Today’s Washington Examiner features an article that calls out Donald Trump on the issue of “outsourcing.” As it turns out many of the Donald’s brand name products are manufactured in Europe, China, and Central and South America. The Examiner reports that “Everything from slippers and men’s shirts to ballpoint pens and “Trump body soap” has come to the U.S. from Asian and South American countries.” Of course the point of the article is to argue that Trump is a hypocrite. While he talks the talk, asking people to boycott Oreo cookies, in his personal business practices he certainly doesn’t walk the walk. As the article notes:
Trump, who has chastised companies such as Nabisco, Ford and Boeing for outsourcing jobs to China and Mexico, has said that “laborers are paid a lot less, and the standards are worse when it comes to the environment and health care and worker safety” in countries where manufacturing is being moved to. Still, that hasn’t stopped the New York billionaire or his family from mass-producing a portion of their products overseas.
But as an economist and a consumer I take Trump’s hypocrisy as a hopeful sign. It suggests that if elected president, he will probably be ignoring his campaign promises. In looking at Trump’s past businesses dealings it seems quite clear that he is not someone who will let a little thing like political promises get in the way of his personal bottom line. A 45% tariff on Chinese imports? (Which by the way is actually a 45% tax on mostly lower income American consumers.) I’d say highly unlikely so long as Ivana Trump brand shoes and Trump ties (only two of the many products he has produced overseas) are imported from Hong Kong.
In other words, I believe that the Donald will be very much like other politicians; when faced with a choice between keeping a campaign promise and preserving his own self interest, he will choose the latter. It is quite clear that if the US pursued the kind of protectionist trade policies that Trump is advocating it is his own bottom line, along with American consumers generally, that will suffer the consequences. Because of this I believe that, despite the rhetoric, we will continue to have relatively free trade with most countries around the world. Happily this will be one time where a politicians personal interest will actually coincide with the economic welfare of the country as a whole.
