The thought of zillions of dollars disappearing into U.S. pockets drives federal and provincial finance ministers and corporate bean-counters to the edge of apoplexy. That is when the hard negotiating begins. A table is set up in a room somewhere in Washington, with a seat on each side for U.S. and Canadian chief negotiators. They offer conflicting advice to the negotiators until, eventually, someone comes up with a solution both sides can live with. At the eleventh hour, just before an exorbitant tariff is about to come into effect, a deal is struck.
All participants return to their home turf, announcing victory.
Within three or four years the new arrangement has generated a whole new host of inequities, is cancelled, and the ritual is repeated. It will continue until the underlying conditions which create it are changed. Today, however, it exacts a price. And the Europeans have captured 20 per cent of the Japanese market. Perhaps the most ludicrous aspect of the whole thing is that neither side of the dispute has any claim to the virtue of competitive free enterprise they both so loudly trumpet.