Optimal Tariff Theory and Its Relation to Standard Free Trade Arguments \ stacker news ~econ

pull down to refresh

Optimal Tariff Theory and Its Relation to Standard Free Trade Arguments fountain.fm/episode/0O3VVgykLV79fPeHKD7B

184 sats \ 22 comments \ @Undisciplined 18 Feb econ

From The Bob Murphy Show

Bob does a good job walking through Optimal Tariff Theory, which I’ve alluded to in a few different conversations.

One of my favorite things about Bob is that rarely if ever uses straw men but rather will steel man most things he is disagreeing with. I learned that I've had some flaws in my thinking about tariffs. It's easy to get high fives while dunking on Trump but that economist isn't a dummy. Assuming your opponents are dumb is easy these days but it's also lazy and in the long-term a mistake.

36 sats \ 14 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

Yeah, Bob is so great. He's the best econ personality out there right now.

29 sats \ 13 replies \ @kepford 18 Feb

Too bad he's a shitcoiner. Though he's been a bitcoiner for much longer. His book was one of the first I read.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @denlillaapan 18 Feb

True

0 sats \ 11 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

Is he? I’ve only heard him talk about Bitcoin and it seemed like he got it.

80 sats \ 3 replies \ @freetx 18 Feb

I think Bob did a show with Roger Ver and Bob seemed convinced by some of the arguments for BCH. But to be fair he had Stephan Livera come on after and offer the rebuttal case for Bitcoin and to me, seemed like he understood those points as well....

39 sats \ 2 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

Was it actually with Ver? I remember he had Stephen Patterson on to sort of give Roger's side of the argument.

view all 2 replies

40 sats \ 2 replies \ @kepford 18 Feb

He gets bitcoin. He also sees utility in the application of blockchain and I have tried to get what he says but it doesn't make sense to me as a dev and bitcoiner.

43 sats \ 1 reply \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

I don't know enough to know why bitcoiners don't see any utility in that. Although, the few times when I have tried to understand other blockchain applications they ultimately didn't seem very compelling.

view all 1 replies

25 sats \ 3 replies \ @kepford 18 Feb

He does work for an insurance company that uses "blockchain" that has a token. He's explained the logic on their podcast in the past.

Not talking about BCH

50 sats \ 2 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

Oh, I didn't even know where he was working now. He seems to change jobs frequently.

view all 2 replies

32 sats \ 2 replies \ @denlillaapan 18 Feb

Cool, don't know what this — will check it out

42 sats \ 1 reply \ @denlillaapan 18 Feb

Interesting... I wasn't at all familiar with this theory. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.

Also, yes, the Reason-type, beltway economist "uh, idiot, don't you know consumer s pay the tariff??" Is so unbelievably tiresome. Heard of tax incidence, you twat??

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

As far as mainstream econ models go, trade is very well validated empirically. Enough so, that I think we should take this idea seriously.

31 sats \ 2 replies \ @kepford 18 Feb

Great episode. Was gonna link it :)

43 sats \ 1 reply \ @Undisciplined OP 18 Feb

I think it's very underappreciated by us freemarket types and we end up making a strawman of the position.

24 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford 18 Feb

100% I was doing that and I know better.

Been going down the rabbit hole of different Christian faith traditions and its wild how many strawmen exist and that I had bought. Best to ask or seek out the position of the people you disagree with instead of their opposition. Strawmanning is just too easy. People take what one person says as the position and often that opinion is not the orthodox position of the group as a whole.