A Fundamental Argument About Free Trade

One of Donald Trump’s many disruptions to the center-right consensus was in the area of trade policy. For decades, the center-right has been largely supportive of “free trade” or trade liberalization, and the disagreements were about the minor details, like whether intellectual property issues should be included in trade agreements, or whether discrete trade agreements were better or worse than the World Trade Organization’s paralyzed processes.

Then Donald Trump came along, bashing trade deficits, bashing China, using zero-sum rhetoric to describe trade as between “winners and losers,” championing tariffs and protecting US domestic producers.

It was fascinating and depressing to see what happens when you open Pandora’s box. One result was former free-traders suddenly doing a 180 and embracing tariffs and protectionism as the new hotness compared to the old-and-busted free trade consensus.

Another was folks on the center-right who had apparently always been skeptical about liberalized trade but kept quiet because they knew they wouldn’t get anywhere. Again, when Donald Trump disrupted the consensus, it opened the door to such trade discontents to air their views.

This is all a setup to suggest that a very illuminating discussion on trade has been going on at the Law & Liberty website. New Right trade skeptic Oren Cass, formerly of the Manhattan Institute, launched a broadside there against the very philosophical foundations of trade and comparative advantage, which (in our view) have been more than ably debunked by longtime champion of liberal trade Donald Boudreaux, professor of economics at George Mason University.

We’re admittedly biased, and IPI actually hosted Prof. Boudreaux some years ago at a trade briefing we sponsored on Capitol Hill. We think he has the better argument, but we wanted to make sure our trade-interested friends were aware of the arguments and discussion in this important policy area.

So here are the links.

First, to Oren Cass’s attack on free trade and comparative advantage.

Second, to Prof. Donald Boudreaux’s able response.

We hope you find these essays as interesting as we did, and we appreciate your interest in the work of IPI.