Kent Paterson, "The crisis slams Mexico," CIP Americas Program, February 24, 2009.

For months, Mexican officials boasted their country was shielded from the worst ravages of the global economic crisis. Although President Felipe Calderon periodically rails against "doomsayers," reality is beginning to slap Mexico City in the face. Daily media reports detail the extent and depth of the economic problems descending on the nation.

According to the National Institute of Statistics, Geography, and Informatics, Mexico shed 750,000 jobs in 2008 alone, bringing the always officially low unemployment rate to its highest level since 2005. The job hemorrhage has been particularly severe in the export assembly sector, affecting tens of thousands of workers in Ciudad Juarez and other cities dependent on the U.S. economy.

The daily La Jornada reports $50 billion in foreign capital fled the country last year, and for the first time in recent years Mexican treasury bonds are losing their investment attractiveness. Mexico's banking sector has so far not exhibited the fatal weaknesses afflicting counterparts in the United States and Europe, but plenty of warning signs abound. According to Mexico's Banking and Securities Commission, the value of bad credit card debt shot up from $1.3 billion in November 2007 to more than $3 billion in November 2008.

...the Calderon anti-crisis plan deepens Mexico's dependency on the U.S. economy.

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