At least according to Vermont’s socialist senator Bernie Sanders, in a Wall Street Journal piece he wrote last week.

As expected, he drew deadly counter-battery fire from people who understand the consequences of coercive interference with peaceful human action. Here are two from friends of mine:

LETTERS
A Senator’s Obtuseness Regarding Economics
If Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) really thinks trade causes poverty, he should encourage the Vermont legislature to erect high tariff barriers against goods from the other 49 states (“Free Trade Treaties Mean Impoverishment,” Letters to the Editor, Oct. 4). Or perhaps he can organize a “boycott Vermont” campaign and encourage companies to refuse to sell goods and services to Vermonters.

Just think, if the citizens of Vermont no longer face competition from outside the state, they could open up auto plants and steel mills, reopen shuttered textile factories, and cultivate every acre of open space and forest land with crops. Using Sen. Sanders’s flawed logic — he also claims free trade has been a bane to Mexico, but a boon to China — this would be a windfall for the state. But the more probable outcome, at least if 99% of economists who have ever lived are right, is that the standard of living of Vermonters would plummet. But at least they would then be closer to the vaunted goal of equality that Sen. Sanders seems to cherish more than freedom, consumer choice, and wealth creation.

Roger R. Ream
Washington

Sen. Sanders asserts that Mexico’s “agricultural sector has been decimated by cheap exports from American agribusiness.” To the contrary, Mexico’s agricultural markets have been roiled by high corn prices caused by our subsidy-fueled demand for ethanol. Earlier this year, the Mexican government imposed price controls on tortillas because of sharp price increases caused by American corn demand.

To give the senator his due, he’s correct that Carlos Slim’s billions are obscene. However, since he’s such a careful reader of Mary O’Grady’s columns, he should know that Mr. Slim’s wealth is not symptomatic of “the kind of economic development championed” by her. Indeed, in a Jan. 28, 2005, column, Ms. O’Grady describes Carlos Slim as the beneficiary of “mind-boggling privileges.”

E. Frank Stephenson
Chairman
Department of Economics
Berry College
Mount Berry, Ga.