IF ONLY WE STILL HAD A REPUBLICAN PRESIDENT:

The TPP is a free trade agreement negotiated by the Obama administration that would have allowed the United States to participate in a free-trade zone with several countries, including Canada, Japan, Mexico, and several others. TPP had critics on both sides of the aisle, but it offered an extended free-trade zone and was part of an Obama administration effort to counter Chinese economic influence.

As it stands, the TPP features 11 countries that make up nearly 13.5 percent of the global GDP. That figure would have been 38 percent with the inclusion of the United States. The Wall Street Journal editorial board recently described the U.S. withdrawal from the TPP as the greatest "own goal" in recent economic history.

American manufacturers, exporters, and farmers all stood to gain from access to the TPP trade zone. With America on the outside looking in, US producers will be missing out on those opportunities. The Peterson Institute for International Economics has estimated that: "U.S. real income under the original TPP would have increased by $131 billion annually, or 0.5 percent of GDP."

Other countries, like Canada, are actively taking advantage of this opportunity. Jim Carr, Canada's Minister of International Trade Diversification, is busily promoting the concept of "diversification" of Canadian trade away from reliance on trade with the United States. For instance, Carr has recently been in Japan (a party to the TPP) promoting Canadian goods and services, and specifically Canadian beef.

Pulling out of TPP has put U.S. producers at a competitive disadvantage compared to Canada and other parties to the trade pact.

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