LB, thanks for the great news. Here is china vote:
quote.bloomberg.com
Bloomberg News
Wed, 24 May 2000, 10:56pm EDT
U.S. House Passes China Bill in Victory for Clinton (Update4)
By Heidi Przybyla
Washington, May 24 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. House passed legislation guaranteeing China access to the U.S. market, rejecting a lobbying blitz by organized labor and handing President Bill Clinton his biggest victory on trade in six years.
The bill granting China ``permanent normal trade relations'' was passed on a vote of 237-197, with 73 Democrats joining 164 Republicans in support of the bill. The legislation will be taken up next in the Senate, where passage is likely.
``We should not isolate China nor should we in the United States isolate ourselves from pressing China in the right direction,'' said Michigan Democrat Sander Levin, who led the effort to win Democratic support of the measure.
Clinton and scores of U.S. companies lobbied for months to win support from members of Congress, while labor unions, human rights advocates and environmental groups waged a furious campaign against the legislation. That forced many House Democrats to choose between alienating traditional constituents and crossing business supporters before the November elections.
Enough of them chose to back Clinton and vote for the legislation that will end the politically charged process of annually reviewing China's trade status and endorse Beijing's membership in the World Trade Organization.
In exchange, China will grant market concessions that will benefit U.S. companies such as Motorola Inc., Worldcom Inc., Citigroup Inc., and Cargill Inc.
New Relationship
``We have seen Airbus make inroads (in China) because of the political tension between the U.S. and China,'' Boeing Co. spokesman Tim Neale said, referring to the European-owned airline that competes with Seattle-based Boeing.
Boeing's share of jet sales to China has dropped from more than 80 percent to 66 percent in the past two years as China purchased more jets from Airbus Industrie, Neale said.
Boeing expects China to purchase $120 billion in jets during the next 20 years, making it the second largest market after the U.S. Having a normal trading relationship with China should poise Boeing to capture more of those purchases, said Neale.
China also agreed to let Boeing and other U.S. companies import and export without using Chinese middlemen, a requirement that in the past has made it difficult for companies to distribute goods there.
Supporters say the China legislation will help the U.S. whittle away at the trade imbalance because China will lower its tariffs on U.S. exports from an average 25 percent to about 9 percent by 2005 as part of the November U.S.-China agreement on the terms of China's WTO entry.
Insurance, Banking
The most significant dividends could go to service providers like Citigroup Inc., which have long complained they are unable to enter the Chinese market.
China committed to open its insurance, banking, telecommunications, travel and tourism, and other markets to U.S. companies once the measure becomes law and China enters the WTO.
``For the first time, non-Chinese banks are going to be able to do every kind of promotional and corporate banking activity in China,'' said Michael Andrews, Citigroup vice president of international business affairs.
More service business with China will help the U.S. trade deficit with China, said Sandy Kristoff, New York Life Insurance vice president of international government affairs.
``Services is what has kept this economy growing,'' she said. ``It is the U.S. services industry that has contributed the most to holding the U.S. trade deficit numbers,'' she said.
China agreed to allow 49 percent foreign ownership in mobile telecommunications and to open wider its group life, health and pension insurance market to U.S. companies within three years after it becomes a WTO member.
More Than Business
Throughout the six months of lobbying, though, Clinton argued that the vote's impact transcended business. He said China's WTO membership would tie it to a rules-based international system, and that U.S. computers and cell phones would be the tools for building a democracy in the world's largest communist stronghold.
Yesterday, he cited support for China's membership in the WTO from the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, Martin Lee, the head of Hong Kong's democracy movement, and Chen Shui-bian, Taiwan's new president.
Clinton praised the House action in a televised address minutes after the vote. ``This is a good day for America, and 10 years from now, we will look back on this and be glad we did it,'' he said.
Labor leaders and their legislative allies charged that the legislation strips the U.S. of any meaningful leverage to improve Chinese practices, including recent crackdowns on the Falun Gong spiritual group and the imprisonment of democracy advocates.
House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt called the annual congressional reviews ``real pressure'' that will bring change to China, adding, ``If we don't lead, who will?''
Opponents also warn that U.S. manufacturers are planning to shift factories to China to cash in on low-wage labor and export the goods back to this country.
``We're going to lose a massive amount of jobs here,'' said Teamsters union President James Hoffa said. ``This is the green light (U.S. companies) are waiting for.''
U.S. imports from China rose to a record $81.8 billion in 1999, a 15 percent increase from 1998, while U.S. exports to China fell 7.9 percent to $13.1 billion in the same period.
Union Threat
Unions threatened to withhold support in the November elections from Democrats who voted for the bill. The vote will encourage union members to ``sit and do nothing as they did in 1994,'' after the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement, Richard Trumka, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO trade federation, said Sunday.
The threat may prove futile, however, because labor has no real alternative. ``It probably won't have a huge impact'' on Democratic efforts to retake control of the House, said Vic Kamber, a political consultant to organized labor. Union members may be angry, but they are unlikely to back a Republican candidate who is less likely to support their agenda in the next Congress, he said.
Congress approved Nafta in 1993, then approved U.S. membership in the World Trade Organization in 1994, Clinton's last big trade victory.
Human Rights
Opponents of the bill, led by House Minority Whip David Bonior, say Congress voted to endorse the policies of a ``brutal authoritarian police state,'' putting profits ahead of morals.
The current annual review system, which for the past two decades has carried the threat of cutting off Chinese trading rights, is the only way to promote change in China, they say.
``This is the only lever we have,'' said Hoffa.
Bonior pledged to keep fighting for human and labor rights in future trade agreements. ``We are not going to go away,'' he told reporters in a press conference after the vote. ``These problems are not going to go away.''
Concerns over China's human rights practices were so great that supporters like Levin -- who comes from a district with a heavy concentration of autoworkers -- risked labor's wrath by devising side legislation to win more Democratic votes.
The AFL-CIO denounced Levin's measure -- which maintains an annual review of China's human rights practices without the threat of severing trade ties -- as ``toothless.''
Still, the White House says the current system isn't working, as evidenced by a recent State Department report showing human rights abuses in China are worsening.
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Best Regards, J.T. |
