The Math Ain’t Mathing: Why High Tariff Schemes Will Always Lower GDP

A great deal of blame for declining GDP has been placed on the impact of imports by the national conservative and protectionist crowds. Pierre Lemieux does an excellent job explaining why imports have no direct impact on GDP here, so there’s really no reason to cover that ground again. It is sufficient to revisit the fact that GDP only accounts for domestic production and consumption; the net export variable simply cancels out the part of consumption measurement that accounts for consumption of imports, reducing the effect to net zero.