According to free traders, U.S. companies should leap aboard the Mexican bandwagon. Think of Mexico’s undeniably low labor costs, pundits say, or the 90 million consumers eager to buy U.S. computers, cars, and clothes. Count the scores of Mexican industries privatized in the past five years, which offer an array of new investment possibilities. And, most important of all, remember the North American Free Trade Agreement. Despite opposition in the United States and Canada, all three countries are likely to sign NAFTA by 1994, locking in Mexico’s sweeping economic reforms.
A version of this article appeared in the July–August 1993 issue of Harvard Business Review.