Globalization is dead, at least that’s the verdict of a seemingly endless stream of commentators. But as ever in economics, the story isn’t quite so simple. The prevailing account runs something like this: tariffs first introduced by President Trump, kept in place by President Biden and now turbocharged in Trump’s second term, signal a new age of economic nationalism.
According to this view, we are witnessing the start of a grand retreat from the open trading system that has defined the past few decades. The world is turning inwards, and the era of global integration is drawing to a close. But this story doesn’t sit comfortably with the facts. Far from collapsing, global trade volumes have continued to rise and today sit near record highs. If this is the dawn of deglobalization, it is a curiously open one.
