Five years ago, the U.S. pulled out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade agreement that both parties ran against in 2016. By then, trade agreements had lost public trust and political appeal. Reasons for this turn against trade included the lack of a U.S. social safety net for workers and communities who were the losers from trade, frustration with China and other countries flaunting trade rules, and the escalation of outsourcing.
After years of multilateral trade negotiations, traditional trade barriers are, with some exceptions, quite low. Today, many global challenges arise from a disparity in the standards that countries use.
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