How U.S.Trade Policy Can Overcome Doha's Failings

Leading the Way: How U.S.Trade Policy Can Overcome Doha's Failings

. . . increased trade does not require new trade agreements. Through unilateral liberalization, policymakers can achieve the U.S. objectives of the Doha Round: better opportunities for American businesses,more affordable products for consumers, improved prospects for farmers and producers in developing countries, alleviation of poverty, and greater international receptivity to U.S. policies.
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U.S. tariffs and quotas are not assets to be relinquished only in exchange for better access abroad. In fact, they are liabilities that raise the costs of production for U.S. producers and the cost of living for American consumers.

Read it all (you'll find the pdf file at the above link). In today's WSJ Bernard K. Gordon writes on Plan B for plurilateralists: What to do if Doha goes down

The initial step would be to tie together these separate FTAs [General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade's artlce 24, Nafta, Cafta, and others] into a broader group of nations that share America's free trade goals. Some in Europe are in that category: Britain, the Netherlands, several in Scandinavia and very probably Germany. They seen hardly willing to continue supporting the French-EU insistence on agricultural policies that have stalled the Doha Round.. . .
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Just as with the existing bilateral and regional FTAs, the new plurilateral free trade group would exist alongside, rather than substitute for , the multilateral system at the heart of the present Doha round, which has evidently come on hard times. The key advantage of plurilateralism would be to continue the widening trade liberalization, rather than being stymied by the split between what Robert Zoellick called the "can do" and the "won't do" nations.

But to get the ball rolling the U.S. must return to its traditional position of trade leadership.

I propose an even more drastic measure: the USA should abolish all trade tariffs. The resulting boom in trade will bring about a period of prosperity in our country and across the world that will outshine anything we've experienced.