Commercial trade policy

When a government decides whether to let cheap imported steel flood the market, or to help a domestic exporter compete abroad, it is making a commercial trade policy choice. Every one of those choices helps somebody and hurts somebody else, at home and abroad — and this topic gives you the vocabulary to describe exactly which tool is doing which job.

In two minutes

Commercial trade policy is the set of government measures — tariffs, quotas, subsidies and other instruments — used to regulate a country's international trade, generally pursued either to protect domestic industry (protectionism) or to encourage open exchange (free trade), with most countries in practice adopting a mix of both.

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