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Adam Smith:
Adam Smith was right in arguing free trade makes countries wealthier.

Free trade is the market model in which the trade of good and services between or within countries are not affected by government-imposed restrictions. These restrictions include taxes, tariffs, and other barriers. A person named Adam Smith argued the point that this market model makes countries wealthier. A country will become wealthier when free trade is imposed because they benefit off the modest cost of products produced in different countries that have a lower opportunity cost of producing a product.
If people are set free of barriers according to Adam Smith then the whole country benefits in return. Adam Smith believed in absolute advantage, which is the ability for a country to do something economically more efficient than another. An example would be if France could produce corn for a lesser price than Germany than France has an absolute advantage over Germany in terms of trading corn. But if Germany could produce sugar for a smaller price than France then the two could trade sugar for corn. “As long as one country has those advantages, and the other wants them, it will always be more advantageous...” (Smith 2, 15). Adam Smith made this clear and evident to many economists during his time.
One problem in economics is monopolies. Free trade helps prevent monopolies. The problem with monopolies is that they place a high price on a product and make it difficult to receive that product at a lower price. According to Smith monopolists “sell their commodities much above the natural price” (Smith 7, 26). Monopolies only serve to increase the wealth of a business not a country as a whole. Because they have so much control in the market they tend to bring the wealth of a country down. Smith believed that the natural price should be the lowest price that can be taken by the company. This “natural price” would be a price that the common man...