By Keith Bradsher and Ana Swanson
“The prospect of a wider trade war between the United States and China sent global financial markets whipsawing on Monday and could force Beijing to make difficult decisions if it hopes to preserve its nascent economic recovery.
President Trump upended what appeared to be steady progress toward reaching a trade pact after he threatened on Sunday to impose still more tariffs on Chinese-made goods unless Beijing moves closer to a deal. Liu He, the Chinese vice premier overseeing economic policy and Beijing’s lead trade negotiator, had been set to travel to Washington for talks scheduled for Wednesday that were widely seen as the potential last round before reaching a trade deal.
Source: Trump’s Trade War Threat Poses Problems for China and Investors – The New York Times
David Lindsay: Good piece. Here are two top comments I endorse.
Please, if you must quote Mr. Trump’s tweets, immediately bracket them with corrective disclaimers. Tariffs ARE NOT paid to the US Treasury. They are paid by the consumer in the form of a higher purchase price, whether buying parts for assembly in the US or the finished goods. The costs are not directly borne by China, except the demand for Chinese products drops due to the increased price. I’m sure people read the tweets and assume it’s a statement of fact.
As Trump manipulates the stock market with his comments, now is the time to investigate whether he or his friends are profiting from advance knowledge of his tweets
Trump does not understand how the Chinese think and does not understand how they keep winning. The main concern of the Chinese leadership is to avoid public embarrassment (“save face”). Trump thinks that publicly embarrassing them (“making them lose face”) is going to make them do what he wants them to do. It’s not going to work. The Chinese are telling him in negotiations (according to this article) that they will do what he wants, but it can’t be done through the legislature because it will be too embarrassing, so he publicly demands that it be done through the legislature. The Chinese don’t have a trade surplus because of tariffs. The Chinese have a trade surplus because they pick winners and they back them with public money, investing in new technologies, often stolen from America. If America invested in the technologies that we invented, like solar power, we would dominate the fields that we invented. But for decades, Republicans (and the centrist Democrats that compromise with them) have refused to “pick winners and losers,” letting the Chinese government pick winners, them, and losers, us. Notice none of this involves embarrassing public attacks on public officials. It is all done subtly. While the USA is spending trillions attacking countries around the world, the Chinese are quietly going around the world investing in third world countries, while the Party of Trump insists that investing in foreign countries is a waste of money. Learn from the Chinese