Dumping on free trade: the US import trade laws

The passage of the Uruguay Round trade agreement represents a natural opportunity for us to review the policy goals of the US import trade laws, to assess how well current laws achieve those objectives, and to explore possible reforms. We argue that there are a variety of policy concerns that militate for a circumscribed set of import trade statutes. The relevant US laws, however, have largely become divorced from such national welfare considerations and are now too often a mechanism for furtive protectionism. The Uruguay Round effected some (marginal) improvements, but left the fundamental structure of the laws unchanged. We discuss possible reforms in the final selection of the paper.