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White House piles pressure on China after Trump tariff threat

8 Comments
By David Lawder and Michael Martina

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8 Comments
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Does that include his ties?

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Does that include his ties?

How about his daughter's clothing line?

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Navarro? The guy who condemned Trudeau to a special place in hell?

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Turdeau will be gone in 2019. Thanks heavens, Allah, who/whatever. Trump does seem to be getting a tad carried away with trade/tariffs... It is getting weird.

0 ( +1 / -1 )

This is messed up on so many levels.

The basic fact is that while China does engage in unfair trade practices that could justify retaliation of some sort, the way Trump is going about this is just reckless and self defeating.

Slapping tariffs on products and then getting into a tit-for-tat escalation as is happening is going to seriously damage both countries' (and the global) economies. Its basically brinksmanship, which only works if you have a plan to get the other side to buckle and give in to some of your demands. Trump doesn't have such a plan and is just ratcheting this up because its the only thing he knows how to do. I don't think the current political calculus in China, or any other country, favors giving in to Trump demands.

Problematically for the US, he is doing this at the same time he is declaring trade wars against friendly countries too. So the US is going to be simultaneously battered by counter-tariffs from most of the major countries in the world while all of those countries will only be battered by tariffs from one country, the US, and their other trading relationships will likely improve as they move away from US trade.

This negates a lot of the advantage that the US would otherwise have owing to the trade deficits it has with some of those countries. In a one on one confrontation a lot of them would be disproportionately hurt by US tariffs and more likely to give in. Because he's declared war on multiple major countries at once, they can offset a lot of that disadvantage through the collective effects of their counter tariffs.

Its basically an own-goal by Trump, and one of the main reasons even his own party doesn't like his trade policies.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

So American companies can’t buy cheap Chinese products and small American business can’t export their products to the worlds biggest market.

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"White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, who views China as a hostile economic and military power, said Beijing had more to lose from a trade war. China imported $129.89 billion of U.S. goods last year, while the United States purchased $505.47 billion of Chinese products"

True!

Economic impact of Trump's trade agenda

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkKXtx_FKKY

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

"White House trade adviser Peter Navarro, who views China as a hostile economic and military power, said Beijing had more to lose from a trade war. China imported $129.89 billion of U.S. goods last year, while the United States purchased $505.47 billion of Chinese products"

Yup, there is a trade imbalance. But that ignores the 550$ billion US firms have invested directly in China which are also potentially in play. If push comes to shove the Chinese can just decide "Oh hey McDonalds, yeah, you aren't allowed to sell hamburgers here anymore, sorry" and equivalent things to every other American company in the country.

That would be their second last resort once tariff options are exhausted. Their actual nuclear option would be dumping US treasuries.

So China has a lot of cards up its sleeve which off-set that US advantage in the effects of tariffs on trade. This isn't a trade war either side will win.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

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