Costa Rica and CAFTA: Three years on

Mateo Arroyo Cortes

17/03/2011

Opinión

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Seven years ago today, negotiations for the CAFTA agreement between Central America and the United States of America were officially launched, and yet Costa Rica is headed for disaster.

Exports have decreased while unemployment has risen to almost 8%. Factories are closing down or cutting back on production and statistics show that 25% of Costa Ricans are living in poverty.

Nearly 90,000 children between the ages of 13 and 17 that should be in classrooms preparing for their future are not there; instead they are either working to help their parents make ends meet or out roaming the streets.

Hundreds of thousands of families do not even have their own home and are faced with the difficult choice of whether to buy food or pay rent.

The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates that 50% of the nation’s workers are not even being paid minimum wage. This means that almost 600,000 workers are earning less than $300 (CRC 156,000) a month.

Vital infrastructure has collapsed. National and international construction companies continue to make a mint on public contracts. The consequences are apparent to all.

The claim was that selling state-owned companies would reduce the public deficit, and yet, not even half the budget presented to Congress was allocated to economic measures. This is not because there is no financing available, but because so many companies that import and export products are evading taxes – despite their numerous privileges.

To make up for this, politicians and business owners are suggesting that the people bear the burden of more taxes, accept lower wages and tighten their belts. They are not ready to stop filling their pockets as they have been over the past 20 years.

Only time will tell what is to come. After 30 years of neoliberalism and 3 years of CAFTA, things just keep getting worse with each new day. More misery, more poverty, more unemployment, more budget deficits, and surrendering even more to the multinationals.

Neoliberalists, whatever happened to the miracles that CAFTA was supposed to bring? (Translated from the Spanish by Leslee Knickerbocker)

- Mateo Arroyo Cortes is a legal consultant

2010-10-08

https://www.alainet.org/es/node/148401