As a result, CEI experts have encouraged and supported trade-enhancing policies and treaties over the years, including “fast-track” Trade Promotion Authority, specific trade deals, and multilateral efforts such as the Doha round of the World Trade Organization. We have opposed increased tariffs, attempts to increase regulation through trade deal language, and the trend toward bilateral rather than multilateral deals. CEI continues to make the case for free trade in the face of increased bipartisan hostility to the idea.
CEI’s experts also work with like-minded colleagues abroad to oppose harmful initiatives, such as working with British colleagues to stop that country’s competition agency from blocking mergers between American firms based on speculative reasoning.
Featured Posts
Blog
AGOA renewal should hold South Africa accountable
Free traders scored a victory in Congress this week when the House Ways and Means Committee passed the AGOA Extension Act. The legislation, sponsored…
The Washington Examiner
Coconut, citrus, and tea: Here’s what got tariff relief quietly over the weekend
The Washington Examiner cited CEI’s expert on tariffs Ryan Young, a senior economist at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said the list of tariff rollbacks is…
The National News Desk
Rollbacks on tariffs for food could bring shoppers some relief on prices
The National News Desk cited CEI’S expert on tariffs raising prices “The positive experience that consumers will see with price reductions on their food…
Search Posts
Blog
Germanic Hoards
The old central powers (Germany, Austria, Hungary) seem to have come together again in opposition to plans to phase out incandescent light bulbs in…
Blog
More Legal Experts Say ObamaCare Is Unconstitutional
More legal experts are questioning the constitutionality of ObamaCare. In today’s Washington Post, two former Justice Department lawyers, David Rivkin and Lee Casey, argue that…
Blog
Bank Robbers for Transparency!
The news that the Federal Government has forced UBS to give up the details of 4000 of its customers’ transactions has other financial institutions…
Blog
Regulation of the Day 36: Buying American
The $787,000,000,000 stimulus contains a provision requiring the Department of Homeland Security to buy american textiles. Basically, that means TSA uniforms will go up in…
Blog
UBS Deal Only a Partial Victory for the Feds
Today, after a long and protracted battle between the U.S. and Swiss government, Swiss bank UBS AG agreed to turn over the names of at…
Newsletter
Health Care Compromise, Growing Deficits and a Sugar Shortage
The White House signals a willingness to compromise on health care reform. The federal budget deficit hits $1.27 trillion. Major food companies warn that the…
Blog
Regulation of the Day 33: Pressure-Sensitive Plastic Tape
Ending the levy would “likely to lead to continuation or recurrence of dumping,” so it’s here to stay. Domestic tape producers must be pleased. Consumers,…
Blog
Obama Backs Costly Health-Care Status Quo, and Limits on Choice and Competition
Germany is a lot smaller than the U.S., but it has a lot more health insurers to choose from, and cheaper health-care costs. One reason…
Blog
Recession Ends in France, Without Massive and Costly U.S.-Style Stimulus Package
The recession has ended in France, which avoided adopting a massive stimulus package like Obama's $800 billion stimulus package.
Blog
Sugar on the table again
Sugar got front-page notice from the Wall Street Journal today. The article focused on a letter sent to the Secretary of Agriculture to increase the…
Blog
UBS and IRS reach an “agreement”
Yesterday my colleague at CEI, John Berlau, released a statement about the recently announced deal between Swiss bank UBS and the…
Blog
UBS-IRS deal — U.S. Constitutional liberties, privacy rights at risk after Obama bullies the Swiss
Lawyers for the U.S. government and the Swiss bank UBS AG have announced that they have reached a deal…
Blog
They Can’t Even Keep Drugs Out of Prison?
Armed guards. All the bad guys behind bars. Under constant supervision. And Mexico still can’t keep drugs and drug dealing out of its prisons.
Op-Eds
Perverts Get Stimulus Money, Not Roads and Bridges
“Join your fellow pervs for some explicit, twisted fun,” urged a recipient of more than $250,000 from Obama’s $800 billion stimulus package, which received…
Blog
Why Intel’s Billion Dollar Fine Violates Human Rights Convention
Intel alleges that its due process rights were violated by a massive $1.45 billion fine recently imposed as a result of a one-sided antitrust investigation…
Blog
“Millions of jobs are at stake on both sides of the border”
So says British Columbia Premier Gordon Campbell. At a meeting of Canada’s provincial premiers held in Regina, Saskatchewan, last week, slapping retaliatory tariffs on…
Blog
Regulation of the Day 29: Protecting Us from Cheap Foreign Goods
Sometimes (but not always), when a foreign producer sells goods to U.S. consumers cheaply, the U.S. government takes action to put a stop to it.
Blog
Deficit Rises $880 Billion to Record $1.3 Trillion, Due to Massive, Unprecedented Government Spending
The federal budget deficit has already risen by $880 billion to an unprecedented $1.3 trillion. Most of the increase is attributable to recent…
Blog
Inconvenient Evidence Suppressed in EU-Intel Antitrust Case
The EU’s top antitrust regulator intentionally suppressed “potentially exculpatory" evidence in its case against Intel. This is the rule of men, not law.
Blog
Liberal Congressional Leaders Buy Luxury Jets, Trash the Environment
Congress plans to spend $200 million on luxury jets for liberal House leaders, even though it earlier denounced the automakers for having corporate…
Blog
Union Bosses Say the Darndest Things
As described in an OpenMarket post by CEI’s Ivan Osorio a couple weeks ago, the Teamsters union and UPS are currently lobbying Congress to…
Blog
Chuck Schumer: “We’ve Got to Stand Still”
High-frequency stock trading — the markets where sophisticated algorithms running on bleeding edge hardware trade assets using information only fractions of a second old —…
Blog
British Government Pays Lobbyists to Lobby It on Climate Change
More proof that government does things better! In traditional “astroturfing,” a company would pay a PR firm to set up a fake grassroots organization aimed…
Blog
The Right to a Green Job?
Demand for wind turbine blades in Europe has slipped, apparently, so a British company that makes them, Vestas, has plans to let go 625 workers…
Blog
Turn out the lights, the party’s over… and tomorrow start the same old thing again.
Cuba has become more and more destitute since the revolution and has fallen on hard times since the collapse of the Soviet Union, a period…
Blog
Billions More for Wasteful Auto Bailouts
The auto bailouts keep expanding. Billions more are going to be spent on wealthy auto-dealers, cash-for-clunkers, politically-correct cars few people will buy, and excessive benefits…
Blog
Penn and Teller on Organics
The irreverent and hilarious comedians Penn and Teller have produced another episode of their television show Bullshit about organic foods. Friends of CEI, Ron Bailey…
Blog
The Obama’s Administration’s Strange Double Standards on Hate Crimes, Terrorism, and Health Care: Soft on the Guilty, Cruel to the Innocent, Unfair to Taxpayers
When black panthers were caught on videotape menacing white voters in Philadelphia, using nightsticks and racial epithets to drive them away from the polls,…
Newsletter
The Microhoo Deal, Food Safety Bills and Free Trade with Korea
Analysts speculate about the future of the Microsoft’s rivalry with Google in the wake of a major new deal with Yahoo. Food safety bills move…
Blog
In Which Greed Is Good
The great economist Joseph Schumpeter wrote that "[F]ree trade is the cement that holds together the idea of peace." His logic is sound. Commerce gives…
Blog
Russia introduces strict new antitrust law
Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev has signed into law amendments that will bring increased penalties for price collusion and unfair competition. The new amendments will allow…
Blog
UBS v. IRS saga continues
Today, Wall Street Journal reports that a Miami court has set meeting Friday between the IRS and UBS to look at…
Blog
Movement on the U.S.-Korea FTA?
It looks like things may be moving – slowly — on the trade front. The U. S. Trade Representative has published a notice in…
Blog
Obama Backs Imperial Presidency
Obama is backing an imperial presidency in Honduras. When Honduras removed its ex-president and would-be dictator, Obama demanded his reinstatement, even though he…
Op-Eds
Now an Obama Adviser Criticizes Health Care Reform
Obama’s health-care plan is drawing criticism from one of his own advisers, Harvard University’s Martin Feldstein. In today’s Washington Post, Feldstein warns that “For…
Blog
The People’s Phone
Venezuela’s increasingly ridiculous strongman, Hugo Chavez, would be funny if not for the misery and repression he continues to impose upon his own citizens. From…
Blog
Obama Health-Care Plan Would Take Away 5 Important Freedoms, CNN Says; Obama Would Also Raise Taxes, End Affordable Plans, and Break Promises
CNN notes that there are “5 freedoms you’d lose in health care reform” as promoted by the Obama Administration: the freedom to choose your…
Blog
The Washington Post’s Conflicted Take on Honduras and the OAS
That the Organization of American States has squandered whatever credibility it had should be obvious to all by now — and it’s not just right…
Blog
CEI Weekly: Attack of the National Broadband Plans
CEI Weekly is a compilation of articles and blog posts from CEI's fellows and associates sent out via e-mail every Friday.
Blog
Obama Health-Care Plan Destroys Cheap Health-Care Options, Raises Taxes, Breaks Promises
In 2008, Obama promised not to raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year. But he is now breaking that promise by…
Blog
Santacruz in Forbes: “Toxic Revenge”
In today’s Forbes, CEI Warren Brookes Fellow Silvia Santacruz talks about the lawsuit against Chevron-Texaco in Ecuador.
Blog
1+1=2
By introducing new regulations the Congress together with major airlines are discouraging us to travel. While the Congress is deciding on how to regulate the…
Blog
In Which the Case for Antitrust Action against Telecoms Weakens
New research finds that U.S. telecoms are charging, on average, ten cents less per minute than their counterparts around the world. Tell me again why…
Blog
“Farming” for dollars in the EU
Most of us knew that the European Union’s system of farm subsidies, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) gives out huge amounts to farmers in the…
Blog
CEI Weekly: Response to EPA Cover Up Increases
CEI Weekly is a compilation of articles and blog posts from CEI's fellows and associates sent out via e-mail every Friday. Also included in the…
Blog
Yeatman: “A Real Choice on Climate Change: Do Nothing”
In today’s RealClearWorld, CEI Energy Policy Analyst, William Yeatman, talks about international attempts at climate diplomacy. Read…
Newsletter
White House Science Czar, Catfish Imports and Gingrich’s “Real” Stimulus
Critics question the controversial beliefs of White House science adviser John Holdren. U.S. catfish producers try to block inexpensive fish imports from Vietnam. Former House…
Blog
Cold friendship
It has been almost 20 years since the end of the Cold War yet the agenda of the U.S.-Russia summit remains unchanged. In the middle…
Blog
Fishy Politics May Harm US Consumers
The various US attempts to hobble the Vietnamese farmed-catfish industry is no less underhanded. And, in order to prevent a trade war with Vietnam, it…
Blog
Obama’s “Willful Disregard of Political Oppression” by Anti-American Dictators Is Admitted by Liberal Washington Post
Obama has demanded that Honduras allow its anti-American would-be dictator, Mel Zelaya, to return to power, arguing that President Zelaya’s removal by the Honduras…
