Publications: Robert D. Atkinson

The European Union wants it all—access to the U.S. market without fully reciprocal access to the EU, U.S. action against China while it free rides by exporting to China, and the freedom to restrict U.S. firms in Europe under the banner of “digital sovereignty.” It’s time for the U.S. government to say, “No more.”

Economics is about more than the economy. It also intersects public and private institutions, culture, religion, morality, and politics. Rob and Jackie explored these subjects with Benjamin Friedman, a professor of Political Economy at Harvard and author of The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth and Religion and the Rise of Capitalism.

Section 337 of the 1930 Tariff Act allows the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) to bar imports when domestic industries suffer harm due to unfair competition. Congress should expand the law to better address the unfair trade practices China uses to capture market share in advanced industries at America’s expense.

In the last few years, a growing movement has advocated “responsible” technology development and use, particularly for artificial intelligence. The problem is that many of these efforts go beyond statements of generally agreed-upon principles and attempt to impose specific, elitist values and agendas on technology development.

It is dawning on the United States that China is not just a military adversary but an economic one. The two countries are at war for primacy in both innovation and production capacity as much of Beijing’s economic gain in advanced industries comes at Washington’s loss—and vice versa. This trend is likely to continue.

The U.S. is currently lacking most if not all of identified characteristics that are associated with competitive advantage, but there are potential steps that can be taken moving forward.

China did not cause income inequality. And it is only partially responsible for low productivity and wage growth. But if it had lived up to its WTO obligations, the world’s faith in globalization would have suffered much less than it has.

For many years Korea had the honor of leading the world in industrial robot adoption. But that lead is now in doubt, as other nations, especially China, but also Japan and the United States, saw much faster increases in robot adoption in 2021, according to the International Federation of Robotics.

From the founding of the republic to the turn of the millennium, America’s core economic creed was growth. But the new prevailing wisdom forswears growth for the sake of other goals: saving the planet, redistributing income, living simply, and the like.

Rob and Jackie sat down with Stefan Link, Associate Professor of History at Dartmouth University, to discuss Henry Ford and his “open door policy” regarding methods and engineering.