Balanced trade

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Balanced trade is an alternative economic model to free trade. Under balanced trade, nations are required to provide a fairly even reciprocal trade pattern; they cannot run large trade deficits or trade surpluses.

The concept of balanced trade arises from an essay by Michael McKeever Sr. of the McKeever Institute of Economic Policy Analysis. According to the essay, "BT is a simple concept which says that a country should import only as much as it exports so that trade and money flows are balanced. A country can balance its trade either on a trading partner basis in which total money flows between two countries are equalized or it can balance the overall trade and money flows so that a trade deficit with one country is balanced by a trade surplus with another country."^[1]