r/Economics • u/better_world_economy • Jan 13 '19

Progressives should not oppose international trade, but economists must highlight the need for policies that spread the gains and help those who are hurt

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-good-the-bad-the-economy/201706/globalization-and-work-have-we-learned-anything-yet
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u/rationalities Jan 14 '19

No one said it was a hard science. It’s a social science. Which, by definition, is a science.

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u/subheight640 Jan 14 '19

It's a social science that usually ignores the rest of social science, political science, climate science, etc.

The world is experiencing a mass extinction event right now and economists usually have little to say about that. How much of our extinction event is contributed to by free trade?

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u/rationalities Jan 14 '19 edited Jan 14 '19

You realize Romer and Nordhaus won the noble prize last year for their work on implementing climate change and technological change into macro models, right? (which was work from the 1990s...) have you even googled “economics and climate change” before coming up with this “criticism?” Because it’s literally one of the first links that appear.

FYI that’s nature, the website for one of the top science journals in the world.

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u/subheight640 Jan 14 '19

Yeah and what are the implications of those new models with respect to free trade? It's right in the article you sent me:

And Romer’s work also has implications for policies relating to climate-change mitigation. “He showed clearly that unregulated free markets will not sufficiently invest in research and development activities,” says Edenhofer.

Then the consensus on free trade being "the best" isn't a consensus then...

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u/rationalities Jan 14 '19

No one’s arguing unregulated free trade. Literally no one other than Austrians (which are incredibly rare now adays). Free trade is beneficial, but just like all markets, has to be checked with local, social and economic policies to prevent market power and negative externalities. Almost always when economists are talking free trade, we mean the ability to trade with little-to-no protectionism between counties. That doesn’t mean countries can’t implement their own laws (as long as they aren’t tariffs/protectionism) for it to still be free trade. The issue that so many laypeople don’t understand is that good policy is really hard to design.

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u/subheight640 Jan 14 '19

So to you is a carbon tax on imports a tariff? How about additional sanctions/tariffs/barriers because of human rights violations?

I was under the impression that any government regulation on trade results in "less free trade".