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Protection or Free Trade: An Analysis of the Ideas of Henry George on International Commerce and Wages
Author(s) -
Martin Thomas L.
Publication year - 1989
Publication title -
american journal of economics and sociology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.199
H-Index - 38
eISSN - 1536-7150
pISSN - 0002-9246
DOI - 10.1111/j.1536-7150.1989.tb02139.x
Subject(s) - protectionism , george (robot) , tariff , economics , free trade , quarter (canadian coin) , free market , capital (architecture) , international economics , economic history , international trade , law , political science , politics , history , archaeology , art history
A bstract .Henry George , the 19th century American economist and social philosopher, abandoned protectionism and became a free trader when he engaged in the great tariff debate of the last quarter of his century. In the controversy, a true follower of Adam Smith, he anticipated neoclassical positions on the tariff question, particularly the Stolper‐Samuelson theory which predicts that free trade will increase the prices of the abundant factors of production relative to the prices of the scarce factors. George's concern in the great debate was labor; he was convinced that only certain interests representing capital or resource ownership would benefit from protection at the cost of labor and the enterprises in fields with more abundant resources. But the free trade effort failed and in 1894 the Wilson‐Gorman tariff increased the exactions to the highest level yet. The protectionist tide, only slowed by the Woodrow Wilson Administration, was not reversed until after World War II.