Zannie Minton-Beddoes
Appearances
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
In which case, there'll be a bunch of turbulence, but perhaps this is only a temporary phenomenon. And It really isn't clear. I think there's a division between the president's advisors. President Trump, if you look at what he's said for the last 30 years, you think probably he thinks the US would be better off permanently behind a high tariff wall, but he also loves to deal.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So because we have no clarity about what the goal is, or at least because there are different goals, that makes it even more uncertain about where this is going from here. Then you have question of how will other countries react.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And right now, there's a big difference between countries like Japan, which have already been knocking on the door saying they want to do a deal, and China, which has reacted with high counter tariffs and other measures. So this is really a tariff war in the making. That's a different approach to that taken by Japan and others.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So we're already, I think, in the early stages of a tariff war between China and the US. I mean, If you just backtrack a bit, there were tariffs imposed by President Trump in the first Trump administration to which China retaliated somewhat. Then President Biden kept those tariffs in place. But this was relatively modest amounts and they didn't really have a huge amount of impact on the U.S.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
economy. Now we've had President Trump, first of all, putting 20 percent tariffs on China earlier in the administration because China, They, in his view, were not doing enough to stop the precursors of fentanyl being shipped to Mexico. Last week, he added another 34% tariffs as part of his broad reciprocal tariffs. The Chinese then very robustly announced a retaliation the following day.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
They said they would impose 34% tariffs on U.S. exports to China and also announced another set of measures. They were going to restrict certain Rare earth exports. They put a number of U.S. companies on what they call their unreliable entity list. They used other tools to retaliate. And now President Trump has said, well, in response to that retaliation, he's going to increase emissions.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
tariffs on China by a further 50%. Now, this is a tariff war, tit for tat. The impact of all of this is that tariffs on Chinese goods coming into the US will, I think, be somewhere in the order north of 100%. The knock-on effect of this, now, China is more dependent on the United States for its exports than vice versa. So it will suffer more.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
But it can retaliate with all manner of other potential. If we really get into a kind of economic war, then, for example, Apple produces a huge number of its phones in China, which are now going to be hit by these tariffs. But China could put all kinds of restrictions on Apple. China could put all kinds of restrictions on other kinds of critical minerals that it exports.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
You can get into a very nasty tit-for-tat situation. economic battle from which nobody wins. And it becomes quite hard to get out of Because whatever the economic logic, this starts then becoming a matter of national and political pride.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So I had been expecting to find China angry and worried because it was clear to me before any tariffs were imposed on Liberation Day that China was likely to be a big target of the Trump administration. And when I'd been in China, I go pretty much every year around this time. And the mood two years ago was very, very grim. There was a sense that, you know, China and U.S.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
I'm sure there would be a recovery rally, but I don't think the uncertainty that he's created would go away. I think we've crossed some kind of a Rubicon in the last week or so, and we're not going to go back to the world as it was before. What do you mean by that?
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
relations were getting ever worse and they were sort of slipping. to a place where you worry about war. Last year, the mood was very grim because the Chinese economy was in very, very weak shape. And so this year, I was thinking, oh, my goodness, this is going to be even worse. But actually, I found a
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Quiet confidence in China that they could weather a tariff war with the United States if it happened. They were feeling more optimistic, partly because of, I don't know if you remember, a few weeks ago, there was the release of a Chinese AI model called DeepSeek. Right.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
The DeepSeek moment, DeepSeek is an LLM, a large language model that is almost as good as those produced by the best American companies like OpenAI and much more efficient and doesn't need as much compute power as the Americans won't have. And it gave an enormous value.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
sort of sense of confidence and ability in China that, gosh, despite the US controls on exports of high-end chips, we can actually make serious progress. So that was one reason for confidence. But the other was that I think there was a recognition amongst many in Beijing that the Chinese economy, which has been flat on its back because
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
it has been going through a very protracted housing bust and debt overhang that the government hadn't really been addressing, but instead it had been relying a lot on exports, that if there was a full-on tariff war with the United States, that would hurt very hard, but it would push China towards the kinds of the reforms that...
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
everyone knows, including the Chinese government, they need to do, which is to focus their economy away from exports and more on domestic consumers, to increase Chinese consumer spending at home, to provide Chinese people with more of a social safety net, to give them more resources to spend at home, to boost the domestic economy. And that's the kind of big shift that China's economy needs to do.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And I think there is a sense in Beijing that if President Trump launches a big tariff war against China, yes, they will be hit, but they will react by boosting domestic consumption. And that because that is something that the economy needs. It's actually an opportunity for China.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Well, you know, President Trump has for decades said that he believes in tariffs and he has said that he feels that the global trading system is unfair to America. It's a very long held belief of his. So this whole tariff action of the last week hasn't kind of come out of nowhere. He really believes this.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Absolutely. So as you say, the United States, by imposing tariffs on everybody, friends and foes alike, is undermining, I think, one of the core aspects of its strength, which is its alliance system and the fact that it does have very strong relations with a large number of countries. And it has the reputation of being the country that
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
set up and upheld this system of global trade and security rules. Whereas now it seems to be turning its back on that. And that is an opportunity geopolitically for China. It was really ironic, you know, being in China and hearing Chinese officials say, We believe in the rules-based order. We believe in multilateralism. You know, it's the law of the jungle in the U.S.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And of course, that's not entirely true because China, as we all know, has abided by the, you know, perhaps the letter of trade rules, but not the spirit. I mean, it has had some very questionable trade practices. No one would deny that, that it is certainly not played by the rules. But it is now because the U.S. is behaving in this way,
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
China is able to say, well, we are upholders of this rules-based system. And the real bully, the real bad actor here is the United States.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Well, if you wanted to deal with China's not fully playing by the rules, then surely the sensible thing to do would be for the United States to to act in concert with its allies to put pressure on China. But that is not what's happening. What's happening instead is that the U.S. is putting tariffs on everybody, allies and foes alike.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
If you wanted to really put pressure on China, you would act much more in concert, which was sort of what the Biden administration was trying to do, right? The Biden administration kept the economic pressure on China, but it also made a big effort to build up alliances in the rest of Asia.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So in Trump's first administration, when he first imposed tariffs on China. Many Chinese companies, in order to avoid those tariffs, moved their operations to other countries, particularly Vietnam, but also Cambodia, some to Mexico, and then exported them to the United States. And because those exports came from Vietnam and not from China, they were not subject to the tariff.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
But it was essentially Chinese companies just doing the manufacturing somewhere else. And actually also because labor costs were lower in Vietnam than they were in China. By now increasing tariffs so heftily on Vietnam, essentially Trump is trying to prevent Chinese companies from exporting to the U.S. by shifting their manufacturing. to Vietnam. That's the logic. But he's not just Vietnam.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And it's part of a broader sense from this administration that it wants to radically remake the rules of global security, geopolitics, economics. And so even if, and I don't think he would do this, but even if he did what you suggest and said, oops, this was all a terrible mistake. Who's to say that he won't change his mind next week or the week after or in six months?
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
He's increased tariffs on pretty much every country and, you know, also a couple of islands only with penguins on them. You know, it's a universal approach.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
I don't think that was serious. And what I think really happened is that they, you know, essentially used a AI program to basically apply these things to pretty much every country. And these islands have a separate, I think it's a separate URL. They come up as separate jurisdictions. And so they got a tariff. The logic, if you will, and it was Howard Lutning.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
The logic of what he said was, well, just as China moved its production to Vietnam, you know, we want to make sure it's not moving its production to these countries. like the ones in the southern near the Antarctic. But if you've looked at these islands, they're tiny and they literally have penguins on them.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So the notion that any Chinese company is going to be, you know, moving an assembly factory there, you know, ludicrous. But the underlying point is, I suppose, to by imposing tariffs across the board, you prevent Chinese companies from avoiding these tariffs by moving their production elsewhere. That's the serious point. But it comes at huge, huge cost.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Creating an adversary is a very strong phrase that you use there. I don't think the Europeans think of the US as an adversary yet. But the shocks of the past two months, which are not just about trade, but they are about, you know, Vice President Vance coming to Europe,
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
a few weeks ago to the Munich Security Conference, and essentially delivering outright hostile speech, accusing the Europeans of not dealing with the enemy within, of not allowing free speech, and essentially pointing to extreme right-wing parties like the AFD in Germany and essentially giving them his support.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
It was a very striking moment where he spoke to Europeans, intervened in European politics and did so in a kind of outright hostile way. Then remember in the controversy about the signal messages that were made public, he said that the Europeans were pathetic. There is a sense in Europe that that this administration is hostile to Europe.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And you can really only go on the best evidence, which is what President Trump has been saying over years and decades. And that is that he believes, wrongly in my view, but he believes that the global trading system is... doesn't work for America. And he believes that it needs radical change. And I think since he's been saying that for such a long time, we have to believe him.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
There is a sense that they want, not just that they want Europeans to spend more on defence, which is absolutely right and the Europeans should, but they want to get out of Europe or they want to reduce the US commitment to Europe.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And in economic terms, as you say, that President Trump thinks that the European Union is somehow designed to hurt the United States, none of which is true and all of which has caused in Europe You know, something like a sort of accelerated version of the stages of grief. First of all, shock, anger, and then acceptance of, OK, this is the new world we're in.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
We can no longer rely on the United States. We thought the transatlantic relationship was immutable, but we can't. What are we now going to do? And if you look at European politics, there's been a huge rise in sort of skepticism of America in European countries. And the European officials are trying to work out how best to navigate this. How do you minimize the hit to the European economy?
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
How do you make sure Europe is less reliant on the United States? And just as with China, actually, this is a big opportunity for Europe. Europe can do more to boost its own economy. Europe can do more to integrate with other countries. Europe can do more to boost its own defense. And it's important to remember the United States is powerful, very powerful. But it is not the only power around.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And the United States only adds up to 15% of global trade. The vast majority of trade globally is by countries outside the U.S., So if the rest of us want to continue with a global trade, rules-based trading order, I think it's incumbent on us to do so. If the United States wants to hide behind a tariff rule, it's going to hurt everyone, but so be it.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
The point then for everybody else is how to retain a system. that I think we all agree is a much better system for leading to prosperity and economic success.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
We wouldn't shut out the U.S., but if the U.S. wants to have these high tariffs, that doesn't mean everybody else has to follow suit. I think the real challenge now will be to ensure that the rest of the world salvages a global trading system, notwithstanding what the U.S. is doing.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So the EU has a mechanism that it created an instrument for itself, which is called, I think, the economic coercion instrument, which... It created a few years ago, ironically, because it wanted to have a way of retaliating against China because it thought China was the biggest, sort of most dangerous actor in the global trading system.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And this mechanism allows it to use retaliation in areas that are not tariffs, basically, in any other area. The one area where many people think the EU will retaliate is on tech companies. And the reason is because the U.S. exports a huge amount of services globally. to the European Union.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
We've talked in this conversation, Terry, about trade in goods, because President Trump is very focused on trade in goods, where it's true that the US runs a big deficit. But services, which is things like, you know, selling Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And so I don't think that there will be a fundamental shift. I think there will be negotiations with certain countries. I think the markets will affect his calculus. But I don't think we can suddenly kind of wish away what's happened and go back to the world that we had before, quote, unquote, Liberation Day.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
I think that this view of the world that President Trump has is at a big picture level fundamentally wrong. The U.S. is the most successful economy in the world, is the richest economy in the world. And broadly, the global trading system has hugely benefited the U.S. Now, that's not to say that there are not certain countries that are not obeying the letter of the global trading system.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
It's not to say that there are certain products in certain areas where other countries should open up more. So it's not perfect. But broadly, I think the U.S. has absolutely benefited. But I think to understand what President Trump is trying to do, you need to step back a bit. And he has two views, and it's not quite clear which of them is predominant.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
But one view is that if you look at the United States over the last 30 years, he thinks that The U.S. manufacturing base has been hollowed out and the U.S. has suffered because of unfair trade practices from other countries and that you need tariffs to reindustrialize the United States and that this permanently would mean that behind a tariff wall.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
you would encourage companies to invest in the United States to create U.S. jobs and that, therefore, the U.S. would fundamentally be better off if it permanently had high tariffs. That's kind of one potential view.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
The other view is that he actually views these tariffs as negotiating tools to get better deals with other countries and that by threatening, then you negotiate a better deal with the other countries.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
There could be truth to both of those, but it's not clear what is actually driving President Trump, whether he primarily wants to have a kind of 19th century view where the U.S., in his view, prospered behind a high tariff wall. And I think that's where he's trying to go. But the modern economy is built, as you know, Terry, on long supply chains.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
where companies get supplies from many different countries, and where the U.S. has specialized in services and higher value add manufacturers. And if you really think what the consequences would be of this vision, do you think the U.S. is going to start having factories making T-shirts? Is the U.S. going to start, you know, having factories that make sneakers?
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
All of the things that are bought from countries around the world. It's a very... sort of radical shift back to an era where the U.S. was much less wealthy and successful than it is now. And so at one level, if that's where he wants to go, this is a fundamental break and it's going to have huge and ongoing consequences for everybody.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Alternatively, it's more of a negotiating ploy and it's designed to get a better deal from certain countries. And within the people around the president, there are different views as to whether these tariffs are really about negotiation or whether they are really about negotiation. creating the barriers that will bring manufacturing back to the United States. They have different visions.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
But both of them imply a lot of turmoil, a lot of uncertainty, and a lot of pain for consumers because tariffs are taxes on consumers. The people who pay this in the end, the cost of the tariffs, are people who pay more for the things that they buy.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Let me try and give the best possible explanation that I can of what I think is the logic of the administration. The administration's logic is We want more things to be built and produced in the United States. We want manufacturing back so we can create the kind of jobs that existed in the middle of the 20th century.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And so we are going to have high tariffs, which will encourage companies to come and invest and produce in America. And another way of encouraging to do that is that we'll offer lower taxes. And for American consumers, we'll get more revenue from tariffs so we can lower other kinds of taxes. That's what you hear from administration officials.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And they will point to the late 19th century when America, it's true, had very high tariffs. And it's also true that that was the main source of fiscal revenue. The income tax wasn't invented until 1913. But to think that you can recreate that now or that it would be a good thing, I think are both very mistaken.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
First of all, if you go back to the 19th century, most of the best scholarships suggest that actually the McKinley tariffs were, if anything, a detriment to the U.S. economy. It would have done even better without them. Are you talking about the tariff of 1930? No, I'm talking about the late 19th century, the McKinley era, when the U.S. had high tariffs and was growing very fast.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
The 1930s are another powerful history lesson because there the Smoot-Hawley tariffs were increased. And although it wasn't the main reason for the depression, it certainly didn't help. And other countries retaliated and that tit-for-tat retaliatory tariff made the depression worse. It certainly didn't help it.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
That's one of the reasons why after 1945, there was a decision made to never again have that kind of a tariff war. and to create a sort of stable global system for trade, which is the one that President Trump is essentially now blowing up. The question for U.S. consumers, and indeed for the U.S. economy, is to say, has the U.S. economy overall really been hurt by the current system?
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
My answer would be no, it hasn't. It's the richest, most successful economy in the world. U.S. consumers have an extraordinary range of choice. They are better off from the competitive environment that comes from a low-tariff economy. If tariffs are raised, consumers pay more. U.S. companies have higher costs. That's why you see this incredible turmoil in the stock market right now.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
I don't think you end up with a system where the U.S. is better off. Nobody gains from a tariff war. And the other part of this is that countries will retaliate. We've already seen China announcing retaliation. I think others will retaliate too. And so you end up with a situation which is really lose-lose. And the goal of it is one that I think is not only unattainable, is not really advisable.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
We're in 2025. The U.S. 's strengths are in high tech. The U.S. 's strengths are in services. The U.S. 's strengths are not in going back to making garments, into sewing sneakers. That's not what the U.S. economy is at. And trying to force it back through tariffs, I think, is a very damaging and dangerous direction to go in.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Well, I would say that that's a big mistake and it will leave the U.S. worse off. I mean, Terry, if we stand back, I think the simplest way of encapsulating this is that in 2025, the US is the most successful economy in the world.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
This administration wants to radically reshape the rules of global trade in order to put a large tariff wall around the United States, which it thinks will lead to a much stronger US economy as companies invest behind that tariff wall. It's not clear that companies will invest because the most important aspect of this current moment is just how much uncertainty there is.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And no one knows if this approach of President Trump is going to last or if these tariffs will be negotiating tools and therefore won't go. So I think the most likely thing is that companies don't actually invest. They just wait and see. But even if they did, and some companies did come back, it would be a U.S.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
economy behind a tariff barrier that is less efficient, less productive than it would be without that barrier. And my view, and this won't surprise you since I, you know… run a magazine that for 183 years has fought for free trade. But my view is that the best recipe for the U.S.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
to succeed in the 21st century is not to hide behind a barrier of tariffs, but to double down on its economic strengths. And those strengths, as you say, are its strengths in technology, its strengths in innovation. It attracts the smartest, brightest people from around the world. It has the deepest, most liquid capital markets. These are incredible strengths that I think the U.S. should play to.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
And it has every possibility of carrying on being the most successful economy in the world. The bit that I would add is that I think much, much more needs to be done to help those people who have been left behind by not just trade, but also technology.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
So I think there is a big to-do list in the United States, whether it's education, whether it's training, whether it's a much more focus on people who really have suffered. But I don't think hiding behind tariff barriers or reshaping the global trading system is going to be the route to long-term success for the U.S. economy.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
No, this is absolutely not. This is without a doubt the biggest trade policy shock, I think, in history. Because if you look at back to the late 19th century, the increase in tariffs under McKinley was less big than this. Even Smoot-Hawley was smaller.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
You know, presidents from Reagan and indeed to President Biden have increased tariffs on individual goods or individual sectors, but nothing like this. So this is off the charts in terms of scale. It's off the charts in terms of speed and uncertainty. Considering what's happening in the markets.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Well, first of all, some people are now beginning to speak out publicly. You will have seen that Bill Ackman, for example, a very prominent investor, is worried about an economic nuclear winter, thinks this is a mistake. Other prominent wealthy investors have started to speak out. I think you're also hearing from senators, Senator Ted Cruz publicly coming out that these were a bad idea.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
You're hearing it from more Republican senators. So I think people are beginning to speak out publicly. Behind the scenes, people are somewhere between, you know, baffled, alarmed, befuddled, you know, because firstly, the scale of this has really shocked people. But I think no one is quite sure. What the administration's endgame is.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
Because as we were discussing, there are three not necessarily compatible goals and the administration's logic switches between them. Is this about, you know, fundamentally changing the global system so that the U.S. reindustrializes behind a high tariff wall? In that case, these tariffs are here to stay because it won't happen unless they stay. And it's going to be extraordinarily painful.
Fresh Air
Trump's Tariffs & The Radical Remaking Of The Global Economy
I would say a very bad idea, but they have to stay. Is it primarily to raise revenue? Because if that's the main goal, then you actually don't want too many factories to come back because obviously if they come back, they're no longer paying the tariffs. You only pay the tariffs if you're importing stuff. And thirdly, is it really a negotiating tool?