Trump Echoes Alexander Hamilton With Import Substitution Stance

When it comes to trade and economic policy, Donald Trump sounds a lot like he’s singing from the same songbook as Alexander Hamilton -- and that’s got the rest of the world worried.

Like the nation’s first treasury secretary, the president proclaims the importance of manufacturing to the economy and wants the government to encourage it. And he is looking to do that through a Hamiltonian-style import substitution strategy -- one that rolls back globalization by replacing foreign-made goods in the U.S. market with domestically-produced ones.