How Not to Do Trade Deals
Swati Dhingra and Nikhil Datta, 21 September 2017
It would be sensible to prioritise a trade deal with the EU. Countries have always traded the most with their biggest, closest neighbours. This is by far the most reliable fact about international trade and holds true no matter which set of countries, time period or sector (goods, services, e-commerce, foreign investments) is looked at. Given that the EU is within swimming distance from the UK, has a population of more than 500 million and a GDP of almost $20 trillion (double that of China), an equivalent replacement is effectively impossible.
