By Ron Barnett – One of the advantages of growing up in a college town is that you get to know a lot of people who are experts in some field that you may need to know something about later on.

Bruce Yandel, of Clemson, one of the most highly regarded economists in the country, is a nice enough guy that I could probably get him on the phone even if I hadn’t taught his sons guitar, but it doesn’t hurt to have a family connection.

Dr. Yandel is dean emeritus of Clemson Univeristy’as college of Business and Behavioral Science and alumni distinguished professor of economics emeritus – and former executive director of the Federal Trade Commission, among other things.

I knew he is a free-market conservative, so I was curious about what he thought of President Donald Trump’s new tariffs. I caught up with him by phone at his summer home in the countryside near where I used to live in Macon, Georgia.

“It doesn’t get hot enough there in Clemson, so we had to find a little warmer climate,” he joked.

OK, so what about this tariff policy?

“It certainly is not, on the surface, beneficial to South Carolina,” he said.

He pointed to a study by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that says South Carolina is the eighth-most severely affected state in the nation because of our heavy reliance on foreign trade.

“We also happen to be heavily international with the countries that have been frowned on and cussed and discussed, negatively, by the Trump administration – namely China, Mexico, Germany and Canada,” he said.

Yeah, that’s about what I thought.

So, what’s going to happen? What is the president thinking?

“Maybe we’re sort of in the second act of a three-act play and right now it’s hardball and lots of frowns but ultimately there’s a happy ending,” he suggested. But he added, “That’s probably an overly optimistic view of the process.”

Clemson economist: Tariff harm offset by other policies