Statist Problems

• Don't Start a Trade War With China
  - Rep. Ron Paul, MD, July 26, 2005 [LewRockwell.com]

• U.S. Limiting Chinese Clothing Imports
  - Jeanine Aversa, May 19, 2005 [Guardian UK]

• The Myth of the Level Playing Field
  - Samuel Bostaph, May 12, 2005 [LewRockwell.com]

• Should We Buy American?
  - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., April 20, 2005 [LewRockwell.com]

• The iniquities of fair trade
  - Leo McKinstry, April 2, 2005 [The Spectator]

• Forcing Some to Make Others' Jobs Secure
  - Tibor R. Machan, March 9, 2004 [Strike the Root]

• Making Enemies
  Some of the worst attacks on our personal freedom come in the form of edicts as to whom we can trade with, and whom we must make war on. - Joseph Potts, January 14, 2004 [Mises]

• CITAC Study Shows 200,000 U.S. Jobs Lost Nationwide From High Steel Prices in 2002 - Steel Tariffs an Important Cause
  More American Workers Lost Their Jobs Last Year Due to Higher Steel Prices Than Total Number Employed by U.S. Steel Producers. - report from CITAC Steel Task Force, February 4, 2003 [Yahoo! Financial News]

• Lumber: A 29 Percent Tax
  Count the term "free trade" as another casualty of political rhetoric and chicanery. - Christopher Mayer, March 27, 2002 [Mises]

• Europe targets guns, garters and lentils in trade war
  The transatlantic trade rift over steel erupted into the pantihose and suspender war last night as the European Union drew up an extraordinary list of 325 American products that it may hit with huge tariffs. - Stephen Castle, March 23, 2002 [Independent.co.uk]

• New Steel Tariffs Will Kill Jobs
  - Michael LaFaive, March 8, 2002 [Mackinac Center for Public Policy]

• Trading Positions
  Bush abandons his principles to keep a promise. - Jacob Sullum, March 8, 2002 [REASON]

• Hard Times for U.S. Steel Industry
  - Emmett Harris, February 25, 2002 [Strike the Root]

• WTO Foments A Trade War
  - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., January 22, 2002 [Mises]

• Bushwhacked in Timber Country
  "President Bush didn't sound like ultra-protectionists Pat Buchanan and Ross Perot during last year's election campaigns, but he certainly acting like these gentlemen now that he is president." - David N. Laband and Daowei Zhang, August 20, 2001 [Mises]

• Enemies of Trade
  "The FTAA protesters in Quebec were misguided. So was the police-state response to them." - Evan McElravy, July 2001 [REASON]

• Tariffs Are Sanctions
  - William Anderson, December 17, 1999 [Mises]

• This Isn't Free Trade
  "According to the hoopla, the World Trade Organization (WTO) was created in 1995 as an instrument of global free trade. Instead, it is proving to be a vehicle for corruption, economic reprisals, and politicization of trade." - James Sheehan, July 1999 [Mises]

• Treaty? What Treaty?
  Review of Is NAFTA Constitutional?
  "The authors of Is NAFTA Constitutional? call attention to a striking absence in the heated public debate over the Nafta agreement. The measure secured the approval of both Houses of Congress, albeit with considerable arm-twisting from the White House. But the Constitution on its face mandates another procedure for agreements of this sort." - David Gordon, Fall 1996 [Mises]

• Why Protectionism Sells
  "Voter opposition to major 'free trade' agreements helped propel a surge in protectionist rhetoric this year." - James Sheehan, July 1996 [Mises]

• The Anti-Free Traders
  - Mark Brandly, May 1996 [Mises]

• Who Killed Free Trade?
  "Trade restrictions, Ludwig von Mises argued in 'Autarky and its Consequences' (1943), are the fulfillment of domestic economic intervention. When governments destroy prosperity, there are always politicians--FDR comes to mind--willing to take the fast track to economic stimulus, the long term be damned." - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., April 1996 [Mises]

• Foreign Trade Follies
  After two years of pretending to be for free trade, the Clinton administration, backed by the Republican leadership in Congress, finally 'fessed up. In their dealings with China and Mexico, they shredded two centuries of economic wisdom, repudiated every principle of sensible economic relations, and kicked taxpayers and consumers in the teeth. - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., April 1995 [Mises]

• Blockading Ourselves
  - Cecil E. Bohanon and T. Norman Van Cott, February 1989 [FEE]

• The Evil of Sanctions
  "Among the conventional weapons in the arsenal of the modern Warfare State, none is crueler or more indiscriminate than economic sanctions." - Justin Raimondo, April 1988 [Mises]

• Stop the WTO
  "Where's the trick? That's the first question to ask about any international trade deal these days. What appears to be a step in the right direction – towards greater liberty in trade across borders – turns out to be a leap into world statism." - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., February 1994 [LewRockwell.com]

• Cliche: "Foreign Imports Destroy Jobs."
  "If imports are restricted consumers have fewer choices, the price of goods rises, and some people are put out of work." - Russell Shannon [cliches.org] (PDF format)

• Cliche: "A balance of trade deficit hurts the domestic economy."
  Explanation of the merchandise trade deficit. [cliches.org] (PDF format)

Libertarian Solutions

• Trading with the Enemy: An American Tradition
  - Murray Rothbard, posted August 1, 2005 [Mises]

• Outsourcing Is Good for What Ails You
  - Bill Walker, April 19, 2005 [Strike the Root]

• India, Pakistan Vows Better Economic Ties
  India, Pakistan Leaders Call Peace Process "Irreversible," Promise Better Economic Ties. - Ashok Sharma, April 18, 2005 [ABC News]

• Why People Trade
  - Carl Menger, posted November 9, 2004 [Mises]

• How Outsourcing Creates Jobs
  - Mark Thornton, April 11, 2004 [LewRockwell.com]

• Ignoring the Fear-Mongering about Outsourcing
  - Sheldon Richman, April 5, 2004 [The Future of Freedom Foundation]

• We Need Real Free Trade Now
  - Sheldon Richman, February 4, 2004 [The Future of Freedom Foundation]

• Who Benefits From Free Trade, and How
  - Robert P. Murphy, January 23, 2004 [Mises]

• Free Trade and Factor Mobility
  ...we should welcome these developments because they mean lower prices for imported goods and services, and hence a higher standard of living for Americans. - Robert P. Murphy, January 11, 2004 [Mises]

• Richard Cobden: Activist for Peace
  Nicknamed the "Apostle of Free Trade," he spearheaded the campaign against the protectionist English Corn Laws, leading to their repeal in 1846, which then spread to the liberalization of trade throughout much of Europe. - Gary Galles, February 19, 2003 [Mises]

• Calhoun's Cause: Free Trade
  American ingenuity and entrepreneurship, not protectionism, were the source of the nation’s wealth, he said in response to Henry Clay’s mercantilist superstitions. - Thomas J. DiLorenzo, July 15, 2002 [Mises]

• Direct from Chile
  Throughout this past winter, Indiana grocery stores have heralded the availability of fresh Chilean fruit. "Direct from Chile," proclaimed the ads. - T. Norman Van Cott, March 26, 2002 [Mises]

• Can Free Trade Really Prevent War?
  - Richard M. Ebeling, Posted March 20, 2002 [Mises]

• Free Traders Need to Tell it Like it Is
  - Tomas Larsson, February 4, 2002 [CATO]

• Will the WTO Back True Free Trade?
  - Jeffrey Tucker, November 16, 2001 [Mises]

• Taiwan's PC Makers Shift Production to China
  "For Horace Tsiang, who has already put his stake in the ground, the issue is simple. 'If war breaks out,' he said, 'the U.S. won't have any computer suppliers. That's why we hope the Bush administration will get along with China.'" - Mark Landler, May 29, 2001 [FreeRepublic]

• Free Trade without the "But"
  - Sheldon Richman, May 2001 [Future of Freedom Foundation]

• The Free Market Means Civilization
  "What poor countries need more than our pathos is American capital, and that is precisely what the Holiday guilt-mongers most want to restrict." - Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., December 22, 2000 [LewRockwell.com]

• Trade and the Rise of Freedom
  - Thomas J. DiLorenzo, posted January 31, 2000 [Mises]

• Trade: Key to Prosperity
  "The best means to help the undeveloped nations of the world is the same as the best means to cure many of the ills that plague more developed nations: Adopt the ideology of the free market. This will lead to the breakdown of all barriers to trade. This will lead to the deployment of resources to the ends that satisfy the most urgent needs of the buying public. Inevitably, the plight of the Third World would improve." - Christopher Mayer, December 20, 1999, [Mises]

• Free Trade without the WTO
  "To advance freedom, free trade and higher standards of living for us, the American people should require the U.S. government to unilaterally repeal U.S. tariffs, import quotas, and other trade restrictions." - Jacob G. Hornberger, December 1999 [Future of Freedom Foundation]

• Chile Takes a Bold Step Toward Freer Trade
  "For more than two decades Chile has been a laboratory for successful free-market reforms." - José Piñera & Aaron Lukas, January 16, 1999 [CATO]

• Peace on earth, free trade for men
  - Daniel T. Griswold, December 31, 1998 [CATO]

• Libertarian Solutions: A Libertarian-style foreign policy: Why free trade equals prosperity
  Part III of a foreign policy series - "Trade restrictions on foreign products lower the standard of living for American consumers. Tariffs, quotas, and other trade barriers are the functional equivalent of a tax, artificially raising the cost of foreign goods and increasing the price that consumers must pay." - Michael Tanner, May 1998 [LP News]

• Free Trade Empowers Americans to Better Their Lives
  - Daniel T. Griswold, November 6, 1997 [CATO]

• A Powerful Case for Free Trade
  Trade is not invasion. It does not involve aggression on one side and resistance on the other, but mutual consent and gratification. - Henry George, June 1996 [FEE]

• The Forgotten Argument for Free Trade
  "In essence, it says that men who are free to do so will discover their relative production efficiencies and will exploit them to mutual advantage — if they specialize and trade with one another." - Samuel Bostaph, October 1994 [The Future of Freedom Foundation]

• A Capitalist Looks at Free Trade
  - William L. Law, June 1991 [The Future of Freedom Foundation]

• Freedom In Transactions
  - Frederic Bastiat, August 1848 [Essays on Liberty]

• Business Profits or Human Rights?
  "Business profits vs. human rights. So do critics of trade with China frame the debate. But freer trade is likely to advance human rights, as well as boost business profits." - Doug Bandow [CTPS]

• California Prosperity and Chinese Reform
  "The U.S. Congress is about to cast one of the most important votes on trade policy in a decade. The vote on whether to extend to China permanent normal trading relations (PNTR) has profound implications not only for consumers and businesses in California and the rest of the United States but also for the people of China, millions of whom are still mired in poverty due to China’s disastrous socialist legacy. Extending PNTR to China, and China’s subsequent accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), will help China’ s leaders reform its state-owned economy into one guided by market forces." - Mark A. Groombridge [CTPS]