‘Free trade’ has been shown to be a costly failure

President Barack Obama’s recent Asia trip is considered a failure because there was no new “free trade” agreement with South Korea. Also, a trade war looms because of China’s continued undervaluing of its currency.

Unfortunately, our president’s economic advisers seem to be out of it. It is time to recognize that “free trade” is a failure. We now have 35 years of evidence. The United States has not had a trade surplus in 35 years. Our average annual trade deficit is $650 billion. Average wages, adjusted for inflation, have fallen 12 percent.

In 1975, there were 17 million persons employed in manufacturing; now there are 13 million. When adjusted for population growth, we should have 20 million in manufacturing. We have lost seven million potential manufacturing jobs.

Free trade was to have made the United States wealthier. Instead, we have become impoverished. We have enough evidence to disprove free trade, and when evidence conflicts with the theory, we throw out the theory, not the evidence. It’s time to throw out free trade.

We need balanced trade. Nations that sell in the United States should be made to buy U.S. goods of equal value. This calls for tariffs on all nations with which we run trade deficits. Time to bring those jobs back home.

Lawrence Briskin

Centerville

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