R Street Institute

Policy Studies Agriculture

Subsidies, Tariffs and Trade Wars: A Terrible Harvest for U.S. Agriculture

by Clark Packard
Sept 14, 2020
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Key Points

The Trump administration’s trade policies have been a disaster for America’s farmers and ranchers.
While there are legitimate concerns about China’s commercial practices that need to be confronted, the Trump administration’s trade war has only damaged farmers while failing to force major changes to Beijing’s economic model.
The bailout program the Trump administration devised to help farmers suffering from trade retaliation is poorly designed and over the long run, will make it more challenging to open foreign markets.

Perhaps all of this damage to the American economy, and particularly the agricultural economy, might be justified if China were changing its economic model in a market-oriented way, but early evidence suggests that not much has changed.

Image credit:  LALS STOCK

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