**Yesterday, the heroes of Bitcoiners were still Ludwig von Mises and Murray Rothbard. Today, it’s Trump with his tariffs. And anyone who criticizes this is suddenly labeled a leftist. What a Clown Show!** 🤡🤡🤡

The Austrian School of Economics, rooted in the principles of free markets, individualism, and limited government intervention, strongly opposes tariffs as a form of protectionism. Here’s a concise breakdown of their stance:

1. **Market Distortion**: Tariffs artificially manipulate prices and disrupt the natural price signals that guide efficient resource allocation in a free market. Austrians argue this leads to misallocation of capital and labor, favoring politically connected industries over genuine economic productivity.

2. **Consumer Harm**: By raising prices on imported goods, tariffs reduce purchasing power and limit consumer choice. Austrian thinkers like Ludwig von Mises emphasized that such policies prioritize domestic producers’ interests over the welfare of consumers.

3. **Comparative Advantage**: Following David Ricardo’s theory (adopted by Austrians), tariffs undermine the benefits of international trade by discouraging specialization. They stifle the gains from trade that arise when countries focus on producing goods where they hold efficiency advantages.

4. **Government Overreach**: Tariffs represent coercive state intervention, violating the Austrian emphasis on voluntary exchange. Murray Rothbard and others viewed them as tools of crony capitalism, enabling bureaucrats to pick winners and losers rather than allowing market competition to prevail.

5. **Retaliation and Trade Wars**: Austrians warn that tariffs often provoke retaliatory measures, escalating into trade conflicts that shrink global economic output. This aligns with their broader skepticism of centralized economic planning, whether domestic or international.