Economist Thomas Sowell Alarmed Trump’s Tariffs May Spark ‘Worldwide Trade War’

Economist Thomas Sowell suggested that President Donald Trump may be taking a “ruinous” approach to tariffs and international trade.

Sowell commented on Trump’s trade policies during an interview on April 1, a day before Trump enacted sweeping tariffs on dozens of countries. The “Liberation Day” announcement, as the White House billed it, put in place a system of “reciprocity” on international trade where foreign countries are tariffed in accordance with the trade barriers they impose on the United States.

Prior to Liberation Day, Trump has vacillated on tariffs and tariff threats to allies and adversaries. Sowell was critical of Trump’s handling of foreign trade, comparing the president’s tactics to those of the 1920s that contributed to the 1929 Great Depression and the tepid U.S. recovery in the 1930s.

“It’s painful to see what a ruinous decision, from back in the 1920s, being repeated,” the 94-year-old Sowell said on an episode of “Uncommon Knowledge with Peter Robinson.” “Now, insofar as he’s using these tariffs to get various strategic things settled and that he is satisfied with that.”

“But if you set off a worldwide trade war, that has a devastating history. Everybody loses because everybody follows suit and all that happens is that you get a great reduction in international trade,” Sowell said.

The elderly economist then brought up former President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who held the United States’ highest office from 1933 to 1945. Sowell said that Roosevelt would experiment and discard ideas until “you come across something that does work.”

The approach Trump has taken to international trade and tariffs is fundamentally different, according to Sowell.

Roosevelt’s approach works “if you are operating within a known system of rules. But, if you are the one who’s making the rules, then all the other people have no idea what you’re going to do next,” Sowell said. “And that is a formula for having people hang on to their money until they figure out what you’re going to do. And when a lot of people hang on to their money, you can get results such as you got during the Great Depression of the 1930s.”

“If this is just a set of short-run ploys for various limited objectives limited in time. Fine, maybe,” Sowell granted. “But, if this is gonna be the policy for four long years, that you’re gonna try this, you’re gonna try that, you’re gonna try something else. A lot of people are gonna wait.”

Sowell noted the recent dips in the stock market that have followed many of Trump’s announcements on tariffs and said that “people are holding on to their money before they do anything because they don’t know where this is gonna lead.”

In an interview recorded yesterday, Hoover Senior Fellow Thomas Sowell criticizes the tariffs President Trump instituted earlier today. Watch the complete interview with Dr. Sowell on @UncKnowledge with Peter Robinson (@P_M_Robinson) on April 15th, 2025. pic.twitter.com/i0Ver1QIp4

— Hoover Institution (@HooverInst) April 3, 2025