Costs (Exports) Are Not Benefits (Imports)
27 August 2007
Editor, Chicago Tribune
To the Editor:
You're correct that free trade likely would create more opportunities for workers in Illinois to produce goods for export ("How free trade boosts Illinois," August 25). Never forget, though, that the ultimate benefit of trade lies not in what people must sacrifice - not in the creation of opportunities to produce output for others ("jobs") - but in the greater quantity, quality, and variety of goods and services that free trade makes possible for ordinary people to consume.
Free trade's bountiful harvest is not its exports; it is its imports.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
Editor, Chicago Tribune
To the Editor:
You're correct that free trade likely would create more opportunities for workers in Illinois to produce goods for export ("How free trade boosts Illinois," August 25). Never forget, though, that the ultimate benefit of trade lies not in what people must sacrifice - not in the creation of opportunities to produce output for others ("jobs") - but in the greater quantity, quality, and variety of goods and services that free trade makes possible for ordinary people to consume.
Free trade's bountiful harvest is not its exports; it is its imports.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
Posted by Don Boudreaux on
Tuesday February 26, 2008 at 2:43pm