Way too complex and way too open to loopholes.
Basing the tariffs on the trade imbalances makes much more sense.
“excluding most raw material transactions”
That is mainly so Canada doesn’t get whacked for exporting oil to us so we can export oil from Texas and Louisiana.
Better five extra words than 30 million angry Canadians.
The base tariff for a particular import shall be:
1. increased 2% per dollar...
on the industry wage shortfall of a key source country
2. increased by...US<->international commercial cash flow US shortfall,
3. increased by the percentage of the latest 12-month US<->the key source country commercial cash flow US shortfall
4. adjusted based on the latest 12-month US<->foreign exchange rate change
5. as directed by the President of the United States..
adjusted based on domestic producer profitability
I’m adding industrial wage shortfall[1], Presidential industry protection[5], considering trade imbalances both with the source country[3] and all foreign countries[2].
Why [4]? So countries like the UK have built-in protection against George Soros-type currency speculators.
Warplanes, tanks, ships, watches and many systems need to be able to take a licking and keep on ticking.
I’m proposing a system that is pretty much self-adjusting so the rules can be counted on for years to come.