> And surely in order to leverage comparative advantage, an economy would need to know how good they would be at producing every possible good.
Comparative advantage is an emergent property of trade that occurs naturally, it is the default state of being and can only be undermined by government policy.
You benefit from comparative advantage when you buy bread from the bakery instead of spending 2 hours a day baking your own bread.
Imagine how much poorer you'd be if the government put a large tax on you buying bread to force you to bake it yourself, in the name of self-sufficiency.
That's what's happening with these blanket tariffs, instead of targeting only critical defense manufacturing, Trump also wants t-shirt sweatshops to magically come back to the US despite only 4% unemployment. It's rank foolishness.
Comparative advantage is an emergent property of trade that occurs naturally, it is the default state of being and can only be undermined by government policy.
You benefit from comparative advantage when you buy bread from the bakery instead of spending 2 hours a day baking your own bread.
Imagine how much poorer you'd be if the government put a large tax on you buying bread to force you to bake it yourself, in the name of self-sufficiency.
That's what's happening with these blanket tariffs, instead of targeting only critical defense manufacturing, Trump also wants t-shirt sweatshops to magically come back to the US despite only 4% unemployment. It's rank foolishness.