Shorter Dean Baker: If we pass the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, U.S. GDP will rise to $24 trillion in January 2027. If it doesn’t pass, we won’t reach that level until…..
March 2027.
And that’s the most optimistic possible scenario. In the less optimistic scenario, passing TTIP only gains us a single month of GDP by 2027.
TTIP may well be worth doing anyway. It depends on what the final deal looks like, and just how badly IP law gets even further screwed up by it. Still, it’s worth seeing the benefits displayed this way, instead of in raw numbers, because it gives you a sense of just how small the economic gains are. There might well be some benefits to harmonizing business regulations, but that’s mostly what this is about. Trade between the United States and Europe is already pretty wide open, so the actual trade benefits of TTIP are modest.