re: Is Reaganomics and free trade officially dead?

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Free trade only works when everyone plays by the same rules.

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As Don Boudreaux pointed out recently on Cafe Hayek, if Team Trump and their supporters are really serious about “making America great again,” we should then enthusiastically welcome, not discourage, the philanthropic redistribution of wealth from foreign countries and their citizens to Americans in the form of government subsidies that lower prices and raise our standard of living. Just like we don’t complain about the free light and heat we receive from the sun every day (and the huge trade deficit with the sun that results from those daily imports of free light that are not offset by exports going in the opposite direction, see Venn diagram below), we likewise shouldn’t complain about low-cost products from abroad. The more foreign subsidies that lower prices for Americans and the more dumping into the US of imports sold to Americans below the cost of production, the greater the foreign aid/philanthropy/wealth transfers from foreigners to Americans, and the higher our standard of living. As Friedman asks,”why should we complain” about that generous philanthropy?

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