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Panelists Larry Fahn, Carla Garcia-Zendejas, California state Senator Liz Figueroa, and Mark Weisbrot
Photo by Annette Souder

by John Byrne Barry
Visionary Solutions Session
Alternative Visions: Global Fair Trade—California state Senator Liz Figueroa; Mark Weisbrot, Center for Economic Policy and Research; Carla Garcia-Zendejas, Mexican environmental attorney; Larry Fahn, Sierra Club (moderator)

One of the prevailing myths that has huge consequences for the environment, especially global warming, is that the U.S. economic model is superior to Europe’s, that the Europeans are trying to hold onto a way of life that is impossible in a global economy.

Unfortunately, says economist Mark Weisbrot from the Center for Economic Policy and Research (CEPR), one of the panelists on Sunday’s session on alternative visions to global fair trade, the vast majority of policy-makers and international press share this ideology and believe that Europe has to be more like the United States.

But they’re wrong, he says.

Proponents of U.S. superiority cite that Europe’s income per person is lower than in the United States. True. In France, for example, it is about 30 percent less.  

But they work far fewer hours, and in fact their productivity is higher than ours.

“If the French worked as many hours as we did,” he says, “they would actually have more income than Americans. But they have chosen to take their productivity gains in the form of shorter hours, longer vacations, and more leisure time.”

In contrast, in the American-style economy, people work more hours at lower wages so they can buy more stuff. (This despite poll after poll that shows Americans would prefer to have shorter hours and more time to spend with their families.)

Europe consumes half of the energy that the United States does, but if it were to adopt the U.S. model energy consumption and accompanying global warming emissions would rise.

This is significant not just for Europe, but for developing nations like Taiwan and South Korea that have pretty much the same standard of living as Europe--as well as for growing economic powers like China. The U.S. model means more stuff, more energy consumption, more cars, more global warming.

The fight to slow and stop global warming depends a great deal on whether these countries seek to emulate European consumption patterns or those of the United States.

(I vastly oversimplified Weisbrot’s argument – you can read a more nuanced and complete explanation at sierraclub.org/planet/200506/weisbrot.pdf or http://cepr.net/.) 

Weisbrot was joined on the panel, moderated by former Sierra Club President Larry Fahn, by Carla Garcia-Zendejas, an environmental attorney from Tijuana, Mexico, and California state Senator Liz Figueroa, author of SB 348, which would prohibit a state official, including the governor, from binding the state to an international trade agreement unless explicitly authorized.

-- 09/11/2005 Sun
11am