U.S. policy in recent years has not been favorable to free trade. Former president Donald Trump boasted that he was a “tariff man” while imposing tariffs on steel, aluminum, and finished goods such as washing machines. Trump also decided against having the United States join the Trans‐Pacific Partnership and demanded that the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) be renegotiated, though the ultimate revisions were relatively minor. (See “Is NAFTA 2.0 Better than Nothing?” Winter 2018–2019.) While President Biden has scaled back some of Trump’s tariffs, he has kept and even extended others. Free trade could use a friend right about now.
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- United States of America
