Alexander Hamilton and the Theory of Tariff Incidence - 2026 ESHET-HES Conference - Mathew A. Frith

The Theory of Tariff Incidence: Alexander Hamilton and His Nineteenth-Century Protectionist Followers A recording of a presentation from the 2026 joint conference of the European Society for the History of Economic Thought (ESHET) and the History of Economics Society (HES). The paper recovers a neglected theory of tariff incidence developed by Alexander Hamilton in 1782 and elaborated on throughout the nineteenth century by thinkers including Daniel Raymond, Van Buren Denslow, Ellis H. Roberts, and Henry M. Hoyt. Against Smith's view, these writers argued that incidence depends on the competitive structure of the market and that, for protective tariffs, the burden shifts from domestic consumers to foreign producers as the protected industry matures. Full paper available on SSRN: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c... America's Neglected Protectionist Tradition (book): https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/AS... Mathew A. Frith, UNE Business School, University of New England