Free Trade Is Superior to Protectionism

Before I begin, however, I must make an argument for my sources. Both the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute are, at the very least, semi-reliable sources who, by far, are above the level of "neoconservative rant", especially in the case of the latter, and they rely on peer-revewed outside sources for most of their arguments, as evidenced in the two sources I cited from. In addition, they are certainly more reliable than Wikipedia. Finally, my opponent doesn't seem to understand that: "Debate resolution, definitions, rules, and structure cannot be changed in the middle of the debate. " He does not have the authority, especially in round 2, to make new rules. I will continue to use articles from both sources. I. Brief History of Trade PolicyThe argument that tariffs cause development is an old one, but one that doesn't stad up to scrutiny. For example, around 1940, countries in Middle and South America and Africa went through a Import Substitution Industrialization Phase, in which they protected their fledgling industies by levying very high tariffs on imports. It worked for a while, but eventually, the system failed, and they were forced to take costly loans which, coupled with the Structural Adjustment Policies, basically turned thoes economies to almost nothing. In other words, tariffs don't really protect growing economies. America's economy grew because of other reasons, like its free-market capitalism and low taxes. This applies more to the microeconomical standpoint, but it has basically the same implications on the macroscopic level: "But if consumers are forced to indirectly subsidize inefficient domestic producers for eighty years in the hope that they will one day become competitive, then the proposal sounds far less appealing. The fact that those espousing the infant industry argument never even mention the time frame just shows how little thought they've actually given to their proposal. "[1]Fledgling industries have a mechanism for staying alfoat for a couple of years - the loan: " Plenty of new firms, especially sole proprietorships, don't make money in their first few years of operation. But so long as the present value of the firm's expected future cash flows is positive, the firm's owners should be able to borrow money to finance the first few years as they develop experience, name brand trust, etc. "[1]On the more relevant macroscopic level, the U. S. was in the middle of its industrial revolution, while the British had already had most of theirs. Free trade forced British industries to compete with the world, making them better and more efficient. That allowed the Britain to experience its industrial revolution sooner than countries like the U. S. , where tariffs subsidized inefficient and failing businesses. The U. S. eventually did surpass Britain in exports, but only because of the rapid growth in population and capital relative to Britain. [2]Overall, the argument that tariffs are responsible for economic development is a bad one because it implies that correlation proves causation, and therefore, it doesn't really explain the point brought up. II. Colonial CountriesThis argument simply misrepresents the problem. Those countries' economies went down because of their policies of heavy protectionism. Between this and the Federal Reserve (specifically in Middle and South America), loans were required in those countries from organization like the IMF, which are not pure free trade associations. The one thing that features in all of my opponent's arguments here is government and loans, both of which are not synonymous with free trade. Further, what America has done in Africa is not promote globalization, but promote protectionism itself (in other words, America is protecting itself by exploting other countries). So, this argument is not very relevant to this debate, and in fact, it should support the affirming side. [3][4]III. Tariffs Here is the essential argument: "Prior to the tariff, the price of the good in the world market (and hence in the domestic market) is Pworld. The tariff increases the domestic price to Ptariff. The higher price causes domestic production to increase from QS1 to QS2 and causes domestic consumption to decline from QC1 to QC2 This has three main effects on societal welfare. Consumers are made worse off because the consumer surplus (green region) becomes smaller. Producers are better off because the producer surplus (yellow region) is made larger. The government also has additional tax revenue (blue region). However, the loss to consumers is greater than the gains by producers and the government. The magnitude of this societal loss is shown by the two pink triangles. Removing the tariff and having free trade would be a net gain for society. [5][6]Tariffs would hurt lower and middle class families by forcing them to pay higher prices for goods. Tariffs increase consumer goods, especially goods such as clothes and food. Since low income people spend a much larger percentage of their income on consumer goods, they are disproportionally hurt by tariffs. For example, even our currently fairly low tariffs transferred $11.8 billion from American consumers to farmers, amounting to an annual 'food tax' of about $100 per household. Therefore, they do not help the common man, but hurt him. [7]ConclusionTariffs have not helped developing countries, but have actually made them take out dangerous loans to non-pure free frade organizations that put those countries in an even worse position, disproportionally hurting the common man. Any argument I haven't covered is either irrelevant (levying a tariff would not solve industrial problems, like in agriculture) or is part of one of the three points I bolded. Sources[1]: . http://mises.org...[2]: Crafts, Nicholas. Britain's Relative Economic Performance, 1870–1999. London: Institute of Economic Affairs. [3]: . http://mises.org...[4]: Pulsipher, Lydia Mihelic and Alex Pulsipher. World Regional Geography Concepts. [5]: Stockman, Alan C. Introduction to Economics. [6]: Mankiw, N. Gregory. Macroeconomics. [7]: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, Agricultural Policies in OECD Countries: At a Glance 2008.