Open Minds, Open Markets, Open Borders - Yeah, They're All Good Things Nick Gillespie - Reason
go to original May 1, 2015

Open the Borders - to Goods and People! (ReasonTV)

Open minds, open source, open bars - openness is usually seen as a great virtue.

But when it comes to open borders for immigrants and open markets for free trade, US Democrats and Republicans sound more like the "they took our jobs!" rednecks on South Park than the wise statesmen they claim to be.

President Obama supports the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which would lower trade barriers among a dozen countries. But leading Democrats - including Harry Reid, former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley, and progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren are opposed. And Hillary Clinton, who supported the deal while she served as secretary of state, is now hedging as she seeks her party’s presidential nomination.

There are intellectual property provisions that are troubling but that’s not what most opponents are bothered by. Democrats have long insisted on “fair trade” rather than free trade, which makes it harder for poorer countries to compete with the U.S. by creating rules and regulations that raise their costs.

If there’s one thing that virtually all economists agree on, it’s that reducing trade barriers creates a richer, more prosperous, and more peaceful world. Former advisers to both George W. Bush and Barack Obama have signed an open letter urging fast-track approval of the Trans Pacific Partnership for the same reason that Adam Smith touted free trade in The Wealth of Nations: “It is the maxim of every prudent master of a family never to attempt to make at home what it will cost him more to make than to buy.” As it is with families, so it is with nations.

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