How exactly is Trump’s use of tariffs different from other American presidents? What are the costs and benefits of his proposals? And how might it change global trade? I put those and other questions to Brad Setser on the latest episode of FP Live. Setser is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and previously served as a senior advisor to the U.S. Trade Representative.

It is well-documented now that while Donald Trump may not be particularly ideological, he genuinely seems to believe the United States should deploy tariffs as a foreign-policy cudgel. In his first few days in office, the new U.S. president has already coerced Colombia into accepting deportation flights, while Mexico and Canada remain on tenterhooks to see if he will follow through on his proposal to levy 25 percent tariffs on their exports.

It is well-documented now that while Donald Trump may not be particularly ideological, he genuinely seems to believe the United States should deploy tariffs as a foreign-policy cudgel. In his first few days in office, the new U.S. president has already coerced Colombia into accepting deportation flights, while Mexico and Canada remain on tenterhooks to see if he will follow through on his proposal to levy 25 percent tariffs on their exports.

How exactly is Trump’s use of tariffs different from other American presidents? What are the costs and benefits of his proposals? And how might it change global trade? I put those and other questions to Brad Setser on the latest episode of FP Live. Setser is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and previously served as a senior advisor to the U.S. Trade Representative.

Follow the free FP Live podcast for an audio version of our discussion. Subscribers can watch the full discussion on the video box atop this page. What follows is a condensed and edited transcript.

Ravi Agrawal: Let’s just start with a very basic definition. What is a tariff?

Brad Setser: I mean, a tariff is a tax on imported goods. It’s a tax the importer has to pay if they want the goods released from the port of entry. So it’s a pretty straightforward tax, actually.

RA: And tariffs have many uses, from protecting domestic industry to raising revenue to providing leverage in a negotiation. But none of this is new. What makes Trump’s use of tariffs so different from that of other American presidents?

BS: I’ll limit the answer to modern American presidents, those in the post-World War II era. Trump literally says that he loves tariffs. He prefers tariffs to other sources of leverage. He calls himself “the tariff man.”

Tariffs have been used for protection, but they haven’t been used very much for revenue until recently. So if Trump carries that out, that would be a significant change. They’ve always been a source of negotiating leverage. But Trump takes that to a new level because he likes the tool. Most presidents have viewed tariffs as a costly imposition on the U.S. economy or as something to negotiate down as part of a trade deal.

Trump is also very open to using tariffs as a source of leverage for goals other than trade. All of those make Trump’s use of tariffs a bit unique.

RA: Brad, you used the word costly there. Everything is a trade-off. Tariffs generate revenue, but how inflationary are they?

BS: I wouldn’t call it inflation. They are a one-off change to the cost of living. So in most instances, if you’re importing a good for a dollar and there’s a 10 percent tariff on it, the importer is going to pay $1.10.