MAKE IT AN EXCLUSIVE CLUB AND THEY'LL ALL WANT IN:

Trans-Atlantic Free Trade?: With the Doha Round of trade talks threatening to come to naught, German Chancellor Angela Merkel has come up with a plan B: a free-trade zone with the US. Such a zone would encompass 60 percent of the global economy. (Der Spiegel, 10/02/06)

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, though, has a backup plan. Should the Doha talks ultimately prove untenable, [German Chancellor Angela Merkel] is open to the idea of forming a trans-Atlantic free-trade zone between the European Union and the United States.

"I find the idea fascinating," Merkel told the EU committee in Germany's parliament, the Bundestag, last week. Such an economic alliance, which would include 60 percent of the gross world product, would be a "packaging of common interests."

Despite Merkel's apparent enthusiasm for the idea, however, she is keeping it largely under wraps for the moment. Not only is she wary of irking India and China, both quickly joining the world's economic heavyweights, but she also wants to give the Doha talks a final chance to come up with an agreement. The trans-Atlantic free-trade zone shouldn't "stand in competition" to the Doha Round. "If the WTO continues, then ok," she said.

If you grafted Britain, Germany, India, Japan, Brazil and Australia onto NAFTA what would the rest of the world matter? Actually, what choice would they have but to join too?

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 2, 2006 12:16 PM