Writes Richard Salsman on the Fallout from the Trade Wars | AIER
“Given the benefits of free trade, the best policy any government can adopt is unilateral free trade (with non-enemy governments), which means free trade regardless of whether other governments also adopt freer trade. Tariffs should only be enacted to secure revenues (e.g., to help fund a navy, the merchant marines, or port infrastructure) and should be low and uniform in rate (applied equally to all imports, wherever sourced, not in discriminatory or targeted ways). Better-motivated (pro-trade) nations pursue bilateral or multilateral trade agreements, and although that’s better than “trade wars,” such approaches, in contrast to unilateralism, waste time and invite costly lobbying and cronyism.”
To learn why read his entire article Fallout from the Trade Wars.