Examination of Nafta
In May 2003, the Congressional Budget Office attempted a full scale examination of NAFTA's economic consequences to date, taking care to note the challenges inherent in any effort to assign direct causation to one specific trade agreement. The report came to three main conclusions:
U.S. trade with Mexico was growing before NAFTA's implementation, and would likely have continued to grow with or without the deal on a scale that "dwarfs the effects" of NAFTA itself;
The direct effect of NAFTA on U.S.-Mexico trade is fairly small, and thus the direct impact on the U.S. labor market is also small; and
Overall, the NAFTA deal has expanded U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) "very slightly," and has had a similar effect -- both positive and small -- on the Canadian and Mexican economies.
