What do Americans think about free trade?

Matthew Benjamin reports on a new Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll: Americans Souring on Free Trade Amid Optimism About Economy (Jan 19):

More Americans are expressing doubts about the economic payoff from free trade even as optimism about the economy hits a five-year high.

By a margin of 68 percent to 31 percent, respondents in a new Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll said the economy is doing well -- the highest percentage since 2001. At the same time, 41 percent agreed that free trade has hurt the economy, versus 28 percent who said it's helped....

Public sentiment on trade has reversed from 10 years ago, when almost 4 in 10 Americans said it helped the economy and 3 in 10 said it hurt....

The poll of 1,344 adults was taken Jan. 13 to Jan. 16 and had an error margin of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Opinions on trade varied more, both by income and party affiliation. While only 18 percent of Democrats said free trade has helped the economy, 41 percent of Republicans agreed, and more than twice as many respondents earning more than $100,000 said trade helped as those earning less than $40,000. 

Contrasting results from early December 2006 are described in the second half of this post (44% find free trade agreements a good thing for the country, 35% a bad thing - see below).

A detailed report on the poll, conducted by phone from Jan 13 to Jan 16, may be found here: Public Backs Democrats’ 100 Hours Agenda, But Asks Congress To Focus On Iraq .

Here's the key question.  The results are actually a little more discouraging that Benjamin's story indicated.  Hardly anyone who thinks trade helps thinks its helped a lot.  A lot of the people who think its hurt, think its hurt a lot (5% think it helped a lot, 22% think it hurt a lot).  This question is phrased in a pretty general way, and doesn't refer to any specific program.  It just seems to tap into a general sense of angst about foreign competition.

The Pew Center published distinctly more upbeat, and detailed, survey results last month: Free Trade Agreements Get a Mixed Review (Dec 19). 

These questions are tied a little more specifically to specfic programs - the negotiation of trade agreements reducing barriers to trade; although there is no distinction made between agreements, and preferential trade and multilateral agreements are lumped together.  There are a lot more questions here delving into the structure of the opinions.

 

So, how do American economists compare to normal Americans?  Robert Whaples examined the views of economists in a recent article in The Economists' Voice: Do Economists Agree on Anything? Yes! (November 2006, subscription required). 

He found:

Economists overwhelmingly favor free trade—apparently, the freer the better. As the Supplemental Table... indicates, the overwhelming majority (87.5%) agree that the U.S. should eliminate remaining tariffs and other barriers to trade. Even more (90.1%) disagree with the suggestion that the U.S. should restrict employers from outsourcing work to foreign countries. Apparently, many economists consider U.S. anti-dumping laws to be protectionist, as 61.3% agree that they should be removed, while 25.1% disagree.

Comments

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I think that North Americans hate free trade due their love for money.