Trump’s Factory Revival Is Happening

Think what you will of President Trump’s chaotic-seeming tariff policies. The ostensible goal — the revitalization of US manufacturing — is of decisive importance for the success of the nation. Or put another way, America is unlikely to maintain global primacy with finance, services, and high-tech alone. All the capital, nice hotels, and mind-bending apps in the world can’t replace factories. While tariffs may prove a good start toward this goal, they are hardly sufficient.

Tariffs are hardly a MAGA invention, of course. On the contrary, the United States has levied protective tariffs almost from its origins as a nation. Tariffs and import substitution formed one of the central pillars of Alexander Hamilton’s political economy.

Today, Europe screams about Trumpian tariffs, but the Continent has been reluctant to lower its own historically high protective barriers, most of them based on non-tariff regulatory policies. Canada, too, has been very protectionist and for a long time. Now, after decades in which Washington put global integration over its own workers and industry, America is playing the same game.

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