The Cato Institute’s Herbert A. Stiefel Center for Trade Policy Studies is committed to the research, production, and dissemination of top-quality, non-partisan policy ideas that are consistent with the view that people are more likely to flourish and reach their fullest potential in societies where there are free markets, individual liberty, and limited government. The Center aims to increase pub
lic understanding of the benefits of free trade and the costs of protectionism and its scholarship underscores the point that “real” free trade requires elimination of domestic barriers to trade and that foreign barriers are not compelling excuses for our own. Our views are properly characterized as “pro-market,” as opposed to what might be considered “pro-business.” The purpose of trade is not to achieve a surplus of exports over imports, as suggested by the establishment, neo-mercantilist, pro-business perspective, but to enable greater specialization, which yields faster economic growth and greater wealth creation. The scholarship of the Center is committed to refuting common myths that misinform the public’s understanding of trade, including especially persistent fallacies such as:
1. Trade is a competition between “Us” and “Them”
2. The trade deficit means the United States is losing at trade
3. Trade only benefits big business and the rich
4. Foreign “outsourcing” hurts the U.S. Trade and globalization caused U.S. manufacturing decline
6. Globalization has spurred a “race to the bottom” in labor, environmental
and consumer safety standards.
7. The WTO is an anti-American institution that undermines U.S. sovereignty.
8. Free trade is not fair trade
9. Free trade agreements are all about free trade
10. Unilateral trade liberalization is akin to unilateral disarmament
When people are free to buy from, sell to, and invest with one another as they choose, they can achieve far more than when governments attempt to control economic decisions. Widening the circle of people with whom we transact—including across political borders—brings benefits to consumers in the form of lower prices, greater variety, and better quality, and it allows companies to reap the benefits of innovation, specialization, and economies of scale that larger markets bring. Free markets are essential to prosperity, and expanding free markets as much as possible enhances that prosperity.
!["Before overreacting with counterproductive policies that would raise [shipping] prices even further, policymakers need ...](https://img3.ngos1.com/589/053/2744192165890539.jpg)
