Tariffs and Inflation

Tariffs and Inflation Kevin Quinn, Econospeak

 Jason Furman and Janet Yellen have both suggested that cutting Trump’s tariffs would be anti-inflationary. But most economists agree that the incidence of the tariffs is for the most part on US consumers, not foreign suppliers (pace the treasonous and ignorant former president, who crowed about all the revenues we were raising from China). So how is a tax cut anti-inflationary?  There is a supply-side effect, which is all to the good, but the demand-side effects may well wash that out. So get rid of the tariffs but reverse the Trump tax cuts, which Manchin favors, through reconciliation. Taxes remain the same, so we’ve neutralized the effects on demand;  and we still get the good supply side effects of a more rational global division of labor.