Is a VAT an export subsidy?

Brian Albrecht March 28, 2025

Brian Albrecht, chief economist at ICLE, was featured in Marginal Revolution with his analysis of VAT. Read the full story here.

Here is a good post by Brian Albrecht, he works through the logic.  A VAT, properly understood, does not favor say European producers over American producers.  Work through his example if you don’t see this right away.  In this sense the pro-tariff “fairness” arguments are quite wrong.  Yet I am not entirely convinced by the rebuttals.  If you compare “the European expoter market position” to “the American exporter market position” it is correct that parity of treatment holds.