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Simon Lester

The Latest from Katherine Tai on WTO Dispute Settlement Reform

Here are some exchanges from a House Ways & Means Committee hearing last week between members of Congress and U.S. Trade Rep. Katherine Tai about the state of WTO dispute settlement reform. Are there any definitive answers in here as to where things are going and when they will

What Is the Economic Purpose of the GATT/WTO? Free Trade/Anti-Protectionism vs. Market Access

In his latest Trade Talks podcast, my friend Chad Bown has covered a topic that he and I have discussed several times: What is the economic purpose of the GATT/WTO? I assume he knew his podcast would generate a reaction from me, and I don't want to

Another Canada - Dairy TRQs Panel

When I say "another" in the title, I mean that in two senses: a second USMCA Canada - Dairy TRQs panel brought by the U.S.; and another one to complement the one recently brought by New Zealand under the CPTPP. The U.S. first written submission in

Guest Post: The EU’s Industrial Strategy and Supply “Resilience”

This is a guest post from Victor Crochet, Trade lawyer and PhD student at Cambridge University In response to the United States of America (“US”) Inflation Reduction Act and regained interest in industrial policies, the European Union (“EU”) recently announced its Green Deal Industrial Plan. The EU’s goal with

First CPTPP Panel Composed

As noted on the blog here, in May 2022 New Zealand filed the first ever CPTPP consultations request, relating to Canadian measures "concerning the allocation of dairy tariff rate quotas (TRQs) under CPTPP (dairy TRQ allocation measures)." A panel request was filed in November 2022. On March 9,

Japan Joins the MPIA

There seems to be a bit of momentum with the MPIA these days. There was the recently issued Colombia - Frozen Fries award, which MPIA Arbitrator Joost Pauwelyn told us about. And now Japan is joining the arrangement, as METI just announced: More than three years have passed since the

One More Time on Manufacturing and Trade Balances

Rob Atkinson was nice enough to respond to my post on manufacturing and trade balances. I have thoughts on a lot of the points he made, but to keep the debate as simple and clear as possible, I'm going to try to focus on a few key issues,

Manufacturing and Trade Balances: A Response from Rob Atkinson

This is a response from Rob Atkinson of ITIF to my post on Manufacturing and Trade Balances: Recently Simon Lester and I got in a Twitter debate about the importance of the trade deficit and manufacturing. Interesting as far as these things go, but at some point you can only

Manufacturing and Trade Balances

Recently, I tweeted this about the trade balance: Ro Khanna's Twitter bio says "Trade surplus again." I wish people would think more deeply about the trade balance. Here are some good pieces to read: https://cato.org/blog/trade-deficit-disorder… https://cato.org/testimony/americas-misunderstood-trade-deficit… https://cato.

New Paper on "The Extension of Legal Precedent": How Much Reliance on Precedent Is Too Much?

Precedent in trade law is a hot topic these days. Jeffrey Kucik, Lauren Peritz, and Sergio Puig have a new article out called "Legalization and Compliance: How Judicial Activity Undercuts the Global Trade Regime." This is the abstract: The crisis facing the World Trade Organization illustrates the trade-off