The United States-Mexico-Canada
Agreement (USMCA) varies markedly from its predecessor, NAFTA, in its
investment, environment, and labor chapters and its treatment of automotive
rules of origin, financial services, digital trade, and intellectual property. Some
highly controversial revisions include imposing unprecedented wage hour and
rule of origin requirements in the automotive sector; establishing new,
U.S.-exclusive tariff rate quotas to penetrate Canada’s dairy market; reducing
dramatically the scope of investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS); and taking
aim at China in allowing the termination of USMCA should any state party enter
into an Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with a “non-market country.” This panel will analyze these changes to
consider what impact on trade, investment, regulation, and foreign relations
they may have both within and beyond North America. In that process, the panel
will compare USMCA to other recent FTAs, including CETA, CPTPP, and what would
have been TPP.