alt Hacker Newsim canadian but this feels performative
yes i get it, stick it to the USA. yay patriotism. suddenly thats cool and not problematic for some reason.
and im also all for less restrictive coordination between nations. it's all performative in the end.
but like, this feels basically like "stick it to trump" and not anything meaningful.
I agree and at the same time I'm all for it.
Almost a decade on and most Canadians don't seem to realize we already have CETA (free trade) with the EU. It's not fully fully ratified but it's there. It's why our grocery stores have been slowly filling with European products we never had before (Yay!)
For example: It's already cheaper for me -- as a consumer -- to import sporting goods (skis, etc) from the EU than it is from the US. (And often less shipping hassle too, oddly).
And yet distributor arrangements often still funnel everything through the US, first as "North American distributor" models. Incurring shipping and sometimes even tariff overhead. (Looking at you Scarpa, North America. You suck.)
Even if all of this is symbolic, it may at least shift perceptions on our side of the Atlantic so Canadian businesses at least start looking to Europe more seriously as both importers and exporters.
People often forget our country was built on an east west shipping and transport axis with the St Lawrence (and later the Pacific) as outflow, to supply Europe (mainly Britain). It was only later that north-south trade became more important economically.
Shipping manufactured goods across the Atlantic to European customers may end up cheaper for them than shipping from China in some circumstances.
I'm maybe also a bit biased, I currently work for a European employer.