Free Trade

President Trump Stubbornly Clings to Archaic Mercantilist Economics

He who dies with the most hoarded cash does not, in fact, win.

J.D. Tuccille | 9.21.2026 7:00 AM

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(Illustration: Alla Kuzmenko/Pavel Chagochkin/Dreamstime/Fatima Ruiz/Midjourney)

Politics is an industry in which ideas demonstrated to be ineffective and morally reprehensible live on long after they should have died. That's the case with President Donald Trump's fondness for mercantilism, as he espouses hoary old nostrums about the alleged benefits of hoarding money and preventing Americans from using their capital to purchase desired goods from other countries. Like a throwback to the 18th century, the president mistakes accumulating the means of exchange for building actual prosperity, as if we'd all be better off with overstuffed wallets than with the things our funds can purchase.

You are reading The Rattler from J.D. Tuccille and Reason. Get more of J.D.'s commentary on government overreach and threats to everyday liberty.

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'Losing' Money on Voluntary Transactions?

Last week, when asked about the eternal political bogeyman of "trade deficits," Trump responded, "If we lose $50 billion a year with a country, and we say, 'we're not going to trade with you anymore,' we don't lose $50 billion a year. It's very simple. Right?"

The president's comments continued a theme he'd expounded on Truth Social, where he wrote, "If we stopped Trading with every country that we have a Deficit with, which is most of them, we would make, at least, 1.5 Trillion Dollars a year."

Earlier this month, the president threatened to entirely stop Americans from trading with businesses in countries with which the Unted States runs a........

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