In an essay published this week by the Economist magazine, outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair shared “What I’ve Learned” during his decade in office. I’ll leave it to others to dissect what he said about the transatlantic alliance, the Iraq War and the National Health Service, but his words of wisdom on the importance of an open global economy are worth quoting.

Declaring that “‘Open v closed’ is as important today in politics as ‘left v right,’” Blair wrote:

Nations do best when they are prepared to be open to the world. This means open in their economies, eschewing protectionism, welcoming foreign investment, running flexible labour markets. It means also open to the benefit of controlled immigration. For all nations this is a hugely contentious area of policy. But I have no doubt London is stronger and more successful through the encouragement of targeted migration.

Isolationism and protectionism now cut across left and right boundaries. They are easy tunes to play but pointless in anything other than the very short-term.

I wish more members of the U.S. Congress would learn the same lessons.