What's driving it, you mean, if in fact the business and agriculture communities are not expressing serious concerns about the NAFTA?
As I've mentioned, there is a case for modernization of the agreement in a number of areas, and that's sincere and substantial. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce shared in the formal process of the Government of Canada soliciting input. We shared a document that outlines a number of points on that, but beyond that, President Trump was successful as a candidate and won the election by speaking to concerns, particularly across the U.S. Midwestern states, that appear to relate to social and economic change in that region.
To some degree, the concern was about immigration, and to some degree it was about manufacturing job losses, and NAFTA was blamed. It's a tale as old as time that the benefits of trade are spread diffusely and the costs are borne narrowly. That has been true with trade, and also true to the degree there has been manufacturing job loss in the United States, but U.S. manufacturing employment peaked in 1979. It has been on a downward trend since then, even though U.S. manufacturing output has doubled and even tripled since 1979. U.S. manufacturers are just more efficient than ever. They make more and more stuff with fewer and fewer workers.
I think we live in a time when candidates can tap into those legitimate concerns. I think what we in the business community need to do is find a way to channel those concerns into ways that will deliver real and practical solutions, such as apprenticeships and helping people get on a highway that's going to take them through the appropriate kind of schooling into real jobs in the private sector.