The HVAC company, Carrier that has been a subsidiary of the larger United Technologies conglomerate since 1979, has announced that it is going to close two facilities in Indiana and shift their production to a new plant in Mexico. The move had been telegraphed well in advance as part of the company’s obligations to its workforce.  

The plants had not been closed because the Carrier was losing money hand over fist or  the products they made were obsolete. It was a cold-hearted medium-term economic planning which might have been cheaper to re-establish it in Mexico.

The Carrier plant closures had became a signature talking point for Donald Trump, On the campaign trail. He argued that it was a concrete example of the overwhelming harm done to American interests by the vague trade deals. And according to Dean Baker, a liberal economist writes, it is roughly correct that facilitating the relocation of industrial activity from the US to Mexico was one of the goals of the NAFTA deal.

Trump, along with the Vice President-elect Mike Pence, convinced Carrier to stay in Indiana. It had been a huge PR coup for Trump and had set the stage for a triumphant public event in Indiana on Thursday.

Research showed that the huge influx of imports from China which followed the establishment of permanent normal trade relations with China in 1999, had reshaped the American economy. Most Americans have benefited at least a little from cheaper goods.

A new study by David Autor showed that many specific communities had been devastated, and those communities have experienced an increasing tendency to vote for ideologically extreme congressional candidates and thus ultimately, Donald Trump. Those communities had been located primarily in the Midwest, which is a politically crucial region that, gave Trump the White House even as he got nearly 2.5 million fewer overall votes than Hillary Clinton.

Also Read: US Ethics Office Tweeted Sarcasm At the President-elect!

By Prakriti Neogi