The efforts of House Ways and Means Committee chairman Dave Camp (R–MI) to implement long-overdue trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea may soon pay off, providing a much-needed boost to the stagnant U.S. economy. Camp has rebuffed demands from the Obama Administration and Senate Finance Committee chairman Max …
In 1987, President Ronald Reagan explained the relationship between federal spending and the U.S. trade deficit: “Here in the United States, we must restrain government spending. Our trade deficit in goods and services reflects that, over the past several years, we have spent more than we have produced—and we have …
Today marks the 81st anniversary of the passage of the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act. Actor and economist Ben Stein famously explained this legislation in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, the classic John Hughes movie that was released 25 years ago this month: In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort …
The AFL-CIO recently ran expensive, full-page ads in several inside-the-beltway publications highlighting the threat of violence facing union leaders in Colombia. Their ads left out the fact that Colombian labor leaders currently visiting our nation’s capital are more likely to be murdered here than when they return to their home …
The Obama Administration recently made its strongest statement yet in support of free trade agreements. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton commented on the challenges of implementing trade agreements: It does mean you have to take on entrenched interests and respond to concerns about new competition, while making the case over …
The U.S. Commerce Department today announced that the trade deficit for April was $43.7 billion. This number is misleading because it implies a “deficit” in terms of dollars leaving the country, which is not the case. For example, the trade deficit numbers do not include the billions of dollars foreigners …
The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis just announced that the trade deficit for March increased to $48.2 billion. The federal budget deficit plays a major role in creating U.S. trade deficits. When the government sells Treasury bonds to finance the budget deficit, it competes with U.S. exporters and private borrowers …
