+1

"Do you sacrifice the benefits of any trade for your own citizens in order to not associate with what is properly considered an enemy?"

Ultimately, it comes down to a question of morals, I completely agree! Do you hold to the line that altruism is unacceptable or do you take a bit here or a bit there because it is monetarily profitable? That's a personal judgment call - or a policy one at a governmental level. What I point out is the moral hypocrisy on the part of the author to excoriate altruism in one paragraph and yet call for its exploitation in the next!

"Removing tariffs and trade restrictions would still leave such trade as unjust."

The situation will remain unjust until the Chinese government alters its state of affairs. The real question is "will the imposition of tariffs encourage the political change necessary to affect the Chinese government's policies." No one knows for sure. There is one other question, however: will the Chinese government continue to raid other nations' intellectual property until they are forced to change? That one is a resounding YES.

Lol, yes indeed. But first they will take away all of your healthy food and give it to someone else.
Then we get to eat the gloriously wonderful pourage and tasty cakes when we are "good".

But that's part of the point: although the US government may be getting out of the way, the Chinese government sure isn't! Free trade has to be free on both sides. The nominal idea of "unilateral free trade" is nonsense. Trade must by definition be bilateral to be a product of freedom! Unilateral trade is a bi-product of slavery to some degree!

"When other government slap tariffs on their imports, they are taxing their consumers."

Agreed. As you point out "they are sacrificing their taxpayers and consumers for the benefit of their cronies." While its great just to think about the consumer, in this case it is the producer - specifically the Chinese producer - who is getting taken advantage of because the wealth is going to Chinese bureaucrats rather than the producers. If you are going to complain about altruism, you have to be concerned about it on both sides.

Good point, at least in part.
A value judgement as to whether one should trade with a group/society that one finds abhorrent is a different question. Do you sacrifice the benefits of any trade for your own citizens in order to not associate with what is properly considered an enemy?

Removing tariffs and trade restrictions would still leave such trade as unjust.

The Marxist post modernist want nothing but pourage be made for us, nothing else except when we are good...they may let us eat cake.

"You seem to imply that "unilateral free trade" would somehow force people to buy things that they don't want to."

Not at all. Who benefits from cheap Chinese goods? American consumers perhaps, but the bigger one is the Chinese government. Who suffers? The Chinese manufacturers and laborers. Why? Because their profits and wage rates are being held artificially low by the government and what would be going to those manufacturers and laborers is instead being rerouted to corrupt government officials.

My dad was a consulting engineer (he speaks fluent Mandarin Chinese). He would find US manufacturers needing parts sourced and would take their designs to China to have them mass-produced. But the business he operated and ran was actually in the name of a Chinese national. Why? Because part of every business deal involved bribes, and US business law forbids the payment of such. So the business partner (as his only contribution) would pay the bribes to the local (and sometimes regional) officials in order to obtain the necessary government approvals for the jobs.

You are correct in that no one is being forced to purchase the cheap goods. The point you overlook is that there are people being forced to manufacture those cheap goods and who do not commensurately benefit from their individual labors. The communist state is a slave state. Trade with them is support of that state.

Subsidizing any production distorts the best use of resources. On average, most people are worse off from such interventions.

However, in the short run, the beneficiaries of the subsidy can be made much better off. And in the long run we are all dead, as the saying goes.

With the market being individual people choosing what price and value of goods they want to purchase. And what they want to make.

Statists like to change the word market into what the government dictates may or should be produced and exchanged rather than individual choices.

You seem to imply that "unilateral free trade" would somehow force people to buy things that they don't want to. The emphasis should be on the individual. China doesn't trade with the USA as a whole. Rather millions and millions of transactions take place by individual people. Each person buying a pair of shoes is better off IF they are freely buying those shoes. If the Chinese government subsidies them so they are even cheaper then that is even MORE beneficial.

I think you have the altruism side on the wrong side of the coin, so to speak.

Did you possibly misread the word "fair"?
The fair trade crowd is trying to implement tariffs which is what you point out in 3 and 4 as being negative things.

The fair trade crowd may have as a stated goal to ultimately lower tariffs but there means is to INCREASE governmental intervention and control into the interchanges between individual people. Thus, it is a bit masochistic. At least in the short run. If it achieved a long run lowering of tariffs and other barriers, then perhaps the ends will justify the means. We shall see.

Speaking with Indian consumers, as one example, they cite horrendously poor quality of Chinese goods as the reason they would rather have more reliable American products, even if they have to pay more. The Chinese workers may work for less pay and work longer hours, but they are poorly trained and have poor quality control.

I respectfully disagree. Almost totally:
1). Chinese workers work harder and for less money than entitled and lazy American workers who refuse to accept they are outbid in the labor market

2) our govt took us off the gold standard which allowed them to print money while temporarily hiding inflation. A gold standard would have prevented the continuation of an imbalance in trade like we have now by weakening the dollar and making Chinese prices relatively higher

3). Tariffs are essentially domestic taxes which just slow down trade both ways

4) tariffs will result in less economic activity in total

The problem we have is that our government has generally stayed out of the way, while other governments have been up to their armpits controlling the market. American goods generally have double or triple digit tariffs in other countries, cutting us off from their markets.

Americans are the most creative, productive labor force in the world, and if we had been able to stay in a real competitive market, the Chinese goods you buy may have been even cheaper by now, if made by an American firm seeking to get ahead of competition.

My little company buys 70% of its parts from China and then assembles them in the USA. 25% tariffs on all chinese imports would increase materials costs by about 17%, and force us to raise prices to the customers who would stay with it by about 8%. Since chinese stuff is 1/3 the price of equivalent made-in-america stuff, we would STILL buy from china and our remaining customers would be paying the duty. Balance of trade with china would stay the same actually, or actually rise because of the newly china imposed reciprocal tariffs

So, I just dont get it. It looks like the government gets a windfall tax increase paid for by our customers, our output falls due to higher prices along with employment of the people who assemble our stuff. The chinese economy stays pretty much the same since we keep buying from them, and US companies sell less to china since the prices of US goods is higher.

So, I repeat. None of this makes sense. Government should just get out of the way.

"Given the benefits of free trade, the best policy any government can adopt is unilateral free trade (with other non-enemy governments), which means: free trade regardless of whether other governments also adopt freer trade."

Absolutely not! The author begins by excoriating the self-flagellation of altruism, then goes on to praise the altruistic nature of unilateral free trade! If the trading field is not level, one is by definition agreeing to be taken advantage of! What is more but they are condoning and even praising such action! What a load of rubbish!

Put the gold standard back into existence. That prevents countries from manipulating currencies without bad things happening to them.

Then get all tariffs and barriers repealed and let the free market deal with it.

In the case of china, if there was a gold standard, the value of the chinese yuan would have risen relative to the dollar as out trade deficit with china automatically made it happen. Chinese prices rise in terms of US$, and our purchases shift back to the USA automatically.

When Nixon abandoned the gold standard for the USA in 1971, HE started this mess. We printed money but the chinese helped us escape the inflation we should have had when we printed the dollars. Now, the inflation will come back as the chinese spend those dollars they have been hoarding right here in the USA.

There is no free lunch that someone doesnt have to pay for.

Yes, allow the market determine the price and value of goods.

Free trade is the only trade...

If a U.S. Company produces the majority of its goods in China, is it "our producer" or is it "China's Producer".

After WWII the U.S. had an amazing advantage over other countries because it had ramped up industrial production for the war and had pretty much the only undamaged industrial production in the world. We loved free trade, we could make stuff and everyone could buy it. By the 1960's the rest of the world started to recover and had newer, more efficient, factories. They protected their markets with barriers and took advantage of the lack of barriers to the U.S. markets.

By the early 70's people were talking about a post-industrial information society where we would develop IP and the rest of the world would produce goods. We had moved beyond manufacturing just like we had moved beyond agriculture. Of course it's a fallicy, we never moved beyond agriculture, we just became so good at it that we can make more than enough food with fewer people. We didn't decide that we would let the rest of the world grow our food, but we did decide that it was OK to let them make our goods.

And, of course, IP only lasts until they steal it

The traditional concept that subsidizing foreign production benefits U.S. consumers only works so long as the U.S. consumers still have their jobs. If they no longer work at the steel mill but have to get a job at McDonalds then the lower priced foreign goods will not be cheaper in terms of their labor. We are becoming a nation of fast food and hedge funds.

In the progressive post modernist world we live in: "Fair" is Unfair in reality, the affordable is unaffordable and progress is regressive.

"Given the benefits of free trade, the best policy any government can adopt is unilateral free trade (with other non-enemy governments), which means: free trade regardless of whether other governments also adopt freer trade."
Yes. Let other countries elect master negotiators to figure out whom the people should trade with. Let their people enjoy all the benefits that supposedly come with that. Let American people make their own decisions.

Terrific article.
The concept of mutually beneficial should be brought up more often in our political discourse.