Vintage clothing and furniture have great appeal and value for consumers, but when it comes to international trade, retro policies can be a horrible look for today’s complicated global economy.
Yet the U.S. is part of a worldwide trend of resurrecting a failed trade policy used heavily by developing countries like Mexico and India that focused on self-sufficiency after World War II: Import-substituting industrialization (ISI).
The Trump administration’s focus on bringing back manufacturing jobs is as likely to be successful and lasting as the historical data tell us. For many Latin American countries in the early 1970s, the economic data indicates that not only had industrial growth slowed, but also Latin America’s rapidly growing urban population was having difficult time finding industrial jobs. This should be of concern to today’s unemployed American manufacturing workers.
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