Regulations, imports from the EU, taxes paid to the EU, and tourists to and from the EU are also part of the equation. So the UK might be better off outside the EU when you ignore trade.
Having said that, offsetting some of the drop in EU exports with and increase in non EU exports seems likely and could allow for a net benefit even assuming a net drop in total exports.
"When you ignore trade" is a pretty spectacular caveat for assessing the claimed economic benefits from not participating in a trade agreement.
We've had several years to hear a concrete argument for what regulations need removing and what the benefits would be, and the best we got was Patrick Minford's ambitious "it's likely we would eliminate manufacturing" growth projections based on the assumption the UK removed all barriers to importing anything. Ironically the EU has made more progress in securing FTAs with our list of putative alternative trade partners...
I wasn’t ignoring trading, I am simply saying that looking at trade in isolation isn’t the full story. People suggesting that an increase in non EU trade must be equivalent to the decrease in EU trade may be ignoring what the other side is saying.
It’s possible for the increase to exist, it to be less than the loss, and for the UK to be better off. As such some people talking about the likely increase may not be implying it’s a 1:1 replacement for the drop.
Sure, but the burden of the extraordinary claim that a particular set of reforms impossible under the EU could be more valuable than trade with the EU falls on those making it.
Regulations, imports from the EU, taxes paid to the EU, and tourists to and from the EU are also part of the equation. So the UK might be better off outside the EU when you ignore trade.
Having said that, offsetting some of the drop in EU exports with and increase in non EU exports seems likely and could allow for a net benefit even assuming a net drop in total exports.