Currency Devaluation Is No Ticket to National Prosperity
If a government manages to undervalue its currency in terms of foreign currencies, it subsidizes the consumption of foreigners who purchase its country’s exports. And while gains are reaped by those of its citizens who work to supply goods for export, currency undervaluation makes most of that country’s citizens poorer.
READ MORE
The Constitution Gives the Trade Power to Congress Alone
Because this is a tool the president can actually use — and because it bypasses the much more difficult task of having to persuade Congress of the merits of his ideas — Trump is using the tariff weapon more and more to address matters further and further removed from trade.
READ MORE
America’s Economic Commissar of Trade
In this he is no less of an economic tyrant than, say, Nicolas Maduro, the socialist dictator of Venezuela. He, too, rules by command and decree.
READ MORE
China Is Not the Enemy
If we persist in reducing their brilliant progress to anything other than hard work being matched with freedom, we risk turning the biggest consumers of all things American against the United States. The economic consequences for the American people will be unfortunate.
READ MORE
Is Trump’s Ultimate Goal Global Free Trade?
Trump has pontificated on trade for decades, with words that reveal him as a clichéd economic nationalist.
READ MORE
The Trade War’s New Level of Bizarre
The Trump administration pulled back from the brink of disaster in trade relations with Mexico — but there is reason to doubt that this unusual display of good sense indicates a change in intellectual orientation, much less a lasting shift in policy. The man-made trade mess of the last year and a half is likely to get more bizarre before it gets better.
READ MORE
President Trump’s Threatened Tariffs Would Wipe Out 2017 Tax Cuts
Should these threatened tariffs come to pass, it will be hard to argue that we have seen a more anti-business U.S. President, from either party, in recent memory.
READ MORE
U.S. Dollar Supremacy Could Quickly Fade
The greatest risk to the US dollar may, in fact, come from within. The imposition of tariffs and sanctions create an opportunity for other countries to engage in bilateral trade. The decision to withdraw from the free trade initiatives such as the TPP and T-TIP weakens not only the prospects for US trade but also the preeminent position of the US dollar.
READ MORE
The Huawei Test
The U.S. has chosen to attack arguably the most creative and powerful and best-led capitalist company in China.
READ MORE
Why They Try to Turn Back the Tide of History
Knowing and seeing the pattern here makes it no less alarming but it does help reveal that these economic/political cycles are not arbitrary. And if history is our guide, we can also see that the efforts of the reactionaries against freedom will fail.
READ MORE
The Return of Protectionism
Fortunately for us, this might be a temporary detour away from the long pattern of the expansion of global trade. The damage could be lasting, however.
READ MORE
Are Tariffs Killing People?
When you play politics with international trade, you play a very dangerous game that can result in vast collateral damage.
READ MORE
