You've heard it all before. Procter & Gamble cut 5,700 jobs last year in a global effort to lower labor costs. The Cincinnati-based firm gets 60 percent of its profits from the U.S. But just 28 percent of its workers are in the U.S. As the Columbia Journalism Review puts it,
Good old Midwestern, middle-class Procter & Gamble employs 72 percent of its 127,000 workers outside the country.You can guess the rest: CEO Robert McDonald took home $15.2 million in pay last year.
And today Procter & Gamble is hosting ambassadors from Pacific Rim countries in Cincinnati. They're all pushing for the TPP to make international trade "less expensive." We know that code.
James Ritchie at the Business Courier reports:
Ambassadors from Malaysia, Vietnam and New Zealand made a trip to Cincinnati to push for a free trade agreement they say would benefit large and small businesses alike, the Cincinnati Business Courier reports.
The ambassadors spoke at an event presented by the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber and Procter & Gamble Co. (NYSE:PG) in downtown Cincinnati. Carolyn Brehm, vice president for global relations at P&G, said the company supports the agreement as a way to make international trade easier and less expensive.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership is being negotiated between 11 Asia-Pacific countries and the U.S. and covers areas such as tariff reductions, rules of origin and e-commerce.Procter & Gamble will no doubt launch its fleet of lobbyists in Washington, D.C., to make sure the trade pact gets approved. previously held government jobs.
Twenty of its 30 lobbyists
That suggests -- strongly -- to us that Congress should vet every single word of the TPP to eliminate every special deal inserted in the fine print by corporate lobbyists. Because you know that fine print isn't good for the rest of us.
