Neg - Mexico Totalization Agreement - Michigan 7 2023 BFHGR

Case Neg --- Mexico Totalization
Info
We tried to stay away from some of the neg articles because some of the best are from the CIS --- a controversial anti-immigrant think tank. There are a few cards in this file from that site, but they are all labeled and I don’t think it is wise to read them unless you want to defend the CIS.
There are some really good ideas for arguments in this file that needs some extra work to be viable during the season. You should also go through the other Social Security aff and neg files to construct the Trust Fund da. We have included links and a uniqueness cp in this file, but you will need to pull impacts from the other files and combine the to create a viable DA.
Case Answers
Solvency
1NC --- Plan Fails --- Compatibility
SSA Review Process Background Info.
Not really card just an explanation of how the SSA works when negotiating with Mexico, rest of this article is like current process :/
GAO ’05 [Government Accountability Office; February 2005; “A More Formal Approach Could Enhance SSA’s Ability to Develop and Manage Totalization Agreements”; https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GAOREPORTS-GAO-05-250/html/GAOREPORTS-GAO-05-250.htm \\pairie]
SSA's policies and procedures for assessing the accuracy and reliability of important information from foreign countries-such as birth and death data-when entering into totalization agreements remain generally informal, but recent initiatives for improvement seem promising. Historically, SSA has conducted only limited reviews, focusing primarily on broad policy issues and systems compatibility, rather than the integrity and reliability of earnings data and evidentiary documents. For example, during preliminary negotiations with Mexico, SSA conducted a limited review of that country's social security system but did not assess the reliability of that country's data. SSA has also developed several initiatives to identify risks associated with totalization agreements. These include: developing a standardized questionnaire for assessing the reliability of foreign earnings data, soliciting input from other government agencies, and using a matrix to compare potential agreement countries. SSA is also conducting "vulnerability assessments" to detect potential problems with foreign countries' documents. All of these tools are positive steps to help SSA assess potential risks posed by unreliable foreign data. However, SSA has not integrated these initiatives into formal procedures. Given the upcoming retirement of key management officials, SSA may lose critical institutional knowledge, which may limit the agency's ability to assess risks associated with future agreements.
1NC --- Plan Fails --- Structure
Implementation will be ineffective --- no organized structure or implementation and retirements gut effectiveness
Nuschler ‘10
(Dawn Nuschler, Specialist in Income Security, Congressional Research Service, “International Social Security Agreements,” pg online @ https://www.everycrsreport.com/files/20100111_R41009_f1dc12843e82d3913aa00854a71db03a76c1ee57.html#_Toc251315428 //um-ef)
Despite these initiatives, GAO cautioned in 2005:
While these tools appear to be a positive first step for helping SSA identify potential risks associated with future totalization agreements, SSA has only recently begun implementing them and has not developed plans to integrate these initiatives into formal procedures. The lack of a formal protocol, coupled with the expected retirement of key management and staff over the next few years, may result in the loss of important institutional knowledge relating to totalization agreements, which may hinder the agency's ability to effectively assess risks associated with future agreements.127
1NC --- Plan Fails --- Workers Excluded
Plan doesn’t help workers --- they’ll still be excluded and doesn’t solve poverty
Stevenson ’14 [Ariel; 2014; “Note: Improving the U.S Guest Worker System Through Tax and Social Welfare Reform”; Yale Law School J.D 2014, London of School of Economics, M. Sc. 2008; 17 Harv. Latino L. Rev. 147* \\pairie]
[*164] However, simply expanding the reach of Totalization Agreements would not resolve this established practice of exclusion for a number of reasons. For one, undocumented workers would continue to be denied benefits, their significant contributions to the system notwithstanding. 84 Additionally, certain categories of legal temporary workers would continue to be barred from receiving Social Security benefits, for example those belonging to exempt visa categories, 85 and those from countries ineligible to receive Social Security benefits. 86
This deliberate exclusion is a profitable policy for the federal government. Temporary workers who pay Social Security taxes and then cannot withdraw benefits provide an annual buffer of several billion dollars to the beleaguered benefit program. 87 Although perhaps it is understandable that the U.S. is not jumping to extend benefits to these uncovered workers, this policy of denial contributes to the enduring cycle of poverty and deprivation that draws these workers to the U.S. in the first place. Not only does this lack of support create disincentives for return migration, it also infringes on migrants' right to social welfare protection, and denies migrants equal treatment under the law. 88 These incentive and rights-based concerns are discussed in detail in the following section.
1NC --- Plan Fails --- SSA overstretch
SSA’s sluggish response causes inevitable delays
Lisa Rein 22 — (Lisa Rein covers federal agencies and the management of government in the Biden administration at the Washingtonpost; ; Published: 10-7-2022; "Pandemic struggles still afflict Social Security, a last lifeline for many"; Washington Post; Accessed: 7-10-2023; https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/10/07/social-security-pandemic-failures/)//Pen-SY
Six months after reopening its field offices to the public, the Social Security Administration is struggling to restore basic customer services and is assisting millions fewer of the poor, elderly and disabled people who sought its help before the coronavirus pandemic, federal data shows. Even as prolonged office closures caused applications for disability benefits to plunge, the sluggish response now of the agency meant to assist the country’s most at-risk citizens has led to delays in processing claims for those who manage to file them, and exhausting waits outside government offices around the country for those trying to. Nearly 20 percent of field offices have had 40 or more customers in line on multiple days when the doors opened, according to data Social Security recently provided to Congress. The long queues have raised tempers and safety concerns. One person fainted in line outside the office in Laredo, Tex. Others in Florida slept outside overnight to secure a spot for the next morning. Social Security’s remedy is to push customers to get help by phone or online, but fast service using those options, for many, is proving just as elusive. From April, when the 1,230 local offices began to reopen, through mid-August, the number of people helped by Social Security staff members had dropped by 46 percent from the 43 million visitors served annually before the coronavirus struck, according to data Social Security officials shared with national disability advocates. Visits have edged up in recent weeks but remain well below pre-pandemic levels, according to internal agency data and congressional offices. Those seeking disability benefits are far more dependent on in-person visits than retirees and others needing service from Social Security, as they often lack phones or access to the internet and must turn over original birth certificates, driver’s licenses and other documents. The extreme measures required from them have deepened questions about the capacity of a major federal department that serves as the last lifeline for many Americans. With its offices closed, Social Security disability claimants have few places to turn
Inevitable SSA delays and internal friction hamstrings implementation
Lisa Rein 22 — (Lisa Rein covers federal agencies and the management of government in the Biden administration at the Washingtonpost; ; Published: 10-7-2022; "Pandemic struggles still afflict Social Security, a last lifeline for many"; Washington Post; Accessed: 7-10-2023; https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/10/07/social-security-pandemic-failures/)//Pen-SY
Acknowledging “delays in service and long waits for disability decisions,” Social Security officials took the unusual step last month of pleading with Congress for an extra $800 million as lawmakers negotiated a temporary budget for the new fiscal year. Congress in the past week approved about $90 million in the temporary spending package that expires Dec. 16. Social Security officials have blamed the stumbles on a staffing crisis and inadequate budgets. But there are many causes, according to lawmakers, current and former Social Security officials and advocates for the disabled: the power of the agency’s labor unions, a hesitance to make temporary pandemic workarounds permanent and an absence of permanent leadership. “They have always been slow,” said Jeff Larsen, a Houston-based attorney with Lone Star Legal Aid who specializes in the disability system. “But it’s much slower now. There’s more friction in the system.”
Mexico Poverty Advantage
2NC --- Mexico Thumper
It’s thumped. Mexico splurges on social security now.
Swarnali Ahmed Hannan et al., October 2020, Swarnali and Keiko Honjo are senior economists at the IMF; Mehdi Raessi is a fellow at the NASA-Stanford Center for Turbulence Research, "Mexico Needs A Fiscal Twist: Response to Covid-19 and Beyond," IMF Working Papers, https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WP/Issues/2020/10/13/Mexico-Needs-a-Fiscal-Twist-Response-to-Covid-19-and-Beyond-49817, b
Mexico currently spends about 2.2 percent of GDP on social safety nets (or social assistance). There are around 8,000 social protection programs at the federal, state, and municipal levels.7 These programs cover 22.9 million Mexicans in the year 2020 (equivalent to 16 million households or 44.5 percent of total). Those in need are largely identified from the social census and SISI. The one-year cost of increased households assistance is estimated at 1.2 percent of GDP.
2NC --- Cartels wont = U.S. Backlash
Cartels won’t provoke US response—they’ll de-escalate the border
Stewart 11, former U.S. State Department special agent, “The Buffer Between Mexican Cartels and the U.S. Government”, 8-17, http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20110817-buffer-between-mexican-cartels-and-us-government#axzz3D37Ei7zA
As we have discussed in our coverage of the drug war in Mexico, Mexican cartels, including the VCF, clearly possess the capability to construct and employ large vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices (VBIEDs) — truck bombs — and yet they have chosen not to. These groups are not averse to bloodshed, or even outright barbarity, when they believe it is useful. Their decision to abstain from certain activities, such as employing truck bombs or targeting a U.S. Consulate, indicates that there must be compelling strategic reasons for doing so. After all, groups in Lebanon, Pakistan and Iraq have demonstrated that truck bombs are a very effective means of killing perceived enemies and of sending strong messages. Perhaps the most compelling reason for the Mexican cartels to abstain from such activities is that they do not consider them to be in their best interest. One important part of their calculation is that such activities would remove the main buffer that is currently insulating them from the full force of the U.S. government: the Mexican government. The Buffer Despite their public manifestations of machismo, the cartel leaders clearly fear and respect the strength of the world's only superpower. This is evidenced by the distinct change in cartel activities along the U.S.-Mexico border, where a certain operational downshift routinely occurs. In Mexico, the cartels have the freedom to operate far more brazenly than they can in the United States, in terms of both drug trafficking and acts of violence. Shipments of narcotics traveling through Mexico tend to be far larger than shipments moving into and through the United States. When these large shipments reach the border they are taken to stash houses on the Mexican side, where they are typically divided into smaller quantities for transport into and through the United States. As for violence, while the cartels do kill people on the U.S. side of the border, their use of violence there tends to be far more discreet; it has certainly not yet incorporated the dramatic flair that is frequently seen on the Mexican side, where bodies are often dismembered or hung from pedestrian bridges over major thoroughfares. The cartels are also careful not to assassinate high-profile public figures such as police chiefs, mayors and reporters in the United States, as they frequently do in Mexico
2NC --- No Failed States Impact
No impact to failed states
Patrick, 11 – IR PhD at Oxford, Senior Fellow, Director of the Program on International Institutions and Global Governance at the Council on foreign Relations (Stewart M, “Why Failed States Shouldn’t Be Our Biggest National Security Fear”, Washington Post, 4/15/11, http://www.cfr.org/international-peace-and-security/why-failed-states-shouldnt-our-biggest-national-security-fear/p24689) // ANK
The message is clear: Failed states are the weak link in the world’s collective security. In truth, while failed states may be worthy of America’s attention on humanitarian and development grounds, most of them are irrelevant to U.S. national security. The risks they pose are mainly to their own inhabitants. Sweeping claims to the contrary are not only inaccurate but distracting and unhelpful, providing little guidance to policymakers seeking to prioritize scarce attention and resources. In 2008, I collaborated with Brookings Institution senior fellow Susan E. Rice, now President Obama’s permanent representative to the United Nations, on an index of state weakness in developing countries.The study ranked all 141 developing nations on 20 indicators of state strength, such as the government’s ability to provide basic services. More recently, I’ve examined whether these rankings reveal anything about each nation’s role in major global threats: transnational terrorism, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, international crime and infectious disease. The findings are startlingly clear. Only a handful of the world’s failed states pose security concerns to the United States. Far greater dangers emerge from stronger developing countries that may suffer from corruption and lack of government accountability but come nowhere near qualifying as failed states. The link between failed states and transnational terrorism, for instance, is tenuous. Al-Qaeda franchises are concentrated in South Asia, North Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia but are markedly absent in most failed states, including in sub-Saharan Africa. Why? From a terrorist’s perspective, the notion of finding haven in a failed state is an oxymoron. Al-Qaeda discovered this in the 1990s when seeking a foothold in anarchic Somalia. In intercepted cables, operatives bemoaned the insuperable difficulties of working under chaos, given their need for security and for access to the global financial and communications infrastructure. Al-Qaeda has generally found it easier to maneuver in corrupt but functional states, such as Kenya, where sovereignty provides some protection from outside interdiction. Pakistan and Yemen became sanctuaries for terrorism not only because they are weak but because their governments lack the will to launch sustained counterterrorism operations against militants whom they value for other purposes. Terrorists also need support from local power brokers and populations. Along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, al-Qaeda finds succor in the Pashtun code of pashtunwali, which requires hospitality to strangers, and in the severe brand of Sunni Islam practiced locally. Likewise in Yemen, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula has found sympathetic tribal hosts who have long welcomed mujaheddin back from jihadist struggles. Al-Qaeda has met less success in northern Africa’s Sahel region, where a moderate, Sufi version of Islam dominates. But as the organization evolves from a centrally directed network to a diffuse movement with autonomous cells in dozens of countries, it is as likely to find haven in the banlieues of Paris or high-rises of Minneapolis as in remote Pakistani valleys. What about failed states and weapons of mass destruction? Many U.S. analysts worry that poorly governed countries will pursue nuclear, biological, chemical or radiological weapons; be unable to control existing weapons; or decide to share WMD materials. These fears are misplaced. With two notable exceptions — North Korea and Pakistan — the world’s weakest states pose minimal proliferation risks, since they have limited stocks of fissile or other WMD material and are unlikely to pursue them. Far more threatening are capable countries (say, Iran and Syria) intent on pursuing WMD, corrupt nations (such as Russia) that possess loosely secured nuclear arsenals and poorly policed nations (try Georgia) through which proliferators can smuggle illicit materials or weapons. When it comes to crime, the story is more complex. Failed states do dominate production of some narcotics: Afghanistan cultivates the lion’s share of global opium, and war-tornColombia rules coca production. The tiny African failed state of Guinea-Bissau has become a transshipment point for cocaine bound for Europe. (At one point, the contraband transiting through the country each month was equal to the nation’s gross domestic product.) And Somalia, of course, has seen an explosion ofmaritime piracy. Yet failed states have little or no connection with other categories of transnational crime, from human trafficking to money laundering, intellectual property theft, cyber-crime or counterfeiting of manufactured goods. Criminal networks typically prefer operating in functional countries that provide baseline political order as well as opportunities to corrupt authorities. They also accept higher risks to work in nations straddling major commercial routes. Thusnarco-trafficking has exploded in Mexico, which has far stronger institutions than many developing nations but borders the United States. South Africa presents its own advantages. It is a country where “the first and the developing worlds exist side by side,” author Misha Glenny writes. “The first world provides good roads, 728 airports . . . the largest cargo port in Africa, and an efficient banking system. . . . The developing world accounts for the low tax revenue, overstretched social services, high levels of corruption throughout the administration, and 7,600 kilometers of land and sea borders that have more holes than a second-hand dartboard.” Weak and failing African states, such as Niger, simply cannot compete.
Their authors cherry-pick anecdotal examples without causal analysis
Patrick 11 (Stewart Patrick, Research Fellow at the Center for Global Development, “Weak Links: Fragile States, Global Threats, and International Security,” Google Books) GG (Recut)
It has become commonplace to claim that the gravest dangers to U.S. and world secu­rity are no longer military threats from rival great powers but rather cross-border threats emanating from the world’s most poorly governed, economically stagnant, and conflict-ridden countries. Public officials and the media—as well as many scholars—depict weak and failing states as generating or enabling a vast array of dangers, from transnational terrorism to weapons proliferation, organized crime, humanitarian catas­trophes, regional 

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