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WSJ Opinion: Potomac Watch

Trade Historian Douglas Irwin on Trump's Unprecedented Tariff Shock

WSJ Opinion: Potomac Watch

The Wall Street Journal

Society & Culture, News

42.7K Ratings

🗓️ 14 April 2025

⏱️ 31 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Paul Gigot interviews Dartmouth economist Douglas Irwin on why Trump's tariffs are unlike any other in U.S. history, how they will change the global trading system, and what to do about the special case of China. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:32.6

From the opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal, this is Potomac Watch.

0:44.7

The biggest story of 2025 so far, certainly from the point of view of the economy, is Donald Trump's use of tariffs to try to remake the global trading and financial system. The president

0:50.6

has imposed the highest U.S. tariffs in a century, and the world is trying to adjust

0:55.6

to this Trump tariff shock. Our guest today, on Potomac Watch, is a man well placed to talk about

1:02.0

the Trump tariffs, whether there are any comparable experiments like this in U.S. history,

1:07.1

and whether or not they will succeed in bringing back American manufacturing, as President

1:12.7

Trump says he wants.

1:14.1

Our guest is Doug Irwin, a professor of economics at Dartmouth College.

1:18.0

He's the author of several books, notably related to us today, clashing over commerce,

1:23.9

a history of U.S. trade policy.

1:30.7

Welcome, Professor Irwin. Thank you for taking the time for being here. As it happens, I was just rereading your chapter on Smoot-Hawley in 1930, which seems to have a

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