By my count, the term "free trade" made 12 appearances in a front page business section article discussing political opposition to new trade deals. Of course the article is not referring to "free trade" (many of these deals increase protectionism in the form of tighter copyright and patent protection), so it could have been more accurate and saved space by just using the word "trade." The article also gets the key issues wrong. The main impact of the trade liberalization from recent trade deals has been on wages, not jobs. The structure of the selective protectionism pursued in U.S. trade policy, in which highly educated professionals (e.g. doctors and lawyers) are largely protected from international competition, while less-educated workers are deliberately placed in competition with low-paid workers in the developing world, lowers the wages of less-educated (non-college educated) workers. That is the main reason that most of the country has opposed recent trade deals. The Post should at least be able to accurately present the main predictions of economics on trade.
--Dean Baker
