Mechanisms
Chapter 52 provides a procedure for the interstate resolution of disputes over the application and interpretation of NAFTA. It was modeled after Chapter 69 of the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement.
NAFTA's effects, both positive and negative, have been quantified by several economists, whose findings have been reported in publications such as the World Bank's Lessons from NAFTA for Latin America and the Caribbean, NAFTA's Impact on North America, and NAFTA Revisited by the Institute for International Economics. Some argue that NAFTA has been positive for Mexico, which has seen its poverty rates fall and real income rise (in the form of lower prices, especially food), even after accounting for the 1994–95 economic crisis. Others argue that NAFTA has been beneficial to business owners and elites in all three countries, but has had negative impacts on farmers in Mexico who saw food prices fall based on cheap imports from US agribusiness, and negative impacts on US workers in manufacturing and assembly industries who lost jobs. Critics also argue that NAFTA has contributed to the rising levels of inequality in both the US and Mexico. Some economists believe that NAFTA has not been enough (or worked fast enough) to produce an economic convergence, nor to substantially reduce poverty rates. Some have suggested that in order to fully benefit from the agreement, Mexico must invest more in education and promote innovation in infrastructure and agriculture.
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