"tim..." wrote in message
...

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
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In article ,
tim... wrote:

"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
tim... wrote:
there are hundreds of country pairs that happily trade with each
other
without a separate deal in place. the idea that it is difficult is
nonsense

Can you name a pair of countries that trade happily with no formal
trade deal?

I meant other than standard WTO rules

(I rather thought that was obvious in the context of my other
contributions)

I'd not really call that a formal trade deal. More of a blanket one.

If it were just fine, why bother with any other deals?

TBH, I don't know

The official line that having a deal between country A and country B
increases the wealth of both countries by billions looks somewhat bogus to
me.

If every county A and every country B enter into a trade deal that would
mean that the wealth of the world would be increased by gazillions.

But, of course, that is not possible. I'm only going to buy the same
number of pairs of shoes each year after all the agreements are signed
than before, so I can't see where this extra economic activity is going to
come from.

ISTM that individual trade deals are just a world wide Ponzi scheme where
only the early entrants win.

That's not really true. The current fad/fashion to have FREE trade
deals means that we don't get slugged any duty or tariff on the
trade so all the buyers benefit from that reduction in that slug.

There is no Ponzi involved at all, everyone really does
win when the trade agreement sees the tariffs binned.

Much better to work to reduce WTO tariffs IMHO.

But much harder to achieve that. The Doha Round
has essentially stalled for various reasons.