One of the confounding realities in arguments about tariffs is that we do not have “free trade” in the modern world, and that there is no way for us to have free trade.
It’s not merely that wage levels are different in different parts of the world. It’s that regulations are different, protections of civil liberties and workers’ rights are…
One of the confounding realities in arguments about tariffs is that we do not have “free trade” in the modern world, and that there is no way for us to have free trade.
It’s not merely that wage levels are different in different parts of the world. It’s that regulations are different, protections of civil liberties and workers’ rights are different, the potential for workers to exercise even economic autonomy let alone economic power is different.
So long as these differentials exist there can be no level playing field among the nations of the world, and so the idea that we can even have “free trade” is frankly a fiction. Free trade means first countries standardize regulatory systems and wages and levels of market power enjoyed by workers.
Those prerequisites are not only not happening, but if anything are being steadily diminished and undermined in the global economy.
One of the confounding realities in arguments about tariffs is that we do not have “free trade” in the modern world, and that there is no way for us to have free trade.
It’s not merely that wage levels are different in different parts of the world. It’s that regulations are different, protections of civil liberties and workers’ rights are different, the potential for workers to exercise even economic autonomy let alone economic power is different.
So long as these differentials exist there can be no level playing field among the nations of the world, and so the idea that we can even have “free trade” is frankly a fiction. Free trade means first countries standardize regulatory systems and wages and levels of market power enjoyed by workers.
Those prerequisites are not only not happening, but if anything are being steadily diminished and undermined in the global economy.