WORLDWIDE TRADE UNION SOLIDARITY NEEDED WITH VICTIMS OF COLOMBIAN EARTHQUAKE
Cuba
Show your solidarity with the Cuban people: firmoporcuba.com
June 21, 2026
Solidarity is the tenderness of the peoples. Support the Cuban revolution and end the blockade.
Workers Without Borders
Gig Drivers and Delivery Teams Fight for Fair Pay
July 2, 2026
Global gig economy workers unite across continents to demand transparency and living wages from tech giants.
Venezuela
Two large earthquakes have struck Venezuela
June 2026
Portugal
Union and precarious workers blocked a law that tried to take away your job security.
June 21, 2026
By walking off the job and standing together in the streets, you showed the bosses that the power is in the hands of the workers.
DPR Korea
Standing with the workers of DPRK
Pyongyang, June 25, 2026
Workers and union members across the country remember his dedication to making sure the working class had a voice in their future.
France
CGT Congress Builds Union Power
Tours, 2026
The CGT congress gathers delegates from across France to define strategies against neoliberal reforms and enhance worker resilience.
USMCA and Domestic Labor Policy
Willebaldo Gómez Zuppa holds a Doctorate in Labor Studies from the Autonomous Metropolitan University (UAM) Iztapalapa, where he was awarded the University Merit Medal. His research interests include productive restructuring, trade unionism, economic development, labor relations and corporate strategies within the automotive industry. He’s a professor at the UNAM Faculty of Economics and also a professor-researcher at the Autonomous Metropolitan University (UAM)-Xochimilco.
During the USMCA’s 2026 mandatory review, President Trump rejected Mexico’s request for a 16-year extension. How will Trump’s decision affect Mexico’s economy?
Levels of foreign investment correlate with economic stability and growth. Given that annual “reviews” would replace a real commitment to a stable trade agreement beyond 2030, US investors will be reluctant to establish production in Mexico. Million-dollar, or even billion-dollar, investments require long-term certainty; thus, US corporate investments will not grow as expected.
Though the current investment by US companies will remain steady, the lack of growth will lower employment levels and increase the threat of plants moving out of Mexico, reducing workers’ bargaining power and putting their rights at risk.
What are Mexico’s primary objectives, and have bilateral negotiations met any of them, as Mexican officials have claimed?
Mexico’s goal was to establish an institutional framework more robust than the one defined by the USMCA. In a document published last year, Secretary of Economy Marcelo Ebrard noted that Mexico’s primary aim was to maintain its own export sector’s preferential access to the US market.
This requires aligning with Washington’s economic security needs — specifically, to protect the US from competition by Chinese companies. Mexico is already complying. For example, in Querétaro, Mexico failed to approve a Chinese company’s winning bid to build a railway line and has stepped up security measures in two ports — Lázaro Cárdenas and Manzanillo — which handle the bulk of trade with China. And, since 2023, the Chinese automaker BYD, which sells some of the most popular vehicles in Mexico, has been trying to build a plant, but the Mexican government has been stalling the project to avoid conflict with the Trump administration.
Even so, the United States is not cooperating with the goal of strengthening the regional bloc — Trump even threatened to impose additional tariffs right in the middle of negotiations! — yet Ebrard and Sheinbaum have described the talks as a “success.” The reason? They want to calm the nerves of both the general public and the business community.
Has “nearshoring” — companies moving production to Mexico to minimize transport costs and delivery times to the US market — reduced the need for a USMCA that makes Mexico attractive to investors?
Despite a slight uptick in production relocations, it was nowhere near the extent projected over the last decade, and the benefits Mexico anticipated haven’t materialized. The US protectionist stance has created too much uncertainty.
We’ve often heard that US companies relocate to Mexico due to lower wages. Is that Mexico’s competitive advantage?
Low labor costs are definitely an attraction, but they are not the only reason to stay with Mexican workers. A key consideration is the experience and skills they have acquired producing complex components — in engine manufacturing, for example. Those specific kinds of expertise could not be quickly reproduced elsewhere. México also has industrial clusters that create an interconnected supply chain within a compact geographic area — more compact than available in the US. México also offers a lower tax burden by giving payroll tax rebates to companies.
Another key factor is the availability and cost of natural resources. Mexico’s abundant land costs a fraction of US land costs. The price per square meter for an industrial park in the Bajío region is two cents — in the US, it hovers around 28 dollars! Mexico doesn’t have strict regulations regarding well drilling, and the easy access to water is crucial for manufacturing.
Surprisingly, resistance to companies taking control of land and water resources has been minimal. Clearly, communities desire access to new jobs. Of course, repression has also played a role, as has the practice of buying community goodwill — for instance, by building a new road. Although Mexican legislation requires environmental impact assessment studies, court rulings in environmental lawsuits have almost invariably favored companies.
Workers at the Tornel tire company have just won a prolonged strike. Why is their success particularly significant?
Worker at Tornel Tire plant, 2026. Photo courtesy of Mexico Solidarity Media
It’s significant because it validates the “industry-wide contract” (contrato ley), which regulates wages, benefits and working conditions for an entire industry. These contracts were created in 2000; they now cover only two sectors: sugar and rubber. When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, a special agreement to prevent corporate losses suspended the industry-wide contract because of the health emergency. But when the emergency ended, tire manufacturers — including Michelin, Pirelli, and Tornel itself —continued to disregard the contrato ley.
The tire manufacturing owners evaded compliance by claiming that tire manufacturing belongs to the automotive sector rather than the rubber sector. The CTM union—known for its corporatist control practices, or “charro” unionism — acquiesced to this sleight of hand.
However, Tornel workers are not represented by the CTM but by the FAT (Authentic Workers’ Front). They struck for 140 days and won! It legally restored the tire industry to the rubber sector. And their triumph vindicates a legal framework — the contrato ley — that covers the industry, serving as an argument that sectoral contracts are superior to factory-by-factory agreements because they raise an entire group of workers’ living standards.
Will Tornel’s victory affect Mexico’s trade with the United States?
The Secretariat of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS), the labor courts, and the Federal Center for Conciliation and Labor Registration allowed the labor dispute to play out — ultimately resolving in the workers’ favor, which demonstrates that the regulatory mechanisms of the 2019 labor reform are working.
The Tornel case allows Mexican negotiators to argue that the 2019 labor law brings Mexican workers’ wages and working conditions closer to those in the US — reducing the incentive for companies to move to Mexico.
We tend to view trade policies and labor policies as separate spheres, yet you maintain that they are interconnected.
US, Canadian and Mexican companies have based their planning on the competitive differences inherent to each country and seek to capitalize on them. Mexico’s competitive advantage has been its lack of labor rights and environmental protections — in other words, corporate profitability has relied on violating those rights. Currently, companies make the ultimate decisions, while governments facilitate corporate pursuit of profit maximization through their trade and investment policies.
I believe that labor standards favorable to workers must be established alongside the assurance of corporate profitability. If we can raise these standards through our domestic labor policies and international trade agreements, competition will no longer be based on what country companies can commit the worst human rights violations.
For that, we must transform the power dynamic between the government and the business sector. The Mexican government should lead with better industrial and labor policies and steer companies in that same direction.