These special-interests have the money and political clout for influencing politicians to pass laws favorable to them. Politicians in turn play on the fears of uninformed voters to rally support for these laws. YOU and all other ordinary consumers. Protectionism is a misnomer. The only people protected by tariffs, quotas and trade restrictions are those engaged in uneconomic and wasteful activity.
Free trade is the only philosophy compatible with international peace and prosperity.
Both Sides Lose. A trade war in which both sides lose. But all too often a depressed economy is not the only negative outcome of a trade war . . . British tariffs provoked the American colonists to revolution, and later the Northern-dominated U.S. government imposed restrictions on Southern cotton exports a major factor leading to the American Civil War. Within a year, over 25 other governments had retaliated by passing similar laws.