ABSTRACT
US trade with the Soviet Union has always been highly politicized, and it is likely to remain relatively sensitive to political vagaries for the foreseeable future. As long as the U.S.S.R. is seen as our principal adversary, economic relations with that country will continue to be employed as an instrument of national policy to a degree not matched in US relations with other countries. This chapter reviews the major issues in trade with the Soviets, and particularly the question of the distribution of economic benefits between the two sides, policy can be improved and US benefits increased. Trade between the United States and the Soviet Union has not expanded as rapidly in recent years as many had predicted in the early 1970s. The chapter examines in some detail the various distributional issues, drawing in many instances on the reasoning and evidence of existing studies.
