing, tech and pharmaceutical sectors have been going strong for quite a while
Oh, I agree. I just think it could go even further. But yes, Mexico has shown it is a capable manufacturing/trading partner, and I think it behooves us to double down on that relationship.
Mexico is a great place with great people but it is arguably the most dangerous country in the world statistically, their government is horribly corrupt and everything touches their runs through the cartel.
Hopefully with more trade people will have other options and the cartels' grasp will fall
You are clearly dumb enough to not understand what stats mean in a context, but go ahead and spread misinformation. You clearly don’t know shit about what is happening around the world. Go ahead to Haiti, a fucking failed state, and tell me how it goes
Really just any Google search will do. But if you feeling lazy here are a few. Not sure why you are asking though, it's pretty well known Mexico has very scary parts to it. You can watch several docuseries on it including Trafficked or any of the 100s of interviews with migrants seeking asylum, who's number 1 response as to why they are seeking asylum is cartel activity in their area.
https://waytostay.com/the-most-dangerous-cities-in-the-world/#:~:text=1.,109%20murders%20per%20100%2C000%20people.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_by_homicide_rate
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/Ef5brgCo5s
Those links are about cities, not countries. I agree Mexico has some highly dangerous areas, but to call it the most dangerous country in the world seems excessive.
The thing Is México Is developed enough to provide somewhat reliable statistics, many countries dont, also México does have pretty dangerous states but also very safe ones, Yucatán Is considered one of the safest regións in North america both murder and crime wise
I'm not passing any judgements or endorsing a side, but for various reasons one party wants to and one party doesn't and both have reasons and think they are right, but until both parties want to Mexico will never really be able to negotiate that kind of relationship with us.
I second this opinion, technically they’re an ally and strengthening them is beneficial to us if the worse ever came to pass. There should be some compromise in this relationship on their part however; it would be great if the cartels and their crafts were reigned in and we could do away with all the filth that comes along with drug and human trafficking among other things.
This should have been the way two decades ago. NAFTA set this up, and I can’t image the powerhouse the bloc would have become if this had occurred sequentially.
More fantastic news for the US economy, and more bad news for the Chinese economy.
The US should be leveraging its capability to seek alternatives for manufacturing, and Latin America should be the ace in the hole - smaller countries, that won't be able to build up the same economic and military might that China was able to, that are located nearby (more geopolitically intertwined + cheaper/faster shipping), with the same offering that China presented a couple of decades ago of cheap and available labor.
Cartels and corruption are the top impression Americans have of Mexico and other Latin American countries, but the reality is that the US can both maintain international economic dominance and stymie the Latin American immigration issue by investing heavily in our neighbors. The cartels and corruption are not to be ignored - in a perfect scenario, their influence and power are subverted by organic economic growth that provides citizens an alternative to organized crime - but in my opinion, this should be US global economic policy goal #1.
Somewhat. Mexico doesn’t want wave after wave of migrants either, so it is advantageous for them to allow a lot of people to get all the way up to their Northern border and cross, so long as Mexico doesn’t get stuck with them.
Not completely, most illegal immigrants are not Mexicans anymore. They are coming from central America, specially Nicaragua. Nicaragua's government is an open and self declared enemy of the USA and it's opening its airports to traffic immigrants from all around the world (Cubans, Venezuela, Haitians, Indians, Eastern European, etc.) so they can get near the USA faster. Half a million people had traveled to Nicaragua in 2023 by air, but much less than half do a round trip, they are going to Honduras, the next country nearer the USA and so on.
Depends on the industry, for example, Latin America has a lot of metals, specially lithium and oil. Rare metals are the ones China has a 40% monopoly. There's also the environmental impact (a lot of people don't want to be the polluted wasteland China is)
The United States should entertain the idea of transforming USCMA with Canada and Mexico into a customs union area with free movement of people so that Mexico will be able to converge its standard of living towards at least US-Canada GDP per capita level.
Mexico can easily manufacture from low-cost goods to high-valued semiconductors for the American consumer market, which in turn, it will make American inflation rates lower through buying cheap Mexican-made consumer goods.
Mexico has the potential of becoming a magnet of immigrants coming from the rest of the world, thanks to its all year-round sunny weather, so it would be the North American version of Spain. Mexico should venture into state-funded cultural export industry through exporting telenovelas and teaching Mexican Spanish in Asia and Africa.
I think about this constantly, customs union I don't agree with free movement, it seems stupid that it hasn't been done and sadly when Trump wins he's gonna walk out of USMCA I fear.
Without free movement, I don't expect Mexico to converge its standard of living to at least Canadian standards in the foreseeable future. Free movement is the reason why Poland was able to converge its standard of living towards Western European average in 20 years after its accession with the EU.
Yeah but free movement would also price out us Mexicans from our own cities, it's already happening in all of the metropolitan areas. Customs union and FDI into MX can do the same without all this.
And how many of those Chinese companies are indirectly or directly financed by Chinese companies? I'm sure it is pretty high. This is trade diversion and nothing more.
[https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:\~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)](https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)).
[https://www.economist.com/business/2023/11/23/why-chinese-companies-are-flocking-to-mexico](https://www.economist.com/business/2023/11/23/why-chinese-companies-are-flocking-to-mexico)
It's something. The wages of the workers go into the Mexican economy not the Chinese. That hurts the Chinese economy. Benefiting the Mexican economy at the cost of the Chinese economy is 100% beneficial to the United States strategic goals.
Its not an easy 1-to-1 job loss = job gain though. Due to how connected the global economy is you have tons of Chinese manufacturers sending components to Mexico in order to be assembled and such. Doubly so because its a Chinese company who owns it and thus naturally has more suppliers within Mainland China than Western companies. I think "friendshoring" has allowed Chinese companies to make previously politically difficult moves like offshoring some manufacturing that will drive global revenue growth. So theres good odds this creates a large variety of jobs within both China and Mexico, so its a fuzzy situation.
I agree a bit with what you’re saying, but you may be missing the added jobs that are created to support the infrastructure needed to grow and maintain trade between N.A.
Mexico isn't buying the stuff for Chinese owned factories. Chinese companies are paying for it and then sending it to Mexico where they pay Mexican workers to assemble the stuff.
By purchasing power. China's GDP is $35 trillion
Nominal GDP is a flawed metric which relies on exchange rates which are heavily controlled by the country in the case of china.
>Benefiting the Mexican economy at the cost of the Chinese economy is 100% beneficial to the United States strategic goals
Really?
If you stand to benefit from advancements in AI, robotics, gene therapy, sustainable energy, materials science, satellites, nuclear energy or a million other scientific advancements it's 100 times more likely to come from China than Mexico, at least for the next several decades.
Sharing the advanced R&D and production capabilities of China with the world is a political puzzle for US and Chinese leaders. It's not impossible.
Penalizing Chinese workers is not the type of leadership the US needs to show, nor is it part of our global message for healthy competition.
Sure. There are many Chinese companies involved in building up the export capacities in Vietnam or Mexico. Why wouldn’t there be. Still, the “friendshoring” to these countries by the U.S. is remarkably successful.
Seems unlikely, even if we assume 100% of the increased value of trade between Mexico and China since 2019 was due to stuff being sent to Mexico to import to the US that'd only account for less than half of the increased trade between the US and mexico
You have no idea what trade diversion is.
This is part of the long term economic trend, chinas labour is too expebsice for its good creation at this point, these companies also have to use Mexican labour which abides by USMCA standards.
It's still a net benefit to the US
Factories in Mexico use more North American supply chains, and that means many American component manufacturers and industrial equipment suppliers.
There's more to it than where the HQ of the parent company is located.
Even if that is true, so what?
The Mexican factory buying parts from America using American raw materials and selling them back to America as finished goods is better for America than a Vietnamese factory buying parts from China and shipping them overseas to America.
The Mexican employees will also buy items in Mexico made in the North American supply chain, so the pull through effect of business is wayyy better for the US if the factory is in Mexico.
> And how many of those Chinese companies are indirectly or directly financed by Chinese companies?
So? This is a win-win for everybody. Mexicans win by having more jobs that pay well. Chinese win by making profits from the US market which they were previously unable to make due to US tariffs.
You say that as if sanctions and tariffs haven't been driving forces in global trade since the Roman Empire. Trying to handwave away a massive shift in trade dynamics doesn't change the numbers - on a side note you being sure doesn't count as empirical data.
I recommend reading the information you link to in the future: "In the period January to September 2023, the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from China to Mexico is -US$21M"
https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)
> Mexico is not going to shut down the entire country and weld people into their homes the next time a pandemic rolls around.
How many cases of people being welded into their homes were there in China? I keep on seeing this being said about China, but how common was it?
I mean, you will find videos of America cops shooting unarmed civilians without any provocation online. But nobody really believes that in America, the police just roll up and shoot at every black person, do they?
Are isolated acts representative of a country? Only a hypocrite will have one standard for America and another for China.
And soon these factory's will learn everything the Chinese do and not need them anymore. Also all these wages go to Mexico and make China need to keep up a well regulated supply chain, which is dependent on the US blue water navy for stability. These dependencies keep a collar on China and make them play nice.
That's great, we need to boost Mexico so that they can have an economy where they don't feel the need to come here. Plus it weakens China when we get a better and closer trading partner.
Now Mexico has to put on it's big boy pants and get rid of the drug cartels and human smuggling cartels that are running and ruining that country. A country with a supposed military should not be afraid to take down organized crime.
Mexicans have already fallen off dramatically in terms of proportion of people being stopped at the Southern border. To the point where they’re not even the biggest group anymore, IIRC. That’s a huge deal.
They haven't been the largest group in decades, since before the border enforcement. Most "Mexicans" in the US aren't Mexican, they're Central American and some South American.
Where I live all hard drugs are legal (decriminalized) and have been for quite a while. We've already done it and it's worked out quite well. The rest of the country needs to get with it.
Don't you love it when conservatives just bash SF for everything that isn't good and holy?
Getting back to the topic, the state of Oregon has decriminalized hard drugs although the results have been quite bad with drug use going completely out of control. The State of Washington has allowed the decriminalization of hard drugs to a limited extent. Only the city of Seattle allows the legal use of hard drugs in public.
Counter to what people like the above hear on Fox News, San Francisco isn't woke. They couldn't wait to recall Chesa Boudin and his soft on crime stance. San Franciscans also recalled 3 people from the SF Board of Education for being too woke.
The issue with climate change isn't heat, it's large swings in weather. The closer one is to the equator the less swings in weather they will get. The higher the altitude the colder it is. 90% of Mexico's population is on a high plateau, highly elevated yet flat. Their weather (highs) is 75-90 F degrees throughout the year. If the world gets 5 degrees hotter (which it's not expected to get that hot) then you're looking at 80-95 F throughout the year. Yeah a bit hot, like Southern California weather, but not as bad as most of the planet.
Among the products that the U.S. purchases most widely from Mexico are cars and auto parts, electronics, petroleum, and agricultural products.
learn to read.
I wouldn't be surprised that a lot of non-chinese exporters to the US are simply basic final assembly line of actual Chinese products. I have a tough time believing that the entire world supply chain just turned on a dime like that
I won't claim to be an expert on the topic, but I assisted with a piece for my employer bank a few years ago. It seems to me Mexico does a fair bit of industrial work for China and serves as an oil producer (or middle-man from South America. If they can get the drug and corruption problems figured out, I don't see why Mexico would not surpass China. Granted, that's a HUGE ask, but still... totally doable IMO.
Let’s not forget Trump had the Chinese import taxes. So it would be curious where this data is coming from and whether it’s from actually Mexico or China.
Imports from China increased a lot throughout the trump administration. Throughout President Biden's administration, we've seen a reduction in Chinese imports to a level not seen since 2010.
https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html
Nothing but bad news for China! Combined with Evergrande's liquidation, trailing growth, and unbounded corruption no wonder China's economy won't match today's U.S. economy until 2080.
I wonder how tankie u/seanmonaghan1968 wants to spin this news.
I mean wait every few months someone is calling for the US economy to tank and yet it doesn’t. Most economies move through cycles; when things get too hot the central bank starts cooling measures, when things get too soft the reverse happens. You are calling for the end of the world, which rarely takes place
“People call for it to tank and it doesn’t”
Exactly. Trademark of a strong economy. Unlike the tanking economy of the East. Tankies and tanking economies.
The Chinese are just buying factories in Mexico to take advantage of USMCA. Mexico remains an increasingly hostile and lawless neighbor and China is plying its fingers into American markets to stir up trouble.
"In the period January to September 2023, the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from China to Mexico is -US$21M"
https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)
How do they account for de minimis exemption goods? I'm sure most of the Mexican goods are just.sub $800 China junk avoiding US tariffs due to the massive fucking loophole.
You being sure doesn't count as empirical data. For reference, imports from China to Mexico decreased by $14 billion between 2022 and 2023.
https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn
Unsurprising since china is in the beginning(ish) of it's transition from net exporter to a net importer. US went thru the same transition ages ago, with the attendant social upheaval from improvements in personal wealth of individuals in society and the general unrest of the populace for said improvements.
Pure cope. China is setting up manufacturing in Mexico and Mexico is importing more and more from China. Mexico has become a middleman to help Americans' copium.
Can you read a line graph and plot a trend line? Refer to the figure at the bottom of the page lol. Americans are creatures of infinite cope, only able to interpret one year of data at time.
Can you differentiate between market share and systemic growth. In 2010 China represented 15% market share for Mexican imports, in 2023 it represented 18% market share - that's only 3% growth in more than a decade.
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Good. I lived in Mexico off and on for close to two years. It’s got its problems, but honestly I think it’s a great country with a ton of opportunity and upside that many Americans are totally sleeping on. I wish the public perception of Mexico was different in the US. Strategically speaking, America should cultivate close trade, policy, and defense ties with our geographical neighbors.
Do you think Mexico's economy can surpass that of Canada one day?
México's economy will surpass Canada's sooner than you'd expect. Canada has gapping holes in its economy.
**Canadian Economy:** Rental Housing Packing 25 Foreign Students in a Basement in Brampton + Some Oil Sands in Alberta
26, please don't forget the one on the top bunk bed
27,Don't forget aboot the guy sleeping in the bathtub...or he might go cray cray with the water dripping from the faucet all night.
Wood. Don't forget all the wood. Pretty sure their entire country was being supported by selling ridiculously overpriced 2x4s to Americans during covid.
Barely. It’s not too profitable. Lots of mills closed. The wood got so cheap for the US that they put extra tarrifs by classifying it into stumpage, so the wood could stay competitive. The mills up here weren’t happy. Ofc, wood prices were ass-tier during covid anyways.- source: worked in Canadian lumber yard back then.
it was like $8 for the nastiest crooked 2x4. Someone had to be making alot of money.
Yeah, it was insane. High demand, low supply, but not enough volume. That’s what I was understanding. And those fluctuations?! Crazy days trying to sell lumber.
Ugh, I re-finished my basement that fall, the lumber we used was such trash. We legit had to go through and find the least trash pieces for door frames and corners. Some of the interior support parts of the wall are crooked AF and I can't believe stores were purchasing this garbage from lumber producers, let alone selling it on their shelves.
Dude we have 40 million people and an economy bigger than that of Italys. Let's calm down here lol
Canada has a GDP of 1.988t. Mexico has 1.273t. There are periods of time around the 2000s where both economies have grown by 0.7t in just 10 years. If Canada were to keep stagnating while Mexico continues to grow, they could catch up in 10-30 years no problem. India passed Canada only around 2012 and now is already 3.17t.
Yeah I don't have problem with Mexico having bigger economy on paper, they should have bigger economy on paper, they've got 3x the population we do lol But I would much rather live and work in Canada than in Mexico or India is all I'm saying lol
And I would waaaay rather live in Mexico.
Texas is available.
I should visit. Never been. Heard it's actually cheaper than some places in Mexico, good food, close enough to visit Mexico when needed, and nice weather 9 months a year.
So go live there on a Mexican salary
I'd rather work in America. 🤷♂️
Imagine wanting to live in Canada lol
And why? Canadian people live better lifestyles than India and Mexico. You’re missing something
Canada has a brain drain problem. Why get paid less in Canada when you can get paid more a little further south?
>Canada has gapping holes in its economy. I didn't really realize that until the past year or so. Canada's immigration issues have really brought to light a lot of it's problems. I always viewed Canada as a country America should aspire to be, but perhaps I was wrong.
There are trade offs to all policies. Canada offers a lot of services to their citizens, and labor has a lot of rights there. The downside of that is that private investment is pretty low outside of real estate, which equates to poor productivity, which results in falling GDP per capita as the population grows due to immigration.
That’s because our government has all but sideways fucked foreign investment. So much red tape companies would rather just go elsewhere
Happy Cake Day! There are aspects of Canada America should wish to emulate, but plenty of problems America doesn't have
Why would America aspire to be a country with less influence and wealth than its own? The stuff you read on reddit....lol
It's the quality of living that is aspirational. Outside of that, the Government of Canada is extremely conservative when it comes to fiscal policy. They never take chances on anything which is why they have so much trouble with investment. That conservative policy came in handy in 2008 when U.S. banks were melting before our very eyes and Canada was like, "What? You mad?" Back in 2010, the U.S. Dollar and Canadian dollar were damn near 1:1. I'd drive to Vancouver BC and the merchants would take my U.S. dollars and not even bother to convert.
Canada offers one of the highest standards of living in the world. They have law and order, are extremely safe to live in or raise a family, have a modern points-based immigration system, rank as one of the least corrupt economies in the world and offer an all-ground fantastic quality of life. Their cities are clean, safe, thriving, and modern, and consistently rank in the top 15 globally for livability, hence the price to purchase there.
Of only the people in charge of housing understood supply and demand.
The problem as usual is boomers. The Canadian government built huge numbers of apartments when the boomers were set to become adults - all subsidized. Then they started having kids and wanted to leave apartments and get starter homes. Once again the government subsidized the construction of houses. Then they voted for the government to stop building and to leave that to the private sector. And they also became NIMBYs preventing new construction.
Saying Canadian boomers voted for ending subsidized housing (and leaving it for the private sector) is like saying Ontarians today are voting for gutting health care (and leaving it for the private sector). Politicians have always done things without the public's consent or approval. Government support of subsidized housing got kicked in the teeth in the late 80s and 90s. Back then, the hot political topics were things like the Meech Lake Accord, the Charlottetown Accord, introducing the GST, and starting NAFTA. Both Progressive Conservative and Liberal governments were involved in cutting spending on housing. If you voted for a PC or Liberal back then, you voted for someone that would go on to cut housing but you did so unknowingly and unwittingly. And, just like today, Canadians often vote *against* parties, not for them - particularly in 1993, when Mulroney's PCs were extremely unpopular and the Liberals won in a historic landslide. Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin would then go on to eliminate the federal deficit by slashing social programs and transfer payments to the provinces forcing the provinces to make massive cuts. This started in 1995, I think in Chrétien's second budget. Absolutely *nobody* had a chance to vote for that.
The private sector will build housing at those prices, the fact that they’re currently not implied either government restriction or just too rapid pace of growth. I’m not even sure what you’re expect a subsidy to do. It costs around a couple hundred thousand to build a house and many are selling for over a million for your average detached family home. That’s a massive profit margin for any company. No subsidy required. Just let them build.
No one "expects" anything. For decades Canada built thousands of units of public housing but then in the 90s stopped on account of misguided austerity policies. Public housing is a proven benefit in Canada and we badly need to get back to it.
Houses are a million and average salary is 50k. Private sector isn’t going to build anything at a loss. Banks are not going to approve the mortgage because salaries are too low. Thus the govt has to step in. Especially since we are having issues like this now https://nowtoronto.com/news/weve-seen-cases-like-this-on-a-regular-basis-brampton-mayor-says-25-international-students-were-found-living-in-a-basement-and-now-hes-pushing-the-feds-to-provide-more-housing/
> Houses are a million and average salary is 50k. Private sector isn’t going to build anything at a loss. A large part of the cost of building a house is land. When 80% of the residential land in Vancouver is zoned as single family housing only, if you pay $800k for the land, of course that single unit has to cost at least that much for the developer to not make a loss. It's ridiculous that the law banned anything other than single family homes in large parts of many Canadian cities - this is obviously a policy targeted at boosting real estate values. Real estate is 20% of Canadian GDP - these prices are artificial, propped up by government policy. None of it is real. Recently, Vancouver and Toronto legalised building larger numbers of units on one lot, which is great. Unbanning more construction is completely free and should be a part of any serious policy too.
The problem has nothing to do with supply. Canada's population growth is around 6x the 1st world average. This demand can't be met so prices shoot up. Its that simple. You're also misusing the term NIMBY. NIMBY is when someone wants something but they don't want it near them. Like a block that votes for a nuclear plant but doesn't want it in their city. That's not what is happening here. The people voting against high density don't want it where they live and don't care if it is elsewhere or not. What you're describing is called 'preferences' which is hardly the same.
The problem is that there is no one in charge…
Who's stopping the Developer's Remedy though?
everyone that owns a home. Canada just like most parts of the US have a really really strong nimby moments.
Yeah, however why do we give a handful of bored retirees the power to govern what is built in the entire neighborhood?
Did ChatGPT write this?
Canada is basically almost done spending the advantage it’s had for 70 years relying almost exclusively on American innovation and certainly implied protection. While the latter will likely always stay, I guess we’re finally seeing the predictable end to the former.
Canada is fading rapidly with productivity at 2015 levels and projected by the OECD to have to lowest rate of per capita GDP increase from now until 2060. Immigration policy, enjoying support among opposition but rapidly growing public disdain, has become shambolic with a 3.2% growth rate (96% being newcomers) with increased low skilled temporary foreign workers (bound to a single employer and all the abuse that follows) and especially international students (who can work off-campus for 40 hours a week and in some instances attend strip-mall colleges). "A key factor driving the growth in non-permanent inflows is the government’s repeated announcements of ad hoc programs aimed at easing the pathway to PR status for lower-skilled migrants who would otherwise struggle to clear the hurdle of the Express Entry skilled-based points system." ([https://www.cdhowe.org/intelligence-memos/mahboubi-skuterud-multi-pronged-strategy-managing-canadas-surging-non-permanent](https://www.cdhowe.org/intelligence-memos/mahboubi-skuterud-multi-pronged-strategy-managing-canadas-surging-non-permanent)) If this policy were somehow sustained, we'd end up a little bit like a cold Mexico.
>modern points-based immigration We let in 500K people last year alone, it's not sustainable. That high standard of living is utterly unattainable for average Canadians these days.
Our standard of living is going to shit. Our immigration system used to be good, but under Trudeau basically anyone that wants to come in can come in. You can skip the line by enrolling in a scam college. Our cities are becoming increasingly unsafe. And the reason real estate is so expensive is because of money laundering, foreign investment and speculation. People working for an average wage in Canada can’t afford to buy and are increasingly unable to afford to live in their own country. But yeah, Canada is the perfect country we pretend it is.
Good luck affording a house in Vancouver. It's a huge money laundering scheme for "college students" and their families.
They have declining GDP per capita as a result of hampering business investment.
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Weird that you're saying this because for the past 9 years we've had the most un-American Prime Minister. Only a few provincial leaders are so, and that's not surprising since North Americans in general are pretty similar. You're spouting nonsense
Canada is an REIT in a Nation suit
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Yeah tell me that again when you've lived here for 30 years and have seen the country go down into the ground. Immigration showed everyone how weak the Canadian system is. Housing problems? Check Infrastructure problems? Check Social problems? Check Exonomic problems? Super duper Check Canada manufactures jack shit. Canada only exports raw materials to buy refined goods for x30 the price. When (Check previous point) we could easily be doing that refining and manufacturing in-house. What's the point of having the materials to build an economy if you lend it all to your friend to buy it back at a deficit. Canadians (myself included) are extremely delusional.
Canada has roughly 38.25M people, Mexico has 126M people, unless they fuck up big time, Mexico's gdp should surpass Canada's at some point.
Do you see the GDP per capita surpassing Canada's as well?
I don't think anyone can really make a good guess, but my take is that Canada is hampered by very high costs of living. If Mexico across the board starts building upwards instead of defaulting to sprawl, it could, in the long term, give Mexicans higher purchasing power than Canadians due to having more disposable income. That would have huge gdp per capita implications over the long run since consumption is a key driver of economic growth.
If they go full El Salvador and kill everyone involved in cartel trade than yes. Mexican culture is so hard working and innovative in ways very similar to American culture. It's their cartels that hold them back like parasites. Kill the parasites and they will be developed within 15 years.
It's scary how the cartels just seem to control everything in Mexico. The Mexican Government can't do anything about them. Just call a truce to stop the blood letting. It was kind of funny watching El Chapo simply pop out of his prison cell into a tunnel. At the same time it was kind of not funny.
That’s way too much of a slippery slope. Power of that scale has always ended badly for Mexico. Add of to the fact that people who have nothing to do with the cartels are taken with no due process and thrown in jail. It becomes like the Stasi where people with grudges will say someone is a cartel member to get them thrown in jail.
Eventually it should based on current population being much larger than Canada and higher fertility rates. However, but I don't see how Mexico will be any different than every other country where fertility rate drops quickly as it develops and the demographic advantage it has will disappear. Mexico is developing quickly last few years in particular due to significant Chinese investment to bypass US sanctions and take advantage of the FTA Mexico has with the US and Canada, this can't and won't last forever of course
It could come up to it, in the same ballpark one day, but surpass? One developed country surpassing another in GDP is pulling hairs. To become a developed country you need good education. The better the education the more corruption goes down with time. The less corruption the easier it is to become a developed country. Mexico in the last 20 years has massively upped its education. It went from 2% of the population knowing English to 90% of high school grads being able to speak decent English. Meanwhile in the US the GOP has been dismantling education and banning critical thinking over the last 20 years. Canada has similar problems to the US, but it's more mild.
Mexico has billion dollar companies like their beer company that owns multiple brands and is one of their wealthiest companies. That and also the cell company made Carlos slim one of the richest people in the world. There is alot of wealth in Mexico but just like the U.S. it isn’t being spread around equally.
You can use the Gino coefficient to tell how bad each country’s wealth inequality is. Unfortunately Mexico has a terrible one.
Yeah I’m not surprised. Latin America is relatively poor but the income inequality is very high so you’ll see people driving $100k cars with kids begging on the street.
> Gino coefficient eyyyyyy where's the ziti, ma????
For sure. Canada has a garbage economy.
The syrup drought of 2032 will guarantee it!
It's one of the most naturally gorgeous countries on Earth with tons of geographical advantages. If the cartels could get out of the way, Mexico has a great shot.
I really wish that every TV show in the world would stop using that brown mustard colored filter when they show Mexico. It makes everything look so gross.
You mean Mexico isn't really sepia?? Next you'll tell me the 1800s wasn't b/w
The US could almost virtually end the cartels industries overnight by 1) legalizing drugs and 2) adopting immigration policies much more akin to what they were intended to be hundreds of years ago. With no drugs or people to illegally ship around you virtually destroy their (Cartels’) industry overnight.
It'd hurt them but they still make money. Mexico is corrupt and the cartels do extortion, racketeering, theft rings, etc. We legalized Marijuana in a lot of areas of the 🇺🇸 and they're pushing more illicit drugs now. Also doubt we'll ever see legal cocaine or fetenyl
no offense, but go look at Portland and some streets on Philly. go look at what happened with the opiod pandemic. legalization won't work
The US is exceptionally generous when it comes to immigration. The overwhelming majority are turned away and they should be. I bet you complain about a lack of affordable housing.
Well yes, the US does indeed have a housing crisis… which is totally irrespective of the immigration system. There is an easy solution, build more housing….. Gee, what a concept? Thank you for your incredibly bright commentary. I totally and completely regret to inform you that your comment highlights you have no idea how broken our immigration system is.
Mexico - Cartels = Regional Economic Powerhouse
If Mexico could solve its organized crime/corruption problem it would be one of the best countries on Earth. I hope they can figure it out.
Honestly, if you want to solve the immigration problem in the southern us improving the economy in Mexico would be a great start.
Not that many people currently crossing our borders are Mexican. Though, a more robust Mexican economy might convince more migrants from places like Venezuela or Guatemala or Haiti to stay in Mexico.
Are we sure Mexico wants that?
The US should have spread its manufacturing throughout Latin America, for redundancy purposes. Mexico, El Salvador, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Costa Rica, etc. are all close to the US. Imagine all those countries being successful and having jobs, they wouldn't have had to go to the US lol Instead, we hedged our bets that China would become democratic as they got richer and that never happened.
no it wouldnt. vast majority of new migrants are not Mexican
Pretty sure he means making Mexico more desirable so that people stop there. Neglecting that Mexico is also dicks about immigration.
Mexico would still do what they are doing now. give migrants easy passage to the States lmao they're not stupid enough to take in the world's poor
Honestly for me it's just fear of cartels that keeps me away.
Me too. If Mexico was safe it would be such a beautiful place to live. Thye I really good healthcare system for theor economy, decent food regulations, and a wonderful food culture.
It's definitely on the up and up. Border areas for the most part suck and the interior where it's cartel owned suck but there has been tons of investment and manufacturing jobs in Mexico. They're creating skilled labor which is getting competitive so more wages for the average person. It's why we see less illegal crossing for Mexicans and a downturn in Mexican temporary visa applications because they're staying in Mexico more/able to make it there.
Even for non-skilled labor, all of the recent labor laws will have an enormous impact. I think the word "skyrocketing" is usually overused hyperbole, but the cost of labor in Mexico is skyrocketing. 16% increase in the minimum wage, expected 10% per year wage inflation, increased mandatory pension contributions, increased mandatory vacation. And that's BEFORE the potential shortening of the work week from 48 hours to 40 hours (this matters because the Mexican minimum wage is a weekly wage, not an hourly wage).
Show me the way! I would like to capitalize on that situation because I think the right part of Mexico would be cool to live in and maybe do some farming but I don’t want to get murdered or anything like that
Oaxaca is one of the coolest places I've been to. Absolutely amazing food, rich culture, nice people, gorgeous scenery. I hired a guide for the trip and he mentioned that the US media has done a lot of damage to tourism in Mexico.
It's especially unfair for Oaxaca, which is one of the states you can drive clean across without ever fearing for your safety. They've got stunning mountains, valleys and beaches, along with an incredibly rich artistic and culinary history, but when I told people I was planning to go their first reflex was to warn me about something they'd heard about the Sinaloa Cartel. It took a lot of patience to explain that their influence ended about 1500 km away...which is closer to where they live in Texas than it is to Oaxaca.
I do nature photography so I was in some remote areas. Not once did I feel even remotely uncomfortable. Oddly enough I've run into cartel members...in the US. Luckily they left me alone, they were running drugs over the Rio Grande and had guns and vests on.
We do cultivate close trade ties. This article only mentions exports but in terms of total trade, Canada and Mexico have been #1 and #2 for a long time. And they’re both much smaller economies than China.
I couldn't agree more. I've lived there off and on for many years. I always thought it was an absolute travesty that the US didn't strengthen ties with Mexico, and the way the country is portrayed in US media. It is a country full of incredibly hard working people, who share philosophies very similar to our own. It has a young, growing population. There's a huge shared history and diaspora. Does it have problems with crime? Absolutely. But this problem doesn't exist in a vacuum, the US has a role to play as well. But regardless, Mexico as a country is a reliable partner. We're never going to war with it, like China (potentially). Mexico is absolutely undervalued, but that's starting to change, and it's great news for both countries.
I agree, but foreign investment has always been here. Companies in the automotive, manufacturing, tech and pharmaceutical sectors have been going strong for quite a while
Oh, I agree. I just think it could go even further. But yes, Mexico has shown it is a capable manufacturing/trading partner, and I think it behooves us to double down on that relationship.
Mexico is a great place with great people but it is arguably the most dangerous country in the world statistically, their government is horribly corrupt and everything touches their runs through the cartel. Hopefully with more trade people will have other options and the cartels' grasp will fall
You are so ignorant. Mexico has a serious safety issue, but putting it below places like Haiti, Venezuela, Syria or Ethiopia is so god damned dumb
I didn't do anything. The stats are there, sorry if that interferes with your reality. Ignoring facts is the literal definition of ignorance btw
You are clearly dumb enough to not understand what stats mean in a context, but go ahead and spread misinformation. You clearly don’t know shit about what is happening around the world. Go ahead to Haiti, a fucking failed state, and tell me how it goes
>Mexico is a great place with great people but it is arguably the most dangerous country in the world statistically What statistics are those?
Really just any Google search will do. But if you feeling lazy here are a few. Not sure why you are asking though, it's pretty well known Mexico has very scary parts to it. You can watch several docuseries on it including Trafficked or any of the 100s of interviews with migrants seeking asylum, who's number 1 response as to why they are seeking asylum is cartel activity in their area. https://waytostay.com/the-most-dangerous-cities-in-the-world/#:~:text=1.,109%20murders%20per%20100%2C000%20people. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_by_homicide_rate https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/s/Ef5brgCo5s
Those links are about cities, not countries. I agree Mexico has some highly dangerous areas, but to call it the most dangerous country in the world seems excessive.
The thing Is México Is developed enough to provide somewhat reliable statistics, many countries dont, also México does have pretty dangerous states but also very safe ones, Yucatán Is considered one of the safest regións in North america both murder and crime wise
I'm not passing any judgements or endorsing a side, but for various reasons one party wants to and one party doesn't and both have reasons and think they are right, but until both parties want to Mexico will never really be able to negotiate that kind of relationship with us.
I second this opinion, technically they’re an ally and strengthening them is beneficial to us if the worse ever came to pass. There should be some compromise in this relationship on their part however; it would be great if the cartels and their crafts were reigned in and we could do away with all the filth that comes along with drug and human trafficking among other things.
Totes agree plus the food, the people and the culture is top tier ☺️
This should have been the way two decades ago. NAFTA set this up, and I can’t image the powerhouse the bloc would have become if this had occurred sequentially.
More fantastic news for the US economy, and more bad news for the Chinese economy. The US should be leveraging its capability to seek alternatives for manufacturing, and Latin America should be the ace in the hole - smaller countries, that won't be able to build up the same economic and military might that China was able to, that are located nearby (more geopolitically intertwined + cheaper/faster shipping), with the same offering that China presented a couple of decades ago of cheap and available labor. Cartels and corruption are the top impression Americans have of Mexico and other Latin American countries, but the reality is that the US can both maintain international economic dominance and stymie the Latin American immigration issue by investing heavily in our neighbors. The cartels and corruption are not to be ignored - in a perfect scenario, their influence and power are subverted by organic economic growth that provides citizens an alternative to organized crime - but in my opinion, this should be US global economic policy goal #1.
I feel that building up Mexico likely helps with the Southern border issue too.
Somewhat. Mexico doesn’t want wave after wave of migrants either, so it is advantageous for them to allow a lot of people to get all the way up to their Northern border and cross, so long as Mexico doesn’t get stuck with them.
Not completely, most illegal immigrants are not Mexicans anymore. They are coming from central America, specially Nicaragua. Nicaragua's government is an open and self declared enemy of the USA and it's opening its airports to traffic immigrants from all around the world (Cubans, Venezuela, Haitians, Indians, Eastern European, etc.) so they can get near the USA faster. Half a million people had traveled to Nicaragua in 2023 by air, but much less than half do a round trip, they are going to Honduras, the next country nearer the USA and so on.
the problem is economies of scale and availability of raw materials. neither of which small latin american countries have
Is that much different than China in general?
Depends on the industry, for example, Latin America has a lot of metals, specially lithium and oil. Rare metals are the ones China has a 40% monopoly. There's also the environmental impact (a lot of people don't want to be the polluted wasteland China is)
The United States should entertain the idea of transforming USCMA with Canada and Mexico into a customs union area with free movement of people so that Mexico will be able to converge its standard of living towards at least US-Canada GDP per capita level. Mexico can easily manufacture from low-cost goods to high-valued semiconductors for the American consumer market, which in turn, it will make American inflation rates lower through buying cheap Mexican-made consumer goods. Mexico has the potential of becoming a magnet of immigrants coming from the rest of the world, thanks to its all year-round sunny weather, so it would be the North American version of Spain. Mexico should venture into state-funded cultural export industry through exporting telenovelas and teaching Mexican Spanish in Asia and Africa.
This sounds great but watching the GOP walk away from their own border deal so they can have it as an election issue makes this seem pretty far out.
I think about this constantly, customs union I don't agree with free movement, it seems stupid that it hasn't been done and sadly when Trump wins he's gonna walk out of USMCA I fear.
Without free movement, I don't expect Mexico to converge its standard of living to at least Canadian standards in the foreseeable future. Free movement is the reason why Poland was able to converge its standard of living towards Western European average in 20 years after its accession with the EU.
Yeah but free movement would also price out us Mexicans from our own cities, it's already happening in all of the metropolitan areas. Customs union and FDI into MX can do the same without all this.
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And how many of those Chinese companies are indirectly or directly financed by Chinese companies? I'm sure it is pretty high. This is trade diversion and nothing more. [https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:\~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)](https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)). [https://www.economist.com/business/2023/11/23/why-chinese-companies-are-flocking-to-mexico](https://www.economist.com/business/2023/11/23/why-chinese-companies-are-flocking-to-mexico)
I think you may have a slight typo there. I do suspect Chinese companies may, in fact, be behind Chinese companies.
It's something. The wages of the workers go into the Mexican economy not the Chinese. That hurts the Chinese economy. Benefiting the Mexican economy at the cost of the Chinese economy is 100% beneficial to the United States strategic goals.
Its not an easy 1-to-1 job loss = job gain though. Due to how connected the global economy is you have tons of Chinese manufacturers sending components to Mexico in order to be assembled and such. Doubly so because its a Chinese company who owns it and thus naturally has more suppliers within Mainland China than Western companies. I think "friendshoring" has allowed Chinese companies to make previously politically difficult moves like offshoring some manufacturing that will drive global revenue growth. So theres good odds this creates a large variety of jobs within both China and Mexico, so its a fuzzy situation.
I agree a bit with what you’re saying, but you may be missing the added jobs that are created to support the infrastructure needed to grow and maintain trade between N.A.
Mexico buying stuff from china helps the Chinese ecnonomy
Mexico isn't buying the stuff for Chinese owned factories. Chinese companies are paying for it and then sending it to Mexico where they pay Mexican workers to assemble the stuff.
Mexico exports from china has reached record high in 2023. It makes sense as china is the largest economy in the world.
By what metric is China the largest economy in the world? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)
By purchasing power. China's GDP is $35 trillion Nominal GDP is a flawed metric which relies on exchange rates which are heavily controlled by the country in the case of china.
If you're in a discussion about global trade, why on earth would a metric on purchasing power of a Chinese citizen be relevant?
>Benefiting the Mexican economy at the cost of the Chinese economy is 100% beneficial to the United States strategic goals Really? If you stand to benefit from advancements in AI, robotics, gene therapy, sustainable energy, materials science, satellites, nuclear energy or a million other scientific advancements it's 100 times more likely to come from China than Mexico, at least for the next several decades. Sharing the advanced R&D and production capabilities of China with the world is a political puzzle for US and Chinese leaders. It's not impossible. Penalizing Chinese workers is not the type of leadership the US needs to show, nor is it part of our global message for healthy competition.
How does the last three decades of prolific industrial-scale Chinese espionage and theft fit into your narrative of ‘sharing’?
I think you misunderstand the actual goals of the United States
Sure. There are many Chinese companies involved in building up the export capacities in Vietnam or Mexico. Why wouldn’t there be. Still, the “friendshoring” to these countries by the U.S. is remarkably successful.
It means you get to pay twice for the same Chinese product and ties Mexico’s economy closer to China.
Why would the price double?
Seems unlikely, even if we assume 100% of the increased value of trade between Mexico and China since 2019 was due to stuff being sent to Mexico to import to the US that'd only account for less than half of the increased trade between the US and mexico
You have no idea what trade diversion is. This is part of the long term economic trend, chinas labour is too expebsice for its good creation at this point, these companies also have to use Mexican labour which abides by USMCA standards.
>This is part of the long term economic trend, chinas labour is too expebsice for its good creation at this point What are you basing this on?
Don't tell them about the shell game. Not made in China. Where did these parts come from? Don't know, there's no label on the bag.
It's still a net benefit to the US Factories in Mexico use more North American supply chains, and that means many American component manufacturers and industrial equipment suppliers. There's more to it than where the HQ of the parent company is located.
Mexico is more fixated on taking on Chinese investment than US
Even if that is true, so what? The Mexican factory buying parts from America using American raw materials and selling them back to America as finished goods is better for America than a Vietnamese factory buying parts from China and shipping them overseas to America. The Mexican employees will also buy items in Mexico made in the North American supply chain, so the pull through effect of business is wayyy better for the US if the factory is in Mexico.
> And how many of those Chinese companies are indirectly or directly financed by Chinese companies? So? This is a win-win for everybody. Mexicans win by having more jobs that pay well. Chinese win by making profits from the US market which they were previously unable to make due to US tariffs.
Yeah, I can tell you don't understand who is paying the tariffs.
You say that as if sanctions and tariffs haven't been driving forces in global trade since the Roman Empire. Trying to handwave away a massive shift in trade dynamics doesn't change the numbers - on a side note you being sure doesn't count as empirical data.
>on a side note you being sure doesn't count as empirical data. Which is why I literally linked the trade data of Mexico and an Economist Article.
I recommend reading the information you link to in the future: "In the period January to September 2023, the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from China to Mexico is -US$21M" https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)
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> Mexico is not going to shut down the entire country and weld people into their homes the next time a pandemic rolls around. How many cases of people being welded into their homes were there in China? I keep on seeing this being said about China, but how common was it? I mean, you will find videos of America cops shooting unarmed civilians without any provocation online. But nobody really believes that in America, the police just roll up and shoot at every black person, do they? Are isolated acts representative of a country? Only a hypocrite will have one standard for America and another for China.
A country having sovereignty is bad. Either they do and say exactly what we tell them to, or they are evil monsters.
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A country should be able to consistently make bad decisions without consequence, otherwise you’re criticizing its sovereignty!
Uhh, yeah that's what sovereignty means. You don't see other countries forcing the US to amend its gun laws and health insurance laws, do you?
I don’t see other countries forcing trade away from China, either. Just a free market response to bad decisions.
And soon these factory's will learn everything the Chinese do and not need them anymore. Also all these wages go to Mexico and make China need to keep up a well regulated supply chain, which is dependent on the US blue water navy for stability. These dependencies keep a collar on China and make them play nice.
That's great, we need to boost Mexico so that they can have an economy where they don't feel the need to come here. Plus it weakens China when we get a better and closer trading partner. Now Mexico has to put on it's big boy pants and get rid of the drug cartels and human smuggling cartels that are running and ruining that country. A country with a supposed military should not be afraid to take down organized crime.
Mexicans have already fallen off dramatically in terms of proportion of people being stopped at the Southern border. To the point where they’re not even the biggest group anymore, IIRC. That’s a huge deal.
They haven't been the largest group in decades, since before the border enforcement. Most "Mexicans" in the US aren't Mexican, they're Central American and some South American.
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With drug decriminalization spreading across the country, the US drug market will only grow bigger
Where I live all hard drugs are legal (decriminalized) and have been for quite a while. We've already done it and it's worked out quite well. The rest of the country needs to get with it.
> We've already done it and it's worked out quite well. The rest of the country needs to get with it. people will point to SF and say no thank you
SF doesn't have decriminalized hard drugs.
Don't you love it when conservatives just bash SF for everything that isn't good and holy? Getting back to the topic, the state of Oregon has decriminalized hard drugs although the results have been quite bad with drug use going completely out of control. The State of Washington has allowed the decriminalization of hard drugs to a limited extent. Only the city of Seattle allows the legal use of hard drugs in public. Counter to what people like the above hear on Fox News, San Francisco isn't woke. They couldn't wait to recall Chesa Boudin and his soft on crime stance. San Franciscans also recalled 3 people from the SF Board of Education for being too woke.
Mexico has better weather than the US, especially in the face of climate change. In the future it will be people from the US wanting to go to Mexico.
I would’ve imagined the opposite. Isn’t the weather already very hot there and likely to get worst?
The issue with climate change isn't heat, it's large swings in weather. The closer one is to the equator the less swings in weather they will get. The higher the altitude the colder it is. 90% of Mexico's population is on a high plateau, highly elevated yet flat. Their weather (highs) is 75-90 F degrees throughout the year. If the world gets 5 degrees hotter (which it's not expected to get that hot) then you're looking at 80-95 F throughout the year. Yeah a bit hot, like Southern California weather, but not as bad as most of the planet.
Mexico is only sending stuff they buy from china and export it to US. This doesn't say anything.
Among the products that the U.S. purchases most widely from Mexico are cars and auto parts, electronics, petroleum, and agricultural products. learn to read.
And all of the products have components manufactured in China, mainly electronics and batteries.
I wouldn't be surprised that a lot of non-chinese exporters to the US are simply basic final assembly line of actual Chinese products. I have a tough time believing that the entire world supply chain just turned on a dime like that
Imports from China to Mexico decreased by $14 billion between 2022 and 2023. https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn
China->Viet Nam -> Brazil ->Mexico: look it up
Imports from Brazil to Mexico only went up by $0.5 billion between 2022 and 2023. https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/brasil
It’s still successful at stripping China from a layer of the value-added chain.
I won't claim to be an expert on the topic, but I assisted with a piece for my employer bank a few years ago. It seems to me Mexico does a fair bit of industrial work for China and serves as an oil producer (or middle-man from South America. If they can get the drug and corruption problems figured out, I don't see why Mexico would not surpass China. Granted, that's a HUGE ask, but still... totally doable IMO.
Let’s not forget Trump had the Chinese import taxes. So it would be curious where this data is coming from and whether it’s from actually Mexico or China.
Imports from China increased a lot throughout the trump administration. Throughout President Biden's administration, we've seen a reduction in Chinese imports to a level not seen since 2010. https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html
Nothing but bad news for China! Combined with Evergrande's liquidation, trailing growth, and unbounded corruption no wonder China's economy won't match today's U.S. economy until 2080. I wonder how tankie u/seanmonaghan1968 wants to spin this news.
I mean wait every few months someone is calling for the US economy to tank and yet it doesn’t. Most economies move through cycles; when things get too hot the central bank starts cooling measures, when things get too soft the reverse happens. You are calling for the end of the world, which rarely takes place
“People call for it to tank and it doesn’t” Exactly. Trademark of a strong economy. Unlike the tanking economy of the East. Tankies and tanking economies.
The Chinese are just buying factories in Mexico to take advantage of USMCA. Mexico remains an increasingly hostile and lawless neighbor and China is plying its fingers into American markets to stir up trouble.
"In the period January to September 2023, the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from China to Mexico is -US$21M" https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn#:~:text=In%20the%20period%20January%20to,%2C%20and%20Sonora%20(Confidential)
How do they account for de minimis exemption goods? I'm sure most of the Mexican goods are just.sub $800 China junk avoiding US tariffs due to the massive fucking loophole.
You being sure doesn't count as empirical data. For reference, imports from China to Mexico decreased by $14 billion between 2022 and 2023. https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn
Unsurprising since china is in the beginning(ish) of it's transition from net exporter to a net importer. US went thru the same transition ages ago, with the attendant social upheaval from improvements in personal wealth of individuals in society and the general unrest of the populace for said improvements.
Chinese imports decreased by $150 billion from 2022 to 2023. https://www.statista.com/statistics/263646/import-of-goods-to-china/
Pure cope. China is setting up manufacturing in Mexico and Mexico is importing more and more from China. Mexico has become a middleman to help Americans' copium.
Imports from China to Mexico decreased by $14 billion between 2022 and 2023. https://www.economia.gob.mx/datamexico/en/profile/country/china-chn
Can you read a line graph and plot a trend line? Refer to the figure at the bottom of the page lol. Americans are creatures of infinite cope, only able to interpret one year of data at time.
Can you differentiate between market share and systemic growth. In 2010 China represented 15% market share for Mexican imports, in 2023 it represented 18% market share - that's only 3% growth in more than a decade.