After the 25% tariff on China’s $34 billion exported to the United States from July 6, the US Trade Representative’s Office announced on August 7 that it would add a 25% tariff on Chinese products worth about $16 billion. Formally implemented on the 23rd. A spokesman for the Chinese Ministry of Commerce issued a speech on the evening of the 8th, stating that the US side once again overriding domestic law over international law is a very unreasonable practice. In order to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests and the multilateral trading system, China has to make the necessary counter-measures and decided to impose a 25% tariff on US$16 billion from US imports and implement it in parallel with the US.
The Chinese response this time, although only a hundred words, is concise and rational, calm and calm. It can be seen that after more than four months of contests, the Chinese have long been acquainted with the US's deceitful means, and they are not surprised by their constant pressure, and they have long been prepared. The principle that China believes in the practice of continuously upgrading the trade war is "I don't want to fight, I am not afraid to fight, I have to fight when necessary." The firm action is to continue to deepen reform and opening up and do well in our own affairs. Naturally, there is no need to say more.
One reason for the US to provoke a trade war is to think of "American national security", help the manufacturing industry return to the United States, and create more jobs for Americans, but the actual results are surprising.
Take the $16 billion list of Chinese exports to the United States. For example, the US Trade Representative Office recently held a hearing for whether or not to impose tariffs. A total of 82 representatives from the US chemical, electronics, and photovoltaic industries spoke. They are generally worried that the increase of tariffs will increase the cost of enterprises, resulting in the loss of jobs, ultimately damaging the US economy, reducing the competitiveness of the US industry, and even causing some SMEs to be forced to close. In the end, only 6 of the delegates agreed to impose tariffs, accounting for about 7%.
Faced with such a disparity in proportion, in the face of the general opposition of American companies and industry associations, the US government still made a decision to impose tariffs on Chinese products worth 16 billion US dollars, which is really incredible. It seems that the hearing in the trade war is only a statutory process, and most of the objections can only be abducted by a small number of policy makers.
For the White House policy makers, the addition of tariffs is not only to curb China's development, to maintain "the United States first", but also to be the fastest and most effective means to help them achieve personal self-interest. According to the New York Times, since May this year, the US Department of Commerce has received 20,000 applications for the reduction of tariffs on steel products. At present, it has not approved an application. The two largest steel companies in the United States successfully refused hundreds of US companies to reduce tariffs on the grounds that tariffs are protecting national security and stimulating more domestic steel production.
The report pointed out that several senior officials of the US government have deep links with the steel industry. For example, US Secretary of Commerce Ross has acquired several steel companies and later sold them for profit. US trade representative Wright Hize, when he was a private practice lawyer, his clients included US steel companies and other steelmakers. As for the director of the White House Trade Commission, Navarro, he took a $1 million sponsorship from the second largest steel company, Nucor, when he filmed the documentary "The Death of China."
Can tariff protection really protect US national security? The White House policymakers may not be sure, but they are at least convinced that the addition of tariffs will benefit themselves. Under this lust, they turned a blind eye to the suffering of American businesses and consumers.
In the past few days, bad news has been circulating in the United States:
US basic electronics company announced on the 6th that it will close its TV factory in South Carolina two months later, and previously cut 134 jobs in the factory by 126 because the US government "has a lot of Increasing tariffs on goods, including major components of television sets, has led to increased costs. According to data from the Peterson Institute for International Economics, if the United States imposes a 25% vehicle tariff on the world, about 195,000 American workers will be unemployed within one to three years. If other countries take countermeasures, the United States will lose about 624,000 jobs. post.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta announced on the 7th that tariff concerns have forced about one-fifth of US companies to reassess, postpone or abandon their investment plans. The agency pointed out that the current negative impact of trade friction on US corporate investment is mainly concentrated in manufacturing. If the situation escalates further, the negative impact of US corporate investment may continue to expand.
For US milk, which is highly dependent on overseas export markets, prices have also fallen to $15/100 pounds due to trade wars. A dairy farmer in the Midwest of Wisconsin, Sarah Lloyd, told the media that their family had a nearly 100-year-old dairy farm and now loses about $30,000 a month. If it doesn't last, "there will be no cows squeezed here next year." Milk."
From Coca-Cola to RVs, from toys to clothing, the US domestic consumer goods market is in the shadow of “National Security”. Just after the US announced its decision to impose a 25% tariff on US$16 billion in Chinese imports, some netizens pointed out that this means that US consumer costs will rise by 25%, and this burden is unevenly distributed on low-income groups. Because they consume a higher proportion of Chinese products. In a recent report, Bank of America Merrill Lynch pointed out that the White House's trade policy is a repeat of the bad policies of the United States in the 1980s. Like 30 years ago, American consumers will become the biggest losers in the trade war.
Obviously, the US government’s big tariffs are hurting the United States itself, hurting people who claim to create welfare for them. In the growing wave of opposition to the increase of tariffs, can the US government do something that is in keeping with the people?
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