Protectionism made the Great Depression of the 1930s much worse. Although tariffs had already been rising during much of the previous decade, it was the Smoot–Hawley Tariff in the United States, and Britain’s principle of “home producers first, empire producers second, and foreign producers last,” that led to an almost complete disintegration of global markets. As a result, the volume of trade contracted by around 40 percent in the Depression’s initial years, returning international trade to its pre-World War I levels.In the succession of crises starting in 2008, the world has mostly avoided such an outcome. Not even Donald Trump’s …read more
Source:: The American Interest
