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Did Late-Nineteenth-Century U.S. Tariffs Promote Infant Industries? Evidence from the Tinplate Industry

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 July 2012

Douglas A. Irwin
Douglas A. Irwin
Affiliation:
Professor, Department of Economics, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH 03755, e-mail: [email protected]; and Research Associate, NBER.
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Extract

Did late-nineteenth-century U.S. tariffs promote infant industries? After earlier failures, the tinplate industry became established and flourished after receiving protection with the 1890 McKinley tariff. Treating producers' entry and exit decisions as endogenous, a probability model is estimated to determine the conditions under which domestic tinplate production will occur. Counterfactual simulations indicate that, without the McKinley duties, domestic tinplate production would have arisen about a decade later as U.S. iron and steel input prices converged with those in Britain. Although the traiff accelerated the industry's development, welfare calculations suggest that protection does not pass a cost-benefit test.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 60 , Issue 2 , June 2000 , pp. 335 - 360
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 2000

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