Texas - The one to lose without NAFTA
There has already been a lot of speculation about the future of NAFTA (North America Free Trade Agreement) but it seems that the negotiations will not have the 3 stakeholders at the table at the same time. Bilateral meetings between the governments of US, Canada and Mexico will be set up. This makes sense because each relationship faces different challenges and by far, the Mexico-USA relationship is more complicated. With free trade as the bedrock of this agreement, issues like drug trafficking, immigration, a border wall, money laundry, gun trafficking and security will be discussed. The current US administration will use trade to pressure the Mexican government but any trade or commercial retaliation can be mirrored by the Mexican government . Some industries are more vulnerable and prone to substitution than others and the impact could be localized in certain areas of both countries.
I decided to analyze each US state exports in order to identify who were the principal stakeholders of the trade with Mexico - and will probably try to lobby their interests into the White House.
Using 2015 data (US Census Bureau) to make the analysis I created an interactive map that allows to explore the exports situation of each US state. The map shows different layers of information:
- 2015 Total Exports as percentage of the State's GDP
- 2015 Exports to Mexico as percentage of the State's GDP
- 2015 Exports per Capita to Mexico
- 2015 Total Exports
- 2015 Percentage of Exports to Mexico by Republican State
- 2015 Percentage of Exports to Mexico by Democrat State
Feel free to explore the map to get a better idea of whose interests will be in the front line during the negotiations (use the layer selector). The future will tell us if there is some congruence between each state's actions and their interest.
It was obvious that border states (Texas, New Mexico and Arizona) were going to be the most affected, but it is important to quantify the value of the NAFTA agreement for them. Some other states, such as Michigan and Indiana, also share important ties with Mexico because of the automotive sector; a sector with a supply chain that crosses oceans and borders. One surprise is Louisiana, with an important amount per capital of trade with Mexico, his principal commodities are ''10 Cereals'' and ''27 Mineral Fuel, Oil Etc.; Bitumin Subst; Mineral Wax'' according to the standard classification. By far, the most NAFTA involved state is Texas with an outstanding 3.4k USD per capita of exports to Mexico each year.
By the way the only Democrat State mentioned above was New Mexico.
It's important to highlight that I am not a NAFTA advocate, I believe that in some extension, the goal of bringing well-being to societies through free trade, got skewed, by creating dependency, low wages jobs, outsourcing, limiting development in particular regions, enriching the wealthy and submitting the poor.
I believe in fair trade.
To be continued