That's why tariffs tend to go up sharply but come down more slowly (neatly expanded on by Douglas Irwin in his recent appearance on Money Talks)

There's a big difference between trade deals and trade agreements. Trade deals are limited, short term, and often superficial (remember IPEF?). Trade agreements are comprehensive, long term, substantive, and require Congressional approval. US isn't doing the latter.

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Declining trade volume is the goal, a feature not a bug

In which I take us back to the 1810s to find a previously frenetic period of US trade policy activity .... Jeff Stein White House eased China tariffs after warnings of harm to ‘Trump’s people’ washingtonpost.com/business/2025/…

NEW: "The US economy is a phenomenally powerful beast." Dmitry Grozoubinski recommends the best books on tariffs: fivebooks.com/best-books/tar… Books by Anthea Roberts, Nicolas Lamp 🇺🇦🇵🇸, Douglas Irwin, Richard Baldwin, Henry Gao, Weihuan Zhou, Jennifer Hillman, Joost Pauwelyn

A lot of people think American wages have stagnated during the era of hyper-globalization since the mid-1990s. In fact, that's when American wage growth ACCELERATED. noahpinion.blog/p/so-why-did-u…

Conventional wisdom check....

The ancients were onto something....

Greg Mankiw on whether economics is a science (WSJ)

Milei goes after the protected industries of Tierra del Fuego (click on image) on.ft.com/43WGVF5 via Financial Times

Gulp . . . getting 1930s vibes . . .

It’s been 95 years since the Smoot-Hawley Act, leading to 20% tariffs that widened and deepened the Great Depression. Some of Trump’s tariffs are just as high or higher. We must avoid repeating this historical policy mistake. youtu.be/rAMb2oa1JWc?fe…

Doug Irwin's Presidential address to the Economic History Association from Sep 2025 is now published online and open access. Great stuff! Douglas Irwin cambridge.org/core/journals/…

“We dismantled the License-Permit Raj, but the job’s not done.” - Dr. Rakesh Mohan reflects on dismantling the License Permit Raj & India’s 1991 reforms on the Ideas of India podcast with Shruti Rajagopalan. A fascinating look at how India moved from control to liberalisation, what’s

This NEW lesson details the history of U.S. tariff policy and features American Historical Association' Alexandra Levy, economics professor Douglas Irwin (Dartmouth 🌲), and history professors Eric Rauchway (UC Davis) and Sharon Ann Murphy (Providence College): c-span.org/classroom/docu…. #Tariff #GovChat