Refusing to liberalize trade unless partner countries adopt new labor or environmental rules is a bad policy, because even if the new standards would reduce distortions on some dimensions, such a policy involves threatening to maintain large distortions in the form of restricted trade.
Responses
Responses weighted by each expert's confidence
Participant | University | Vote | Confidence | Bio/Vote History |
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Daron Acemoglu |
MIT | Bio/Vote History | ||
Not clear that increasing carbon-intensive imports from, say, China would be a step closer to a less distorted allocation.
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Alberto Alesina |
Harvard | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Joseph Altonji |
Yale | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Alan Auerbach |
Berkeley | Bio/Vote History | ||
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David Autor |
MIT | Bio/Vote History | ||
When countries adopt beggar-thy-neighbor trade/currency policies, bilateral trade agreements are a powerful tool for disciplining behavior
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Katherine Baicker |
University of Chicago | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Marianne Bertrand |
Chicago | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Raj Chetty |
Harvard | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Judith Chevalier |
Yale | Bio/Vote History | ||
Measuring the social cost of the environmental distortion and the social cost of the trade distortion is hard to do definitively.
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Janet Currie |
Princeton | Bio/Vote History | ||
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David Cutler |
Harvard | Bio/Vote History | ||
Theory is clear that we cannot make such statements outside of the first best.
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Angus Deaton |
Princeton | Bio/Vote History | ||
I see the point, but it seems impossible not to want to reserve judgment on a case by case basis.
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Darrell Duffie |
Stanford | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Aaron Edlin |
Berkeley | Bio/Vote History | ||
Such a broad proclamation seems overstated. Relatedly, are the trade restraints on Iran bad on balance because of distortions?
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Barry Eichengreen |
Berkeley | Bio/Vote History | ||
Theory of the Second Best suggests strongly that "it depends."
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Ray Fair |
Yale | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Pinelopi Goldberg |
Yale | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Claudia Goldin |
Harvard | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Austan Goolsbee |
Chicago | Bio/Vote History | ||
Depends on how big the distortion is in the status quo
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Michael Greenstone |
University of Chicago | Bio/Vote History | ||
Yes but new research sez benefits of trade smaller than old view Greenhouse gases impt exception b/c global impact of climate change.
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Robert Hall |
Stanford | Bio/Vote History | ||
Policymakers seem to think that granting the right to export to the US is a valuable privilege that comes at some cost to the US.
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Bengt Holmström |
MIT | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Caroline Hoxby |
Stanford | Bio/Vote History | ||
If there a true distortion (e.g. environmental) that needs correction, it should be addressed directly, not through distorting trade.
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Kenneth Judd |
Stanford | Bio/Vote History | ||
These arguments are often used by protectionists who use these issues to block freer trade.
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Anil Kashyap |
Chicago Booth | Bio/Vote History | ||
OK to threaten it, but losing a deal over this would be bad policy; this reasoning seems to make it much harder to reach deals.
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Pete Klenow |
Stanford | Bio/Vote History | ||
Income growth and technology transfer through free trade could actually improve environmental and labor standards.
-see background information here |
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Jonathan Levin |
Stanford | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Eric Maskin |
Harvard | Bio/Vote History | ||
If the labor or environmental practices are bad enough, they should have primacy.
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William Nordhaus |
Yale | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Maurice Obstfeld |
Berkeley | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Emmanuel Saez |
Berkeley | Bio/Vote History | ||
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José Scheinkman |
Columbia University | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Richard Schmalensee |
MIT | Bio/Vote History | ||
In many, perhaps most cases I would agree, but I don't see how one can argue that the trade distortion is always more important.
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Hyun Song Shin |
Princeton | Did Not Answer | Bio/Vote History | |
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Nancy Stokey |
University of Chicago | Bio/Vote History | ||
This question is to broad/vague to be meaningful. Specific instances would probably lead to different answers.
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Richard Thaler |
Chicago Booth | Bio/Vote History | ||
Poor question. Trade deals are negotiated. The word "refusing" is an odd choice.
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Christopher Udry |
Northwestern | Bio/Vote History | ||
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Luigi Zingales |
Chicago Booth | Bio/Vote History | ||
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