5 ms·

Can other countries trusy Trump administration at all at this point? It seems obvious, to deal with Trump, you have to prepare for the worst, since he is not pr

Can other countries trusy Trump administration at all at this point? It seems obvious, to deal with Trump, you have to prepare for the worst, since he is not predictable and tends to whatever he wants and whenever he desires.

xienze 8y ago
Maybe get back to the original question and the reason Trump is interested in starting a trade war? Why is it OK for other countries to levy tariffs against us but not the other way around?
- fentonc 8y ago
  We levy plenty of tariffs on goods from other countries to protect local industries - on average ours are very slightly lower than places like the EU, but it’s like ~2.5% vs 3%, not 0% vs 30%, which seems to be your claim.
  - zaroth 8y ago
    “America’s taxes on imports are much lower than those of almost every other country.” — The NY Times China’s weight average tariffs are 3x higher than the United States, approximately 10% vs 3.5%.
    - morsch 8y ago
      ... when you nonsensically pretend that VAT is an import tax. "Once value-added taxes and sales taxes are included in an international comparison, America’s taxes on imports are much lower than those of almost every other country."[1] The point still stands when not considering VAT, but the difference is far less pronounced. Though I am hesitant to trust the authors' research given the above. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/business/trade-china-protectionism.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/business/trade-chin..., also https://tradediversion.net/2017/03/08/on-the-nyts-building-trade-walls/ https://tradediversion.net/2017/03/08/on-the-nyts-building-t...
    - teh_klev 8y ago
      Depends on how you define "much lower", especially with a major trading partner such as the EU: U.S. exports to the European Union enjoy an average tariff of just three percent. Source: https://www.export.gov/article?id=European-union-Import-Tariffs https://www.export.gov/article?id=European-union-Import-Tari... In 2016, according to the World Bank, the average applied U.S. tariff across all products was 1.61%; that was about the same as the average rate of 1.6% for the 28-nation EU Source: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/03/22/u-s-tariffs-are-among-the-lowest-in-the-world-and-in-the-nations-history/ http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/03/22/u-s-tariffs-... US to EU average import tariffs differ only by ~1.4%, sure the US tariff is (slightly) lower but it's hardly a huge imbalance. Edit: just picking up from morsch's comment, these are international trade tariff figures which is what Trump is imposing. What countries do internally when it comes to sales or Value Added Tax is a whole different thing; these types of taxes apply to all goods and services sold within that country, regardless of origin (i.e. regardless of whether a pencil is manufactured in the UK or the US, it will still attract a domestic sales/VAT of 17.5% if sold in the UK).
- bkor 8y ago
  > Maybe get back to the original question and the reason Trump is interested in starting a trade war? The reason for starting it was explained in completely different ways. Therefore it's not clear. It's both for security reasons as well as being easy to win as well as a supposed unfair imbalance. There's no consistency.
- tanilama 8y ago
  US doesn't have the lowest overall tariff in the world, it is Japan who does among major countries. Talking about fairness, it is fair for US to print their own currency and buy goods around the world, while other countries can't do the same? The reserve status of dollar doesn't come by itself, there is a price to pay, you can't have the cake and eat it.
  - adventured 8y ago
    Japan has slightly lower average trade weighted tariffs than the US. Japan has nearly 200% higher agriculture tariffs than the US.
    - selectodude 8y ago
      >Japan has nearly 200% higher agriculture tariffs than the US. Which have a lot of holes in them. The US sends thousands of tons of un-tariffed rice to Japan every year, which they then lock into a shed and let rot. Which is their prerogative, I guess.
- Maarten88 8y ago
  > Why is it OK for other countries to levy tariffs against us but not the other way around? I see this comment a lot, I think Trump also said this, but I wonder what specific tariffs is this talking about? My country (Netherlands) has a negative trade balance with the US, we buy a lot of software, entertainment and (heavily subsidized) Tesla's from the US. Even the "German" car I drive (a BMW) is manufactured in the US because of US trade demands. Also many international trade laws are heavily influenced by US policies that mostly benefit the US (i.e. IP, drugs). It seems pretty clear that Trump started this trade war because he didn't like the existing equilibrium. And because he is who he is, other countries must be to blame. I think US people will have to get used to the idea that maybe the US economy is not competitive and US people have been living above their means for a long time now. There are a lot of things the US can do to improve their competitiveness: education, health, corruption, equality, finance all have real impact on the economic competitiveness of a country and you can't make a mess out of it without it having real consequences. US companies also will have to learn to deal with the fact that the US no longer is the single biggest economy in the world, and the US can't set the rules unilaterally. Trump is helping a lot weeding out the diplomatic goodwill that the US historically enjoyed. US business is spoiled with their huge home market and seems to find it very hard to adapt to smaller country's rules. In order to export successfully in a more level world, you have to play it by their rules. If my country want to export flowers to Japan, and they allow them only when sterile and without a grain of sand, and they only like bright colors, then we will make them so.
  - selectodude 8y ago
    >My country (Netherlands) has a negative trade balance with the US, we buy a lot of software, entertainment and (heavily subsidized) Tesla's from the US. Even the "German" car I drive (a BMW) is manufactured in the US because of US trade demands. Your car was built in the US because the labor is cheaper and 40 percent of their cars are sold in the US and China (shipping to China from the US is basically free, better off being here).
struppi 8y ago
Several European leaders have said publically (though in nicer words) that they don't trust America under this administration anymore. e.g. Sebastian Kurz, a few days ago (1): "The American President is unconventional and American politics has become unpredictable. [...] This is a challenging geopolitical situation." (1) German Interview - https://derstandard.at/2000081642343/Kanzler-Kurz-Wer-auf-Orban-und-Salvini-herabschaut-zerstoert-die https://derstandard.at/2000081642343/Kanzler-Kurz-Wer-auf-Or...
- adventured 8y ago
  Why would that trust be necessary? It very clearly isn't. Which is not the same as arguing that trust can't be valuable or critical in international relationships depending on the context. China has gone from a $1 trillion to a $13 trillion economy in 20 years, with vast barriers to trade (into their country) and extreme domestic protectionist policies (eg barring majority domestic business ownership, and most foreign acquisitions). China is the greatest one-way mercantilist economic result in recorded history. There's very little trust in any relationship with China, they do literally whatever they decide fits their nationalist aims, whether that's annexing territory, stealing corporations (Ant Financial), forcing technology transfers, blockading foreign ownership, whatever it takes to buy time until China is impossible to resist. China is already buying up Eastern Europe, and buying votes within the EU (eg bribing Greece for favorable voting). Is that a premise of trust? Of course not, they're using their increasing might strategically wherever they can, and it's going to get a lot worse. The fact is, all nations should pursue their self interest. When the US decides to act as everyone else does and pursue its economic self interest, it's denounced. And there's China parroting that they're in favor of free trade, while being aggressively against free trade in practice, and hardly being called out for the hypocrisy internationally. The reason the US is denounced, is because the export gravy train is coming to an end, the easy exports into the US that many other large economies have enjoyed are going to get more expensive going forward. If that wasn't the case, all of these other nations wouldn't be upset about the US change in behavior: they all know the US is an immense global consumption engine that powers their domestic production. Responding to psergeant's comment below: > I wonder if you could help me understand Trump trying to rescue ZTE in terms of what you’ve just said? The US got China to immediately sign off on the Qualcomm acquisition of NXP in exchange for the ZTE deal. That's an extremely valuable acquisition for the US tech industry. Simultaneously the US has received $2.2 billion in fines from ZTE over time for their violations of US sanctions. Further on top of that, the US is getting even more compliance pledges from ZTE. It's a substantial self interest win for the US. The US gets to eat one of Europe's valuable tech companies (of which they have relatively few), which then reduces Europe as a tech competitor over time. I'd call the ZTE deal a win, win, win, win arrangement.
tyfon 8y ago
Not at all. Here is a perspective from the Norwegian foreign minister [1], with google translate [2]. The key word here is uncertainty and unpredictability. [1]https://www.nrk.no/urix/_-vi-ma-jobbe-annerledes-med-donald-trump-i-det-hvite-hus-1.14071128 https://www.nrk.no/urix/_-vi-ma-jobbe-annerledes-med-donald-... [2]https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nrk.no%2Furix%2F_-vi-ma-jobbe-annerledes-med-donald-trump-i-det-hvite-hus-1.14071128&edit-text= https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&pr...

xienze 8y ago

Maybe get back to the original question and the reason Trump is interested in starting a trade war? Why is it OK for other countries to levy tariffs against us but not the other way around?

fentonc 8y ago
We levy plenty of tariffs on goods from other countries to protect local industries - on average ours are very slightly lower than places like the EU, but it’s like ~2.5% vs 3%, not 0% vs 30%, which seems to be your claim.
- zaroth 8y ago
  “America’s taxes on imports are much lower than those of almost every other country.” — The NY Times China’s weight average tariffs are 3x higher than the United States, approximately 10% vs 3.5%.
  - morsch 8y ago
    ... when you nonsensically pretend that VAT is an import tax. "Once value-added taxes and sales taxes are included in an international comparison, America’s taxes on imports are much lower than those of almost every other country."[1] The point still stands when not considering VAT, but the difference is far less pronounced. Though I am hesitant to trust the authors' research given the above. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/business/trade-china-protectionism.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/business/trade-chin..., also https://tradediversion.net/2017/03/08/on-the-nyts-building-trade-walls/ https://tradediversion.net/2017/03/08/on-the-nyts-building-t...
  - teh_klev 8y ago
    Depends on how you define "much lower", especially with a major trading partner such as the EU: U.S. exports to the European Union enjoy an average tariff of just three percent. Source: https://www.export.gov/article?id=European-union-Import-Tariffs https://www.export.gov/article?id=European-union-Import-Tari... In 2016, according to the World Bank, the average applied U.S. tariff across all products was 1.61%; that was about the same as the average rate of 1.6% for the 28-nation EU Source: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/03/22/u-s-tariffs-are-among-the-lowest-in-the-world-and-in-the-nations-history/ http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/03/22/u-s-tariffs-... US to EU average import tariffs differ only by ~1.4%, sure the US tariff is (slightly) lower but it's hardly a huge imbalance. Edit: just picking up from morsch's comment, these are international trade tariff figures which is what Trump is imposing. What countries do internally when it comes to sales or Value Added Tax is a whole different thing; these types of taxes apply to all goods and services sold within that country, regardless of origin (i.e. regardless of whether a pencil is manufactured in the UK or the US, it will still attract a domestic sales/VAT of 17.5% if sold in the UK).
bkor 8y ago
> Maybe get back to the original question and the reason Trump is interested in starting a trade war? The reason for starting it was explained in completely different ways. Therefore it's not clear. It's both for security reasons as well as being easy to win as well as a supposed unfair imbalance. There's no consistency.
tanilama 8y ago
US doesn't have the lowest overall tariff in the world, it is Japan who does among major countries. Talking about fairness, it is fair for US to print their own currency and buy goods around the world, while other countries can't do the same? The reserve status of dollar doesn't come by itself, there is a price to pay, you can't have the cake and eat it.
- adventured 8y ago
  Japan has slightly lower average trade weighted tariffs than the US. Japan has nearly 200% higher agriculture tariffs than the US.
  - selectodude 8y ago
    >Japan has nearly 200% higher agriculture tariffs than the US. Which have a lot of holes in them. The US sends thousands of tons of un-tariffed rice to Japan every year, which they then lock into a shed and let rot. Which is their prerogative, I guess.
Maarten88 8y ago
> Why is it OK for other countries to levy tariffs against us but not the other way around? I see this comment a lot, I think Trump also said this, but I wonder what specific tariffs is this talking about? My country (Netherlands) has a negative trade balance with the US, we buy a lot of software, entertainment and (heavily subsidized) Tesla's from the US. Even the "German" car I drive (a BMW) is manufactured in the US because of US trade demands. Also many international trade laws are heavily influenced by US policies that mostly benefit the US (i.e. IP, drugs). It seems pretty clear that Trump started this trade war because he didn't like the existing equilibrium. And because he is who he is, other countries must be to blame. I think US people will have to get used to the idea that maybe the US economy is not competitive and US people have been living above their means for a long time now. There are a lot of things the US can do to improve their competitiveness: education, health, corruption, equality, finance all have real impact on the economic competitiveness of a country and you can't make a mess out of it without it having real consequences. US companies also will have to learn to deal with the fact that the US no longer is the single biggest economy in the world, and the US can't set the rules unilaterally. Trump is helping a lot weeding out the diplomatic goodwill that the US historically enjoyed. US business is spoiled with their huge home market and seems to find it very hard to adapt to smaller country's rules. In order to export successfully in a more level world, you have to play it by their rules. If my country want to export flowers to Japan, and they allow them only when sterile and without a grain of sand, and they only like bright colors, then we will make them so.
- selectodude 8y ago
  >My country (Netherlands) has a negative trade balance with the US, we buy a lot of software, entertainment and (heavily subsidized) Tesla's from the US. Even the "German" car I drive (a BMW) is manufactured in the US because of US trade demands. Your car was built in the US because the labor is cheaper and 40 percent of their cars are sold in the US and China (shipping to China from the US is basically free, better off being here).

struppi 8y ago

Several European leaders have said publically (though in nicer words) that they don't trust America under this administration anymore. e.g. Sebastian Kurz, a few days ago (1): "The American President is unconventional and American politics has become unpredictable. [...] This is a challenging geopolitical situation." (1) German Interview - https://derstandard.at/2000081642343/Kanzler-Kurz-Wer-auf-Orban-und-Salvini-herabschaut-zerstoert-die https://derstandard.at/2000081642343/Kanzler-Kurz-Wer-auf-Or...

adventured 8y ago
Why would that trust be necessary? It very clearly isn't. Which is not the same as arguing that trust can't be valuable or critical in international relationships depending on the context. China has gone from a $1 trillion to a $13 trillion economy in 20 years, with vast barriers to trade (into their country) and extreme domestic protectionist policies (eg barring majority domestic business ownership, and most foreign acquisitions). China is the greatest one-way mercantilist economic result in recorded history. There's very little trust in any relationship with China, they do literally whatever they decide fits their nationalist aims, whether that's annexing territory, stealing corporations (Ant Financial), forcing technology transfers, blockading foreign ownership, whatever it takes to buy time until China is impossible to resist. China is already buying up Eastern Europe, and buying votes within the EU (eg bribing Greece for favorable voting). Is that a premise of trust? Of course not, they're using their increasing might strategically wherever they can, and it's going to get a lot worse. The fact is, all nations should pursue their self interest. When the US decides to act as everyone else does and pursue its economic self interest, it's denounced. And there's China parroting that they're in favor of free trade, while being aggressively against free trade in practice, and hardly being called out for the hypocrisy internationally. The reason the US is denounced, is because the export gravy train is coming to an end, the easy exports into the US that many other large economies have enjoyed are going to get more expensive going forward. If that wasn't the case, all of these other nations wouldn't be upset about the US change in behavior: they all know the US is an immense global consumption engine that powers their domestic production. Responding to psergeant's comment below: > I wonder if you could help me understand Trump trying to rescue ZTE in terms of what you’ve just said? The US got China to immediately sign off on the Qualcomm acquisition of NXP in exchange for the ZTE deal. That's an extremely valuable acquisition for the US tech industry. Simultaneously the US has received $2.2 billion in fines from ZTE over time for their violations of US sanctions. Further on top of that, the US is getting even more compliance pledges from ZTE. It's a substantial self interest win for the US. The US gets to eat one of Europe's valuable tech companies (of which they have relatively few), which then reduces Europe as a tech competitor over time. I'd call the ZTE deal a win, win, win, win arrangement.

tyfon 8y ago

Not at all. Here is a perspective from the Norwegian foreign minister [1], with google translate [2]. The key word here is uncertainty and unpredictability. [1]https://www.nrk.no/urix/_-vi-ma-jobbe-annerledes-med-donald-trump-i-det-hvite-hus-1.14071128 https://www.nrk.no/urix/_-vi-ma-jobbe-annerledes-med-donald-... [2]https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nrk.no%2Furix%2F_-vi-ma-jobbe-annerledes-med-donald-trump-i-det-hvite-hus-1.14071128&edit-text= https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&pr...