International Trade Under President Reagan: Us Trade Policy in the 1980s

Under the Reagan presidency, the United States saw a period of strong economic growth. Analyzing the evolution of US foreign trade and its impact on the economy under the Reagan administration, Giuseppe La Barca shows how their economic achievements came about in part through well-exploited luck and reaffirmation of the supremacy of US economic interests. In stimulating its economy by consuming more than it produced, the US caused a growing trade deficit, appreciation of the dollar and an inflow of foreign capital that attracted prolonged differential interest rates.

Offering a critical analysis of the evolution of US foreign trade and its impact on the national economy during the 1980s, this book shows how domestic and international economic policies shaped one another, and the impact they had in an increasingly globalizing world.

Giuseppe La Barca is an independent scholar and the author of International Trade in the 1970s (Bloomsbury, 2013) and The US, the EC and World Trade (Bloomsbury, 2016). He is an expert on the economy of the United States in modern history.