> In classical economics, specialization is good, and industries should go to whichever country is most efficient at providing them. Any sort of national tariff

> In classical economics, specialization is good, and industries should go to whichever country is most efficient at providing them. Any sort of national tariff interferes with that: to the extent that the tariff succeeds at collecting revenue, it does it by making consumers choose an inferior product (in the sense that without the tariff, they would've chosen differently). The problem with that argument is that in a modern globalized world, what you're often doing is buying products at a lower cost because the negative externalities aren't reflected in the price. Products are often cheaper in countries with few environmental regulations and exploitative labor practices. Free trade can be a race to the bottom. The general argument that tariffs between countries that are roughly equal in terms of wages, regulations, human rights, and so on causes more economic harm than the revenue it generates seems plausible though.