The familiar yellow cartons of Mayfield ice cream chilling in your local supermarket get there because of delivery drivers like Tim Stone.
But Stone fears his job might be in jeopardy under the international trade deal signed in Atlanta on Monday. He worries companies like Mayfield might take a hit if the market is flooded by cheaper dairy products from overseas. Manufacturing jobs might be in danger, too, he said.
“My concern is it’s going to take good paying jobs from Georgia and ship them overseas like the auto industry,” he said.
Stone is a small cog in the wheels of global commerce, just like Alan Wolkin, whose family-owned baby mattress company could stand to benefit from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a pact between U.S. and 11 other Pacific Rim countries.
It’s a mammoth trade agreement that links up countries representing 40 percent of the world’s economic output. But for people like Stone and Wolkin, it’s about their livelihoods.
Wolkin has his concerns, too, but he said: “I like it if it will help grow our business.”
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution talked to workers, business owners and others and found debate about the blockbuster agreement is flaring across Georgia. Read more about it in the Sunday print edition of the AJC or online at www.MyAJC.com.
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