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So it is good for us how? It will cost us jobs, raise prices and hurt the economy.
What part of that is good for our workers and industry?
Trump is merely continuing Obama's policies:
Aggressively Pursuing – and Winning – Cases at the World Trade Organization:Today, the United States Trade Representative (USTR) is launching a new trade enforcement action against China at the World Trade Organization (WTO) targeting China’s unfair subsidies for its aluminum industry. This is the 25th WTO challenge of this Administration and the 16th against China alone. The United States has brought more WTO challenges over the last eight years than any other country. And we’ve won every single one of these challenges that has been decided.
Levying Anti-Dumping and Countervailing Duty Penalties on Foreign Industries and Trading Partners at the Highest Rate in 14 Years, Particularly Important to the Steel Industry: The Department of Commerce, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are enforcing 370 trade remedy orders that address dumped goods or unfairly subsidized imports and level the playing field for American workers and businesses.
New York: Producers in China and six other countries sold cold-rolled steel at unfairly low prices in the US market and will be taxed as much as 266% on the price, the Commerce Department said in a preliminary decision on Tuesday.
There are going to be a lot more tariffs on US goods in a trade war and the jobs might not come back, however making steel more expoensive is going to hot lots of US Industries from construction to ship building to food and beveridge and beyond. Materials costing more money will leed to more job loses and increased inflation, and also effect US exports. The Chinese may hit back by imposing tariffs on US Soya market, which relies on China or it may stop buying US Airliners and buy Aurbus and numerous other countries and trading blocks may follow suit, so a US against the entire world trade war is not a good, and in the end will just hurt the US and indeed the world economy.
The truth is the US consumer needs China in order to keep the supply of cheao goods in it's shops, this may not but the case when automation takes ever more jobs but it is the cae at the moment. It costs much more to make the same cheap product in the US, however in terms of quality and luxury goods the US and Europe can compete as the cost margins for such goods are much better.
It also should be noted that China has been preparing itself for such a situation for years. It also should be noted that the EU and other countries that are traditional US allies are also going to look mto put tariffs on numerous American goods, so this is going to be potentially very bad for everyone including the US.
Btw the UK is one of the few countries the US often enjoys favourable trade with, and we want to encourage free trade post Brexit and not more tariffs.
Now with the scare tactics. Oh brother.It is these other countries that have cause to be scared more than us, especially China.
By the way, these sorts of emotional arguments stand a much better chance of working with leftists, who tend to think and evaluate these matters emotionally, rather than rightists, who are more interested in practical solutions to our problems. The argument that you are making - be afraid, very afraid - is at this point just going to fire a lot of people up and put them in a fighting state of mind.
You have already seen some of that conveyed here in this thread. If you want to see this de-escalate faster rather than slower, I suggest you change your strategy on this.
As far as the UK, you guys are in a great spot, because like Trump already said, as soon as you free yourselves from the EU, you will be at the front of the queue for a new "Free" (and Fair) trade agreement. Since you know very well Trump is an international businessman who owns properties in the UK, I presume that you are not one of these willfully ignorant hammerheads who want to try to tag Trump as an "Isolationist". He isn't and I believe the people posting here with any significant intellectual chops, including you I think, know that.
Trump would love to have a low tarriff deal with the UK, as would the vast majority of the rest of the people in the US. As an aside, none of our "Free Trade" deals are actually "Free" in the sense that they are completely absent any tarriffs. They just have tarriffs that are significantly lower than the default tarriffs included in the WTO schedules. Anyway, the US and the UK can negotiate a "Free Trade" deal, I am sure - if the Democrats in the Senate will allow it - and it will be not only "Free" for both sides, but "Fair" as well.
An interesting piece on Canada's aluminum industry.
"Bauxite, the main ore of aluminum, contains about 50-60% alumina (aluminum oxide, Al2O3) and is formed by the weathering of aluminum-rich rocks under tropical conditions."
"Canada does not have any bauxite mines; however, the availability of abundant hydroelectric power at a competitive price, a qualified labour force and modern public infrastructure close to major markets led to the establishment of a world-class aluminum industry in Canada."
Aggressively Pursuing – and Winning – Cases at the World Trade Organization:Today, the United States Trade Representative (USTR) is launching a new trade enforcement action against China at the World Trade Organization (WTO) targeting China’s unfair subsidies for its aluminum industry. This is the 25th WTO challenge of this Administration and the 16th against China alone. The United States has brought more WTO challenges over the last eight years than any other country. And we’ve won every single one of these challenges that has been decided.
Levying Anti-Dumping and Countervailing Duty Penalties on Foreign Industries and Trading Partners at the Highest Rate in 14 Years, Particularly Important to the Steel Industry: The Department of Commerce, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are enforcing 370 trade remedy orders that address dumped goods or unfairly subsidized imports and level the playing field for American workers and businesses.
New York: Producers in China and six other countries sold cold-rolled steel at unfairly low prices in the US market and will be taxed as much as 266% on the price, the Commerce Department said in a preliminary decision on Tuesday.
Fine, but leave it at that - NOT fall off a cliff into tariffs.
Prior to Congress agreeing to China joining the WTO in 2001, it passed legislation that would prevent China from importing in amounts that would swamp US industries, allowing for a period of adjustment. 10 years.
These actions against Chinese imports were to be implemented on a case-by-case basis but there did NOT have to be dumping or countervailing alleged - the imports need not be "unfair" but simply here. The first case came - China threw a fit - Bush 43 backed down (against economic advice). And backed down repeatedly until US manufacturers threw up their hands in defeat. Bush allowed for NO trade restrictions under this statute during the remaining 7 years of his administration. Obama reversed policy but by that time it was too late - the 10-year period was about up, manufacturers already shut down.
Now this is not to bash Bush for he made the decision on the basis of what he felt the key issue - national security. That the best way forward was to make China a partner - both in terms of trade and in other affairs.
It was easy back in 2001 to underestimate the sheer power of Chinese manufacturing ability - and, of course, Bush had no knowledge of the compounding effect of the 2007 recession to come.
Edited to add - The difference between the "tariffs" you describe and those proposed by Trump is that the AD and CVD tariffs fall under the WTO. They are imposed in response to unfair trade actions - selling at less than fair costs to enter a market or with government subsidies. Trump wants to overturn negotiated agreements for so-called "fairly traded" imports. That's a big deal - and is what prompts fears of a "trade war.".
Last edited by EveryLady; 03-04-2018 at 04:10 PM..
Oh well. We’ll just have to make sacrifices. This is a war worth fighting. Americans have been taking it in the shorts for years, and all you Neil Cavuto/Stuart Varney types with all of your talk about how protectionism is bad for American Jobs and American consumers, simply don’t scare folks like me anymore.
The rest of the world NEEDS this market. There is no other market in the world with 325 million people that consume like a school of piranhas. It’s time that we use our leverage in favor of the American people for a change. Your arguments that favor a tiny coterie of multinational corporations don’t resonate with me. If there’s pain, so be it.
You sound scared. Go to church.
No. It isn't worth fighting at all. We are doing very well right now, and our economy is stable.
Why do we have to sacrifice that? Why do you think we need to sacrifice anything to get ahead? That's crazy!
We aren't taking it in the shorts- we have adapted to a changed world at last, and are doing much better than just holding our own. We don't have the problems Germany has, or Great Britain, France, Italy, or the other countries in the EU.
Sure, the world needs this market. Right now. But when a trade war makes every thing we import a lot more expensive, our market share will only decrease, not increase. So the nations that import to us will turn to other nations who don't have to pay those high prices we would pay.
In a trade war, those other nations could make their goods even more tempting to other countries by lowering their prices to other nations. Because we will be paying more for the same goods. It evens out for China, and allows China to establish new solid markets. On our money, while we lose out in those same markets because we are no longer competitive.
We don't have to worry about China only. In a trade war, China, Japan, Germany, India, Canada and some vital raw-materials nations in Africa could all join together against us in mutual trade that benefits them all, but not us, at all.
Am I scared? Damn rights I am! International trade is at a delicate balance. A trade war will remove all the weight from our side of the scale and place it on the rest of the world.
And once that shift happens, none of us will live long enough to ever see the balance return. Every city in the United States would become Flint, and the generations to come will spit on our graves for our stupidity.
Understand this: China & the United States have reciprocal tariffs. We also have them with most countries. We pay up to a 35% tariff to export something into China. The tariffs are already there & have been for years. What China has done is to charge us for our imports and then bypass paying us when the door swings the other way. They do that by building in Mexico or Canada, then funneling the goods into the US tariff free via the NAFTA agreement (It's not just the Chinese either). In addition to this avoidance of the agreement they signed, they also subsidize many of their industries like steel, which give them an unfair trade advantage and in the case of steel they intentionally overproduce in order to artificially drive down prices and hurt foreign steel manufacturers. We're not talking about a level playing field, where Trump just decided to attach tariffs because he's a dummy. Trump is going to create a level playing field and we should be thankful.
For the past 50 years Democrats have been calling for an end to free trade deals that crushed our unions, demolished our steel/auto industries & hurt the working/middle classes. In the past seven days the Democrats have done a complete ideological 180' because the multinational corporate interests who own the the politicians & MSM started feeding the left talking points that are pro-corporate and anti-worker. In addition, the Russians have flooded the internet pushing the false narrative that these moves will hurt the American people. The absolute last thing the multinational corporations, predatory nations like China or Russia want is to see the US steel industry revived to it's former glory. It didn't take a decade to change the minds of the rank & file Democrat voters, it didn't take years, it took one measly week for the left to start defending the multinational corporations at the expense of the American worker. Frustrating.
It's far from "the past 7 days". Democrats of today are far from the Democrats of the 60s-70. They changed, in my recollection starting back in the 90s, but have done a complete flip by the early 2000s. They no longer look out for, or represent, middle class working people in any way. They support higher and higher taxes. Policies that force our producers out of the country. They expect working people to be the ones to fund all their handouts and support their twisted view of a socialized nation. They bailed on the working middle class, instead looking for support from, and in turn supporting, the non-working, non-contributing members of society. US citizens that are capable of working but refuse to. Illegal aliens in return for votes. Criminals. And at the opposite extreme they represent the idle rich that feel guilt over wealth and success they did not earn. But the middle class working people? They are deplorable in the eyes of the modern Democratic party.
Me thinks your stance has much more to do with your personal animosity toward the man calling the shots at the moment than the objective substance of the issue. And you have plenty of company in that regard.
We would be hearing much more applause than "trade war" mania if this plan was coming from a Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, or (heaven help us) Hillary.
Not at all. I would be just as alarmed if any other person was in the White House.
If a trade war begins, no one will be applauding it here. No one at all. Anyone who applauds one now, no matter who's supporting it, is either delusional, in advanced dementia, or an idiot from the get-go.
We cannot win a trade war. We are the ripest low-hanging cherry on the tree, and the rest of the world will pluck us and happily feed us to the crows if we start a trade war.
It would be an economic disaster that would last for decades, and would come at a time when America is doing better than it has ever since the 21st century began.
A trade war would be the economic equivalent to World War I, and we would end up being the Weimar Republic by the time it ended.
I would say it perfectly illustrates why Canada deserves these tariffs. Back dooring your friend and neighbor via NAFTA is corrupt.
Goods produced in China, bound for the US through Canada, do not fall under NAFTA.
Goods with materials from China that are produced in Canada do.
Goods with materials made from China that produced in the US do.
My guess, is Canada takes in more produced goods with material from China made in the US than the other way around.
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