Is there any economic justification for trade barriers like tariffs and quotas or even anti-dumping laws?
Professor Bhagwati: No, but many of us have tried to get rid of it but it just doesn’t work. Particularly the EU and U.S. have set very bad examples and it’s impossible to get anything through the Congress. And while I’m a Democrat I must say that when Senator Byrd – who I was most surprised had been a Ku Klux Klan guy in Virginia is his youth and then became an icon of the Democratic Party, I could never understand that –proceeded to have what was known as the Byrd amendment under which any anti-dumping tariff which was levied against foreigners (which to begin with were simply protectionist actions), he even said that any revenues which were derived from using such tariffs against other people in what were called anti-dumping actions, that those revenues should be given to our firms which were competing with those firms – it was like double-dipping. And the astonishing thing was that our beloved Senate (they’re so self-satisfied about how brilliant they are and how the world owes the
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