Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
No More Excuses on Trade
Trump was in rare form Saturday at the G-7 press conference. It’s hard to argue with his thesis that free trade should be a two-way street. Trade concessions from our friends and adversaries alike must come, and I think they will come. I am a free trader. I believe a free exchange of goods leads to prosperity on the national and international level. I read Adam Smith and David Ricardo. Comparative advantage is a magical thing. But free trade has to be a two-way street. Let all countries reciprocate the free market access that we extend to them. I call for an equitable reduction in tariff and non-tariff barriers that benefits all countries.
When libertarians say that other countries’ tariff rates are none of our business, that’s a load of nonsense. Does this policy extend to all aspects of foreign policy? It’s none of our business when other countries block sea lanes? It’s none of our business when they invade and occupy their neighbors? Is it our business when countries sell nuclear and chemical weapons all over the world?
This is not a serious position. It is what I would like to call “the one-way street” approach to free trade. The idea that since free trade is beneficial it should be undertaken without reciprocation is extremely flawed. This approach may be the optimal one if you are a small country like Chile with no international market power. However, the US economy represents 22 percent of global GDP. That is power.
Of course, neither I nor President Trump intends to use this power to hurt other countries on trade. Proof of this is the fact that at the G7 meeting, our supposedly “protectionist” President floated Larry Kudlow’s idea for a tariff-free G-7. Yes, you read that correctly: Trump offered to eliminate all US tariffs on goods from G-7 countries if G-7 countries agree to reciprocate! Did you hear that? That was the sound of our mealy mouthed allies running out of excuses for continuing their unfair trade practices. It’s time for our allies to put up or shut up.
European sophisticates love to lecture Trump and his supporters on multilateralism and politeness, but they should practice what they preach. The German schoolmarm Angela Merkel, pictured above lecturing our President, needs to explain why the winner of WWII has to pay the loser four times the tariff rate on car imports. If our trading partners want free trade, it should be free trade that benefits everyone. No more protection of favored business interests. No more byzantine regulatory excuses. No more!
SaveSave
Published in General
Or, maybe, just maybe, Trump’s outrageousness is providing air cover to his various department heads to effect policy.
A stopped clock, and all that.
;)
Every cycle since entering congress, one lone Democrat puts in a repeal of that ammendment.
Its empty gesticulating. Is there any real chance this would fly domestically? No. If he started at home saying I am going to the G7 to raise these questions and propsals, hey sure then it looks better. But considering he flips and flops like a fish out of water, one can’t take such a proposal seriously.
More then one way to look at that picture.
Unpredictability is the essence of negotiation. Again, I understand why it seems so unorthodox. Past presidents just let our allies run all over us on trade. There was no negotiation. This is the new way. Future presidents will emulate Pres. Trump.
I have created a post titled “‘Pepe the Frog’ should be banned from Ricochet.”
I didn’t want to hijack this post, so I created my own post, and I suggest that comments be filed under the new post.
My new post relates to the fourth picture from Comment #9 in this post. I brief, I say,
“The green skinned “Pepe the Frog” has been adopted by members of the Alt Right. It has become a hate symbol. See the following article by the Los Angeles Times.
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-pepe-the-frog-hate-symbol-20161011-snap-htmlstory.html
The Code of Conduct prohibits the displaying of “Anything that makes the Ricochet Community look like a bunch of fruitcakes.”
Prior to Pepe the Frog being appropriated by the Alt Right, I would have no problem with it.
For example, in Arizona in the 1920’s highway signs used to have swastikas, honoring an American Indian symbol. See for example the 1927 state highway map. That stopped in the early 1940’s after its appropriate by the Nazis.
http://www.route66news.com/2006/10/26/swastikas-on-old-arizona-road-maps/
I would support the automatic censorship of the “N” word” in Ricochet. I suggest that Pepe the Frog now falls into that category. I assume that the software could be tweaked to catch any attempts to place this vile symbol in Ricochet. At a minimum, whenever a Moderator sees “Pepe the Frog” that comment should immediately be removed. (I flagged the comment over 12 hours ago, however it still has not been removed.)
I assume that the author of Comment #9 did not realize that he was using or promoting a hate symbol, and I am not casting any aspersions against him. I assume that he simply saw what appeared to be a funny picture. (I also assume that the moderator who reviewed my flag, did not realize how Pepe the Frog is now a vile symbol.)
Everything about Trumps position on trade is either insane, ignorant, deeply stupid or outright mendacious. It’s like the man is purposely dead set on destroying our long standing alliances in service of Putin’s agenda.
Take the following facts that Trump is either lying about, ignorant of or too stupid to understand:
1) the average tariff rate of United States, Britain, Germany and France is identical at 1.6%. Japans is 1.4% and Canada’s a paltry 0.8%. Sure they all have specific tariffs and industries with high relative tariffs but this is just rank protectionism in the name of special interests and a prime example of why tariffs are bad policy in the first place.
2) US/Canada trade is essentially in balance (not that this matters) and yet it’s Canada’s dairy tariffs that got Trump all fired up.
3) Dairy makes up less that 1% of our trade with Canada
4) The US government subsidizes domestic dairy production to make milk and cheese more affordable for our consumers (because of course we do. Yet another stupid policy), Canada does not. Hence why Canada puts a tariff on US dairy – to remove the US governments artificial competitive advantage.
5) The TPP would have actually normalized a lot of this and opened Canadian markets for US dairy. Who was it that scuttled that agreement?
The President is lying to you about trade with the G7 nations. Period. In service of what agenda I don’t know. He did make a huge stink about how Russia was kicked out of the G8 – I mean all they did was invade another sovereign nation and take their territory, why hold that against them.
Is Trump trying to destroy the long standing western alliance in the service of furthering Russian interests? Probably not, he’s not smart enough to plan that out strategically. Still, ask yourself this, if he was trying to do so, how would he act differently?
And blind squirrels . . .
May I ask for an example of this past behavior?
an example of what past behavior?
So, Jamie, can we agree on a G-7 that is completely free of tariff and non-tariff barriers?
The rip off and letting allies get a free pass on trade?
Sure. Can we agree that pointlessly antagonizing long standing allies in furtherance of Russian interests is making the perfect the enemy of the good?
I am laughing so hard right now…
Speaking as the author of Comment #9, I absolutely understand the background and meaning of Pepe the Frog.
Briefly, Pepe started as a character in an underground cartoon, he was turned into a meme by some 4chan folks, and was adopted by a large number of fans of Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton’s campaign then planted articles claiming a “hate symbol”.
Pepe is all about love.
Meanwhile, back in Yoorup:
The first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.
You shock me.When the people demand lies it’s inevitable that someone will grant their wishes.
I respectfully believe that you are hurting that which you hold dear. Pepe the Frog has no place in Ricochet.
Additionally I don’t see how the opposition in Canada can oppose the government with out looking like they capitulated to Trump’s silliness. The mood from Ottawa seems to be “We will wait this out”.
A tariff-free G-7 it is. Let’s take that agreement and put it in the bank.
I wouldn’t have made the Russia comment, knowing what I know. I’m not sure why Trump made the comment, other than that he thrives on the chaos that he creates. Or possibly he wants to keep Russia from violating sanctions with North Korea. I don’t have access to all of the intelligence info that he does, and neither do you.
Europe and France make and keep their commitments.
How’d they do on Kyoto?
How many European countries are meeting their NATO defense spending commitments.
I think about 5 out of 29 or so.
Tell that to Mogan Kinder. Hes is protecting our workers by forcing the taxpayer to spend 4 billion on a pipeline that we should have gotten for free till his bungling.
Look Trudeau can say all he wants on protecting the Dairy Industry. But he isnt going to cross the banks. They are the ones that control this country and they are not going to allow his preening to cost us NAFTA.
Speaking as a Canadian I hate the Dairy tariffs and look forward to them being dismantled. I applaud Trump for making this an issue. Its disgusting and all three major parties support it because they are beholden to the dairy industry.
Its a giant tax on poor people. So any party who wants to oppose it could. They could just ask the other parties why they hate poor people. But they wont. Cause those rich farmers donate lots of money to the current parties.
Also as a Canadian I dont feel my interests are being represented at all by PM Trudeau.
I keep wanting to add a question mark after your first sentence. The sentence as a statement is a joke. The essential difference between the Trump position and our ‘allies’ is more about ‘national sovereignty’ than trade and tariffs. I have never been able to accept that there is a need to support both free trade and Soros-style globalization. I support free trade.
My understanding is that the tarrif in America dairy is to offset subsidies you american dairy farmers. Canada doesn’t subsidize its dairy industry. Is this correct?
FYI the overall tarrif rate for Russia, the country Trump demands be part of the G7, is 3.6% – double that of the US and most other G7 nations.
A tarrif Free G7 would be nice but it’s not as important as maintaining longstanding alliances and countering Russia’s agenda.
I don’t understand this obsession with other nations tarrifs. It’s a tax on their people making them poorer. I would eliminate all US import tarrifs regardless of what other nations do. I have much more faith in Americans and our ability to use capital free of government taxation for productive ends.
Susan, you question contains two incorrect implicit assumptions.
If you take those out, you get this question
The answer is that everyone would gain, (once malinvestments in the labor markets and capital structure were liquidated, a temporary period but for some a painful one.)
When an American makes a free trade with a foreigner, he benefits. If he is not free to make it, he loses that benefit, in proportion to the extent of the abrogation of his economic rights. If every American were free to make every trade that he and a foreigner agreed to without any degree of coercive interference from his government, then the benefit to America would be at a maximum insofar as it is within the power of the US government to control.
The same argument applies to foreigners. Put the two policies together, and the gain is maximum for everyone.
The question of mercantilism vs free trade, stated clearly, isn’t too complex for this forum at all, because it’s Basic Economics. It was clearly understood by all economists in the early 1800s.
The false implicit assumptions are of secondary importance. First we need to get as many liberal-minded Ricocheteers as possible on the same page about the laws of economics. Then they will immediately recognize by themselves the false, but subtle assumptions of the arguments for interventionism.
We can’t fight the anti-freedom propaganda directly, because the falsehoods are cunningly concealed in propaganda language, images like “two-way street” and “level playing field” and “unfair advantage” that not only hide economic falsehoods, but play on strong natural emotions concerning justice and American patriotism in order to overthrow justice and bring an end to the American idea by undermining its founding principles.