The Trans-Pacific Partnership
What you need to know about the most progressive trade agreement in history.
Why We Trade
America’s trade policy may seem remote and technical, but it has a significant impact on the strength of our economy and the lives of millions of Americans. If the companies you buy from everyday also sell their products to customers abroad, they are more likely to expand and create jobs here at home. In fact, trade has played an indispensable role in America’s resurgence from the Great Recession – accounting for nearly one-third of our overall economic growth since the end of the recession in mid-2009.
More Videos
Watch the President's Weekly Address on TPP
The Presidents Remarks on Trade
TPP's Impact on the American People and Workers
WORTH A SHARE: 5 ways trade is linked to our economic strength
-
Made-in-America exports are a growing pillar of our 21st century economy:
Last year, we broke the record in American exports for the fifth year in a row, selling $2.35 trillion in goods and services abroad – more than ever before. -
The more we sell abroad, the more jobs we support here at home:
In fact, U.S. exports supported 11.7 million American jobs in 2014, an increase of 1.8 million since 2009. -
Those jobs tend to pay better wages than non-export related jobs:
In fact, businesses that sell their products abroad pay up to 18% more than businesses that don’t. -
Ninety-five percent of the world’s potential consumers live outside our borders:
To ensure our economy keeps pace with China and the rest of the world, we have to ensure our entrepreneurs have access to the fastest growing markets so they can expand here at home. -
High-standard trade helps level the playing field for American workers:
Enforceable protections for our workers and environment in trade agreements like TPP will help our workers compete and win.
How We Trade
Past trade deals like NAFTA have not always lived up to the hype – and the President is the first to recognize that. That’s why he is working with Congress to upgrade our existing trade deals with one that reflects American values. It’s called the Trans-Pacific Partnership — the most progressive trade agreement the world has ever seen.
See how President Obama is making updates to improve our trade policy here.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership is a negotiation with 11 countries in the Asia Pacific, including Canada and Mexico. Through the Trans-Pacific Partnership we are renegotiating NAFTA and instituting stronger, fully enforceable labor and environmental standards. These high standards will not only bring hundreds of millions of people under enforceable labor standards and protect endangered wildlife in one of the fastest growing regions of the world—they will also help level the playing field for workers and businesses here at home by ensuring our trade partners are playing by the rules.
To help deliver the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the President is also asking Congress to work together to pass bipartisan Trade Promotion Authority which will help guarantee that America speaks with one voice on trade priorities like protecting our workers and environment.
Who Trade Helps
SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS:
Right now, 98% of American businesses that export are small businesses. Yet only 1% of our 28 million small businesses in America export their products. The President’s trade deal includes a small business chapter for the first time.
WORTH A READ: Tom Lisicki, the head of Stash Tea, shares how the President’s trade deal will help him put his tea in kitchen cupboards around the world.
ONLINE BUSINESS OWNERS:
Our trade policies should reflect the digital era we live in—helping entrepreneurs who rely on e-commerce sites like eBay and Etsy navigate the rules of selling abroad. This one does. The Trans-Pacific Partnership would not only reduce or eliminate tariffs and streamline customs regulations for our small businesses, but it will also keep the Internet free and open for a growing number of online entrepreneurs who are selling more products abroad and creating more jobs at home.
WORTH A READ: Nick Martin, the cofounder of the largest cycling parts store on eBay, shares what the Trans Pacific Partnership would mean for his business and his community.
WORTH A READ: Egg Press’s founder Tess Darrow, shares the pride she has in selling her Made-in-America designs to international customers – and how the TPP can make that easier.
WOMEN HERE AND ACROSS THE WORLD:
Empowering women in business, encouraging women’s participation in the global economy, promoting gender equality – these are top priority goals for President Obama when he considers policy. That’s why the TPP makes concrete progress on these goals by creating new export opportunities for American businesses, supporting higher-paid jobs in the U.S., and strengthening worker protections abroad, including non-discrimination. See how the President's trade deal will empower women in the U.S. and across the globe here.
WORTH A READ: Diana Doukas, the Director of the White House Business Council and accidental entrepreneur, explains how the TPP will help workers and empower women in business.
FIGHTERS FOR HUMAN RIGHTS:
The President’s trade deal reflects more than our interests, it reflects our values, especially when it comes to making progress on human rights. Through the TPP deal and our engagement with trade partners, we are improving living standards for workers and families at home and abroad while addressing serious human rights issues in countries across the globe. This includes:
- LGBT rights: Engaging with certain countries to ensure that they sign on to U.N. conventions that will prohibit and prevent violating the rights of their LGBT citizens
- Human trafficking: Requiring signatories to address forced labor and take specific actions to prevent trafficking, protect victims, and prosecute and convict traffickers.
- Forced labor: The TPP puts in place, for the first time, enforceable protections against forced and child labor that our trading partners will have to comply with in order to trade with us.
WORTH A READ: Eight U.S. Ambassadors who are among the nation’s most powerful LGBT leaders explain how the TPP will export our values of equality and tolerance.
What’s At Stake If We Don’t Trade
Right now, there are 525 million middle class consumers in Asia alone. By 2030, there are expected to be 3.2 billion middle class consumers there, more than 8 times the size of what the U.S. market is expected to be then.
Whose goods and services are these consumers going to buy? Who will have access to their markets? And who will set the international standards that define how the world does trade?
If it’s not America, it’s going to be competitors like China. That can’t be better for our workers, our businesses and our values. We're in a race to secure a trade deal for the fastest growing markets in the world. And right now, this is the choice before us:
IF AMERICA LEADS:
- Reduced or eliminated tariffs for American goods
- Streamlined and simple customs rules for American businesses
- Countries are required to put in place the most progressive labor standards, including a minimum wage, a ban on child labor, the right to form unions
- Countries are required to put in place the most progressive environmental standards ever, including a ban on wildlife trafficking, illegal logging, and overfishing
- A free and open Internet that will allow people to openly search and buy American goods
- New rules to make sure foreign state-owned companies compete fairly with our private businesses
IF WE SIT ON THE SIDELINES:
- High tariffs that let our competitors’ goods in and block Made-in-America goods out
- Complicated customs rules that prevent small and online businesses from selling abroad
-
No enforceable protections for millions of workers: No minimum wage, no prohibition against child labor, no right to form unions
- No enforceable protections for our environment: Wildlife trafficking, illegal logging, overfishing
- A quick rise in “data nationalism” in which governments regulate the Internet
This is a race to make a difference in how the world does business. It’s time to put in place the most progressive trade agreement in history: one that does right by American workers and by America’s middle class.
Are you an Ambassador for the most progressive trade deal in history?
Share your thoughts here and join President Obama in rewriting the rules of trade to ensure America comes out on top. Because when Americans play on a level playing field, we win every time.