The US-Mexico-Canada Agreement takes effect Wednesday, fulfilling President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign pledge to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement — which he’s often referred to as “the worst trade deal ever made.”
The new agreement was signed by Trump and his Mexican and Canadian counterparts in 2018 and approved by Congress earlier this year after Democrats added stronger labor rules.
It was touted by the President as a major political win ahead of his reelection campaign but has since been overshadowed by the coronavirus pandemic and other crises.
Much of USMCA simply updates the 25-year-old agreement it’s replacing. It’s expected to create 176,000 jobs after six years and increase US GDP by 0.35%, according to a report released last year — long before the pandemic — by the US International Trade Commission, a federal government agency. By comparison, the United States added more than 152,000 jobs in January 2020 alone.
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