The Canadian Libertarian

  It has been a little over a year since Javier Milei took office, pledging to take a chainsaw to the bloated bureaucracy and to "blow up" the central bank. While the ultimate effects of his neo-liberal reforms will take years to manifest, the libertarian firebrand has made impressive inroads in his efforts to roll back the Argentinian state. When Javier took office Argentina was in dire economic straits. Poverty was at 45% and rising, the economy had not grown for more than a decade, and the Argentinian Peso was experiencing hyperinflation. With aggressive budget cuts - ironically, aided by the very hyperinflation that was ruining the economy - Milei managed to tame inflation.

 In 1930, interventionist President Herbert Hoover imposed steep tariffs ( an average rate of 60% ) on many industrial and agricultural goods with the passage of Smoot-Halley. The imposition of these increases, which led to the second-highest tariff rates in American history, prompted a sharp retaliatory response from affected European nations, who were also in a serious recession. These retaliatory tariffs devasted the export-dependent American agricultural sector, the collapse of which caused the widespread failure of rural banks. Were it not for Smoot-Halley, and other measures taken by Hoover that aggravated the economic situation, the Great Depression would have been just another brief panic. How then, should Justin Trudeau or his successor respond to the 25% across-the-board tariffs announced yesterday by the US president? There is no question that tariffs on the import of Canadian goods will hurt Canadian producers. That is the point. Nevertheless, our politicians should not...