Free Trade
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Understanding Trade
Few areas of life are as poorly understood as trade. This is remarkable because each of us engages in trade every day. We buy our groceries, clothing, electronics, etc. from other people rather than making them ourselves. If we didn’t think trade was worthwhile, we wouldn’t do it. But we do—because we know how poor…
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A Border Adjustment Tax Is Protectionism
Free trade lets global markets provide consumers with the best products at the lowest prices. Throughout its history, AIER has consistently argued against restrictions on free trade—protectionism—and likewise we oppose the border adjustment tax proposed by President Trump. The BAT would incentivize relatively inefficient domestic production over efficient production overseas. Many U.S. companies have moved…
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Home and Abroad on the Range: U.S. Ranchers and Trade
We at AIER recently wrote an article defending free trade amid a new climate of protectionism. While the arguments for free trade apply to all sectors of the economy, we focused primarily on manufacturing examples. A recent op-ed in the Dallas News used another excellent and perhaps less obvious example – Texas cattle ranchers. Richard…
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“Unfair” Trade, At Home and Abroad
We received some great questions from readers on our recent article about free trade, many of which had to do with how we should respond to unfair trading practices by foreign firms or governments. One practice commonly labeled unfair is dumping, where trading partners sell a commodity at a price deemed artificially low by…
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Fighting Protectionism Once Again
“When adversely affected minorities are politically powerful, governments often intervene with special-privilege legislation to insulate the “injured” parties from the effects of international cooperation or to give them special advantages in the international arena. As the chronic worldwide inflating of the past few decades has left its usual legacy of faltering economic performance in virtually…
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Mostly Domestic Manufacturing
In the wake of President Donald Trump’s protectionist stance for domestic manufacturing, many observers have spoken in defense of free trade. AIER has its own history of publishing in this area. In this post, I want to highlight one point that we touched on briefly in the December edition of AIER’s “Business Conditions Monthly” –…
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Trump, and the Free-Trade Tradeoff
The biggest news story in the world this past week has been the election of Donald Trump, and the biggest reason for his election was the vote of working class white voters in the Rust Belt states of Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, states that had been projected to vote for Hillary Clinton. One current explanation…
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As U.S. Weighs Trade Pact, Trade Deficit Grows
With the Trans-Pacific Partnership heading to Capitol Hill for ratification, U.S. policymakers will weigh the proposed free-trade zone in an increasingly challenging trade environment. The strong dollar, a weaker global economy and low energy prices have all worked against the United States when it comes to trade, said Bob Hughes, senior research fellow at the…
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Research Reports – 1982, Issue: 48
Protectionism: Prescription for Stagnation; Book Review: Stalin’s Secret War, by Nikolai Tolstoy
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Playing Chicken with World Trad
Research Reports – 1989, Issue: 03 Also: A Regulatory “Success Story” Undone
