Abstract:
The sarcasm of Baetiat almost 150 years ago quite aptly and in all seriousness covers a fair share of the arguments raised whenever foreign industries are more competitive than domestic ones. Vested interests, ranging from employers and employees to unions and elected officials, arouse support around the well-known protectionist arguments, among which the employment issue plays a central role. Such is the case with the Multifibre Agreement (MFA), which came into being under the umbrella of GATT, itself (ironically enough) born out of the recognition of the need to ensure full employment and a steadily increasing volume of real income (see GATT Preamble). This paper first gives a brief overview of the scope of the problem; attention is then drawn to certain theoretical and policybased incongruences before moving on to some statistical underpinnings.
