Poll: Nearly Half of Americans Think NAFTA has been an Economic Boon

This article originally appeared in World Trade Online

Nearly half of all Americans think NAFTA has contributed to economic growth over the last 20 years, according to a new poll that shows a broad swath of the public is not aligned with the president on the deal.

Livingston International, a consulting firm that “focuses on customs brokerage and trade compliance,” commissioned the survey from Harris Poll. It found that 45 percent of 2,264 respondents “view NAFTA as contributing to economic growth in the U.S. over the past 20 years,” while almost as many said they think the deal “has contributed to the growth of America’s knowledge economy (e.g., professional services, engineering, IT, etc.).”

Among other notable results:

Close to one in five Americans (17 percent) believes the U.S. should neither renegotiate nor withdraw from NAFTA because it is already an effective agreement or because doing so will harm key industries