Cross-purposes

President Trump, as he has made clear, wants to shrink the U.S. trade deficit. For that reason alone, it’s mystifying that his administration is attacking a sector of the economy in which the United States enjoys a substantial trade surplus.

I’m talking about education. The administration has decided to crack down on foreign students in the United States by making it harder to get student visas, scouring social media to identify scholars it thinks should be excluded, and revoking thousands of visas of students who’ve been in the country for years. “A visa is not a right. It is a privilege,” Secretary of State Rubio pronounced on May 20.

Of course no student has a right to a visa. But in addition to other undesirable effects, such as driving away talented scholars who could contribute to U.S. prosperity, clamping down on foreign students directly conflicts with another Trump priority: reducing the U.S. trade deficit. In 2023, the United States ran a $41 billion surplus in education-related trade, most of it due to foreign students’ living expenses and tuition payments at U.S. universities. If fewer foreign students come, either because they can’t get visas or because they choose friendlier destinations, U.S. educational exports will shrink, eliminating jobs in the process.

As I argue in Outside the Box, the next phase of globalization will have more to do with trading ideas and services than with transporting goods in container ships. By discouraging trade in educational services, the U.S. risks missing the boat.