Posted on 05/31/2018 8:02:21 AM PDT by Olog-hai
The Trump administration announced Thursday it will impose tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from Europe, Mexico and Canada after failing to win concessions from the American allies. Europe and Mexico pledged to retaliate quickly, exacerbating trans-Atlantic and North American trade tensions.
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said the tariffs would be 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum, and go into effect on Friday, as the administration followed through on the penalties after earlier granting exemptions to buy time for negotiations. President Donald Trump had announced the tariffs in March, citing national security concerns.
The European Commission’s president, Jean-Claude Juncker, said Trump’s decision amounted to trade protectionism and that Europe would respond with countermeasures. “This is protectionism, pure and simple,” Juncker said. Mexico said it would penalize U.S. imports including pork bellies, apples, grapes, cheeses and flat steel.
The tariffs directed at some of the U.S.’s most ardent allies represented the latest move in Trump’s “America First” agenda that has roiled financial markets and raised the specter of a trade war involving the U.S., China and some of the globe’s most dominant economies.
The trade actions have opened the U.S. to criticism that it’s burning bridges at a time when Trump is seeking to rid North Korea of nuclear weapons and help stabilize the Middle East. …
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
Mexico needs to impose an export tax on narcotics if they want to hurt us. /s
So, what’s wrong with “protectionism”?
Sure, Americans want to be protected, for their lives, well-being, trade, etc.
A great American President makes sure we are “protected”.
Does placing an “ism” after a word somehow make it “evil”?
We’re also accused (by Obama) of “colonialism”, while he trades and deals in “tribalism”...I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be in a colony, than in a “tribe”, any day.
I don’t mind spending a bit more to buy American.
“The EU trade commissioner, Cecilia Malmstrom, said the EU “did everything to avoid this outcome.” Noting her discussions with U.S. officials, she said. “I have argued for the EU and the US to engage in a positive trans-Atlantic trade agenda, and for the EU to be fully, permanently and unconditionally exempted from these tariffs.””
Translation: We need to continue to be able to screw the United States without any interference.
The EU already has tariffs on pretty much everything.
The bottom line is that the EU and Mexico are not fair trading with the US. They are at an advantage on wages and environmental protection(s) and are effectively dumping their products here to force the domestic US producers out of business. Once the US competitors are gone they can control prices.
Screw them....open your markets to the US, or you will find the US closed to you.
Why don’t we raise the tarriffs on illegal aliens?
Why don’t we raise the tariffs on illegal aliens?
The BBC says the EU has a gun held to it’s head , OMG the Humanity or Drama ,LOL
The free ride is over.
Change or die
They aren’t allies. As soon as you look at it through that lens, you figure out the tariffs are overdue, and that those calories spent hyperventilating could have been used figuring out some other area of the average European’s life that could still use supervision.
The EU had a chance in 2016 to fix up TTIP talks and that basically went nowhere. None of the 28 members of the EU have the authority to go out on their own, and write their own US-individual treaties.
I’ll predict that by August, they quietly agree to go back to the TTIP table and write up a replacement trade situation. At best, they can mount this anti-Trump tirade for about a hundred days before the public tells them to shut and negotiate.
“[I]n general, the protective system of our day is conservative, while the free trade system is destructive. It breaks up old nationalities and pushes the antagonism of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie to the extreme point. In a word, the free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone, gentlemen, that I vote in favor of free trade.”And every politician in favor of free trade thinks the same way. Even though they institute protectionism themselves. The target, after all, is the USA.
— Karl Marx, Brussels, 1848
Neither do most of us. I always look at tomatoes and other fresh produce, If it says made anywhere besides USA I do not buy it. I will never buy Mex anything.
Mexico may have in mind recalling all those superbly talented illegals that they have magnanimously allowed to come into the United States in order to save it.
Correct. The Euroweenies also use absurd regulations to keep our products out. Europe will lose...as always.
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