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Abstract: "Samuelson's Concern" and "Kindleberger Trap" are cited as justifications for trade protectionism under the Trump administration. After reviewing Samuelson 's and Kindleberger 's trade theories, this paper finds that both Samuelson and Kindleberger are actually proponents of free trade, and that their common concern is falling US competitiveness due to its economic model, domestic institutional rules, and unilateralism. Both the "Samuelson 's Concern" and "Kindleberger Trap" are distortions of Samuelson 's and Kindleberger 's original theories and the arguments ' defense of protectionism cannot overcome the challenges confronting the U.S. and will destabilize international economic order.
Keywords: trade protectionism, Samuelson 's Concern, Kindleberger Trap, international economic order
JEL Classification Codes: F15, F40
DOI:1 0.19602/j .chinaeconomist.2019.9.03
1.Introduction
Amid rising U.S. trade protectionism and the China-U.S. trade tussle, two U.S. economists have received renewed attention. One is Paul Samuelson, a Nobel Prize laureate in economics and economics professor at MIT. In his "Where Ricardo and Mill Rebut and Confirm Arguments of Mainstream Economists Supporting Globalization" published in the Journal of Economic Perspectives in 2004, Paul Samuelson pointed out that under certain conditions, China-U.S. trade will threaten long-term U.S. interests (Samuelson, 2004). This paper was lauded by U.S. conservatives and simplified as "Samuelson's Concern" that "China-U.S. trade hurts U.S. interests." It became the theoretical banner for trade protectionists in the recent China-U.S. trade spat.
The other economist that I am going to talk about is Charles P. Kindleberger, a U.S. economic historian and professor of economics emeritus at MIT. In The World in Depression, 1929-1939, he blamed the Great Depression of 1929-1933 on the U.S. reluctance to take over leadership of the world economy when Britain no longer could (Kindleberger, 1973). Joseph Nye, a neoliberal scholar on international relations and former U.S. assistant secretary of defense, described this view as "Kindleberger Trap." He said that "the U.S. should be cautious about chaos in global order arising from China's evasion of responsibility for providing open market as a public good."
From the angles of two-way trade and the multilateral international economic system, both Samuelson's Concern and Kindleberger Trap are cited to justify U.S. protectionism, evasion of international responsibilities, and attempts to contain China. This paper strives to offer an objective and fair commentary on Samuelson's Concern and...