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I have a practical solution to propose. I first got this idea from Dick Gephardt in 1984 when Gephardt ran for president. He touted this idea.

We should have tariffs on a sliding scale. A law passed in congress should govern the process. When we have a trading relationship with a nation where they buy approximately the same quantity of goods and services from us as we buy from them, then we should not tax that trade relationship at all and tariffs should be zero on their products. But if they export to us just 50% more than we export to them, then we should put some kind of a tariff on their products. If they export twice to us what we export to them, then we should put on a much bigger tariff for that country, etc. For countries like China that export to us 5 times what we export to them, then in my mind the tariff should be 100% or even 200%.

Under these conditions the Chinese would immediately find American products to buy en masse. They would adjust their expectations and play under the new rules in order to develop their economy.

If we pursued this type of a policy, then the american economy would be buffered from the fallout. The less competitive manufacturers would still fail, but not nearly so many of them. We would be able to keep manufacturing industry here. We need this for both military and economic security.

I also think we should slap tariffs on countries that don't meet what we consider to be reasonable human rights policies. A Vietnam or a China that arrest people for possessing bibles should face a tariff just for that. Saudi Arabia that doesn't allow christians to meet should get the same.

We should re-adjust these tarrifs once a year. Then we should give all the money to the citizens in the form of tax rebates, a one time payment that is proportional to the amount of payroll taxes that the individual paid.

What you are talking about may be necessary.

The first step is to understand the seriousness and inevitability of what is happening on our current course. In 15 years this nation will be a third world country with a collapsed economy at the rate we are going. We are becoming irrelevant.

We should have tariffs on a sliding scale. A law passed in congress should govern the process. When we have a trading relationship with a nation where they buy approximately the same quantity of goods and services from us as we buy from them, then we should not tax that trade relationship at all and tariffs should be zero on their products. But if they export to us just 50% more than we export to them, then we should put some kind of a tariff on their products. If they export twice to us what we export to them, then we should put on a much bigger tariff for that country, etc. For countries like China that export to us 5 times what we export to them, then in my mind the tariff should be 100% or even 200%.

I have been proposing something similar for a while now, although someone likely said it first. There are a couple problems with Gephardt's plan, asuuming he still supports it. You can not look at trade simply between two countries since it is too easy to re-export from another country to get around the rules. You have to look at trade as us and everyone else. Also, I don't think it makes any sense to drop tariffs when trade balances out to zero. In fact, I think you would encourage it to race away from zero again. The simplest thing to do is float a single tariff rate up until trade is balanced, meanwhile cutting income taxes as tariff revenues flow in. At this point we will have truely free trade with all the benefits and none of the penalties. There will also be some tangential benefits: increased security now that all incoming freight is inspected to levy tariffs and reduction or elimination of income taxes.

I suspect the tarrif system should be based on the functional equivalen worth of the machinery or other product. That way circuitous routs of entry would be negated.