tariff: Evolution of Tariffs

Tariffs have been used by governments since ancient times, although they were originally sources of revenue rather than instruments of state economic policy. Early customs duties consisted of payments for the use of trade and transportation facilities, including ports, markets, streets, and bridges. By the 17th cent., however, they came to be levied only at the boundary of a country and usually only on imports. At the same time, European powers established special low tariff rates for trade with their possessions; such systems of colonial preference formed the basis of the trading patterns that developed in the 17th and 18th cent. (see mercantilism and Navigation Acts).

Although the free trade movement in the early 19th cent. discouraged the use of tariffs, a new system of trade relations known as imperial preference developed in the late 19th cent. Great Britain and France, in particular, used preferential tariffs to organize the flow of foodstuffs and raw materials from their colonial dependencies and to regulate the export of domestic manufactured products into those areas. Other European nations retaliated by raising their tariffs, and a period of relatively high protective tariffs lasting through the Great Depression followed.

Sections in this article:

• Introduction
• Trend toward Free Trade
• Evolution of Tariffs
• Modern Tariffs
• Bibliography

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