# Quote — Chang Ha-Joon, Bad Samaritans

> Britain and the US are not the homes of free trade; in fact, for a long time they were the most protectionist countries in the world. Not all countries have succeeded through protection and subsidies, but few have done so without them. For developing countries, free trade has a rarely been a matter of choice; it was often an imposition from outside, sometimes even through military power. Most of them did very poorly under free trade; they did much better when they used protection and subsidies. The best-performing economies have been those that opened up their economies selectively and gradually. Neo-liberal free-trade free-market policy claims to sacrifice equity for growth, but in fact it achieves neither; growth has slowed down in the past two and a half decades when markets were freed and borders opened.

- Author: [Chang Ha-Joon](https://www.leafyquotes.com/chang-ha-joon.md)
- Book: [Bad Samaritans](https://www.leafyquotes.com/chang-ha-joon/bad-samaritans.md)
- Page: 17
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ha-Joon_Chang#Bad_Samaritans:_The_Myth_of_Free_Trade_and_the_Secret_History_of_Capitalism_(2008)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/chang-ha-joon/bad-samaritans/britain-and-the

## More from this book

> Markets have a strong tendency to reinforce the status quo. The free market dictates that countries stick to what they are already good at. Stated bluntly, this means that poor countries are supposed to continue with their current engagement in low-productivity activities. But their engagement in those activities is exactly what makes them poor. If they want to leave poverty behind, they have to defy the market and do the more difficult things that bring them higher incomes—there are no two ways about it.

p. 210 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/chang-ha-joon/bad-samaritans/markets-have-a-strong.md)

> Countries are poor not because their people are lazy; their people are 'lazy' because they are poor.

p. 18 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/chang-ha-joon/bad-samaritans/countries-are-poor.md)

> Manufacturing is the most important...route to prosperity.

p. 215 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/chang-ha-joon/bad-samaritans/manufacturing-is-the.md)