Trump has already discredited protectionism
Trump's pointless and destructive tariffs demonstrate the value of free trade
“No one anymore, on the left or the right,” Joe Nocera writes in a recent essay for The Free Press, “denies that globalization has fractured the U.S., both economically and socially.” Nocera’s essay is titled “The Intellectual Godfathers of Protectionism,” and it argues that the subjects of his piece—vociferous critics of free trade such as the economists Michael Pettis and Dani Rodrik—have “won the argument, at least for the time being.” Now that Trump is “imposing huge tariffs on China and on-again-off-again tariffs on the rest of the world,” Nocera observes, “the case against neoliberalism isn’t a fringe opinion. It’s the logic of White House policy.” Nocera says the anti-free trade economists he talked to now feel “vindicated” as Washington and the American public have at long last accepted their case for protectionism.
There’s just one problem: the new consensus Nocera and the protectionist economists are celebrating doesn’t exist. Over the past month, hundreds of “economists and scholars in related fields” have signed an anti-tariff declaration published by the Independent Institute. Even before Trump’s “liberation day” tariffs sent global markets into a tailspin, support for free trade among Americans saw a dramatic spike as Trump’s chaotic attempt to restore mercantilism and protectionism (with the Canada and Mexico tariffs at first) created a pointless economic crisis in North America. While 61 percent of Americans said foreign trade is an “opportunity for economic growth” in 2024, this proportion surged to 81 percent in 2025.
Americans may be more wary of free trade than they were a couple of decades ago, but this doesn’t mean they support a scattershot global trade war. As in so many areas—illegal deportations to Salvadoran dungeons, assaults on vital scientific research to wage ideological warfare on universities, the deployment of SpaceX interns to destroy entire federal agencies—Trump has misinterpreted his narrow electoral mandate as a green light to implement radical trade policies that Americans don’t support. This is why his economic approval rating is plummeting, while support for the tariffs is particularly low. Gallup reports that 89 percent of Americans expect higher prices as a result of the tariffs, while 62 percent believe the imposition of tariffs “will end up costing the U.S. more money than it brings in from other countries.”
Recall what Nocera described as “on-again-off-again tariffs on the rest of the world.” If it’s true that the protectionists have “won the argument” and Americans have turned against free trade, why is the Trump administration constantly vacillating between the imposition and removal of the tariffs? The administration’s approach to trade has been incoherent from the beginning. Trump is pursuing two mutually exclusive goals—on one hand, he’s using tariffs to coerce companies into producing more goods in America. He argues that this will bring back American manufacturing jobs, despite the fact that many of these jobs were permanently lost to automation rather than globalization. On the other hand, Trump is using tariffs as a negotiating tool to pursue other policy priorities, such as cutting down on cross-border fentanyl smuggling. This was one component of the agreement with China (announced on Monday) to substantially reduce tariffs in exchange for greater cooperation on issues like the interdiction of fentanyl ingredients.
The “huge tariffs on China” that Nocera cited as evidence of a shift in the economic zeitgeist were reduced nearly five-fold on Monday. Global markets reacted with glee. These developments contradict Nocera’s thesis—whenever it looks like tariffs will remain in place indefinitely, consumer sentiment collapses, stocks decline, and Trump has to reassure the country that all the “short-term pain” will be worth it in the end. Whenever the tariffs are reduced, everyone breathes a collective sigh of relief. While Americans may support some aspects of protectionism and onshoring—Nocera cites the reliance on Chinese supply chains for personal protective equipment at the beginning of the COVID pandemic, for instance—it’s clear that Trump does not have a mandate to move the United States into a post-free trade era.
Trump’s defenders will continue to stampede from one diametrically opposed idea to the other as circumstances require. On some days, Trump is the savior of the American working class by reshoring manufacturing. On others, he is a brilliant tactician who’s using tariffs as leverage to accomplish his geopolitical goals—a strategy that requires the removal of tariffs to function as a credible inducement. Similarly, on days when the stock market is down, Trump says we’re still living in Biden’s economy. On days when it’s up, the economy suddenly belongs to Trump. Just a few weeks ago, MAGA influencers like Laura Loomer, Benny Johnson, and Andrew McCarthy were manning the battle stations for a scorched earth trade war with China. But now that Trump has changed course, the “TRUMP WILL CRUSH CHINA” narrative as morphed seamlessly into the “ART OF THE DEAL” narrative.
But many Americans see through Trump’s self-serving rationalizations and evasions—59 percent believe his policies have worsened the state of the economy, and Gallup reports that far more Americans believe Trump owns the economy than his predecessor. It’s revealing that 55 percent of Republicans argue that Biden is “more responsible for the current state of the U.S. economy,” while just 21 percent say Trump bears responsibility.
Trump’s recent trade agreements with China and the UK have exposed the hollowness of all his talk about brilliant bilateral dealmaking. The agreement with China was warmly received by markets because it was a step back from a self-inflicted economic catastrophe. The Trump administration secured concessions which don’t even begin to justify the economic chaos caused by the tariffs, the consequences of which we will see in the coming months. Like the pause on Trump’s global “reciprocal” tariffs, the deal with China is set to last for 90 days—one of many reminders that we will likely be dealing with neurotic swings in trade policy indefinitely.
Meanwhile, the UK deal keeps 10 percent tariffs in place, even though the United States has a $12 billion trade surplus with the country—not a great sign for other countries in negotiations with Washington. The deal provides carveouts for specific sectors like steel and includes random provisions like the UK’s agreement to buy American-made aircraft. While this was welcome news for Boeing, American automakers chafed at the reduction in tariffs on British-made cars, which make them cheaper to important than some American models that rely on Canadian and Mexican production. Wasn’t the whole point of Trump’s trade fiasco to boost American manufacturing? Making McLarens and Bentleys cheaper to import while jacking up prices on groceries and everyday essentials for the rest of the country won’t do much to improve Trump’s economic numbers.
While free trade has costs like job displacement, it has also been a powerful engine of economic growth. After World War II, international trade grew faster than in any previous historical period and America enjoyed an unprecedented era of prosperity and global economic influence. Throughout this period, faster GDP growth was correlated with higher rates of trade as a share of total output. Cross-country data and rates of labor productivity suggest that trade played a causal role in economic growth around the world.
When Trump announced his massive “reciprocal” tariffs—which were arbitrarily imposed and completely out of touch with basic economic reality—he said his trade war was a reaction to many years of abuse and betrayal the United States has suffered at the hands of its trading partners. “For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped, and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike.” Trump argued that “hard-working American citizens were forced to sit on the sidelines as other nations got rich and powerful, much of it at our expense. But now it’s our turn to prosper.”
This makes it sound as if the United States has underperformed other developed economies over the decades, but the opposite is true. From 1960 to 2023, the GDP of the United Kingdom increased by 307 percent, EU GDP rose by 406 percent, and American GDP surged by 543 percent. From 1987 to 2022, per capita GDP in the UK increased by 247 percent; the EU, 229 percent; and the United States, 285 percent. The United States also benefits from its role as the anchor of a global free trade system in many other ways. The “exorbitant privilege” of printing the world’s primary reserve currency has allowed the United States to borrow at lower costs and use its control of global financial infrastructure to pursue its geopolitical goals—such as imposing sanctions on adversaries like Russia and Iran.
Despite these benefits, it’s true that there has been a bipartisan shift against free trade in recent years. As Trump’s high-decibel hostility to free trade fills the headlines, it’s easy to forget that Hillary Clinton abandoned the Obama administration’s signature trade agreement, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Bernie Sanders described TPP as “disastrous,” which put pressure on Clinton—who already had reasons to be worried about Trump’s economic populism. Although Clinton boasted that she “led the way” on the TPP negotiations and traveled the world advocating for the agreement, she later rejected it. After Trump imposed tariffs on many Chinese goods during his first administration, President Joe Biden kept them in place.
However, in a strange twist, the most protectionist president in over a century may be the one to turn the political tide back toward free trade. As with so many of Trump’s policies, he has recklessly overplayed his hand with the tariffs. It turns out that Americans don’t like being told by their billionaire president that their kids might have to accept fewer toys or that a recession isn’t out of the question due to his desire to return to the economic policies of the 19th century. Trump is running a vast and dangerous economic experiment—rolling back many decades of economic integration which have coincided with the greatest period of prosperity in American history—and the American people are his guinea pigs. If Nocera is right that the protectionists have won the argument on free trade, their victory will be short-lived.