I have never endorsed the idea of tariffs, however, I can say through real life experience that the tariffs that other countries have placed on US products hurt those manufacturers. Unless you buckle under and actually build a manufacturing plant in those countries, you are forced to accept the barrier.
Truly free trade would benefit the US greatly.
Me too. I have kind of dodged this issue in “Patriot’s History” but the fact is-—hard to refute except to say “different time”-—is that under Washington through Taft we had tariffs. The nation grew like wildfire.
I have reviewed the scholarly/academic studies and there is no indication that tariffs in any way hurt early American industry up to the Civil War and a lot of evidence that they helped. Further, the only true “free trade” anyone can point to is that which is achieved at the end of a gun-—Britain in the 1800s, America in the mid-20th century. Yeah, free trade works . . . if you enforce it. If not, it’s NOT free trade.
“Truly free trade would benefit the US greatly.”
Yup.
And countries that erect trade barriers mainly (but not exclusively) harm their own people. They protect industries that need not improve, and foist higher non-competitive prices on their people. The winners are the few, the protected, the politically capable. Everyone else loses.
So what’s annoying is the folks here at FR who think trade barriers are going to generally help. They are going to generally hurt widely in a way that is hard to spot. But they will help a few for a little while in a political spoils system.
How that’s different than welfare for the left’s chosen poor people eludes me.