Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer Trade Wars, Class Wars & Globalization: Unpacking The Truth About Trade (featuring David Autor & Marc Palen)
Sep 16, 2025
Delve into the intricate world of trade policy, where it's not just about tariffs but the lives affected by decisions. Discover how globalization's promises often overlook the pain in struggling communities. Learn from experts about the true impact of trade dynamics on workforce recovery and economic inequality. The conversation challenges conventional wisdom, advocating for an inclusive trade approach that prioritizes people over profits and emphasizes cooperation over competitive advantage.
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Trade Enables Specialization And Complexity
- Trade enables specialization by letting people exchange the products of narrow expertise across wide networks.
- Without trade, societies cannot scale complex production or high-value innovation.
Reversing A Harmful Tariff Change
- Nick Hanauer recounts fighting a bad tariff change that threatened his U.S. pillow factories and successfully reversed it through meetings in Washington.
- The episode taught him how federal processes can be responsive when stakeholders push back directly.
Policy, Subsidies, And Geopolitics Skew Trade
- Chinese exporters benefited from government subsidies and lax regulation that distorted true comparative advantage.
- U.S. trade policy often served foreign-policy goals, not purely economic comparative-advantage logic.
