Whatever you think of President Trump's tariffs, there's one point you have to concede: his interest in them is not a passing whim. He noted that on Wednesday, in the Rose Garden, when he was announcing the latest, massive round of tariffs. "I've been talking about this for 40 years," he said.The use of tariffs are a core belief for Donald Trump. Trade deficits are bad, other countries take advantage of the U.S. and tariffs are the way to fix this.Since the Rose Garden announcement, markets have plunged, other countries have promised to retaliate, and members of his own party have spoken out against the tariffs.Trump's tariff plan is designed to eliminate U.S. trade deficits. Are trade deficits actually bad?For sponsor-free episodes of Consider This, sign up for Consider This+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.Email us at considerthis@npr.org.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
Chapter 1: Why is President Trump interested in tariffs?
Whatever you think of President Trump's tariffs, there's one point you have to concede. His interest in them is not just some passing whim. He noted that on Wednesday in the Rose Garden when he was announcing the latest massive round of tariffs.
Great consistency, actually, because I've been talking about it for 40 years. But because I saw what was happening 40 years ago. If you look at my old speeches when I was young, very handsome. Yeah. My old speeches, and people would say, I'd be on a television show, I'd be talking about how we were being ripped off by... These countries, I mean, nothing changes very much.
The only thing that changed were the countries.
It's true. He's been talking about this for years. Here he is on the Oprah Winfrey Show back in 1988.
If you ever go to Japan right now and try to sell something, forget about it, Oprah. Just forget about it. It's almost impossible. They don't have laws against it. They just make it impossible. They come over here, they sell their cars, their VCRs, they knock the hell out of our companies.
You see, these are core beliefs for Donald Trump. Trade deficits are bad. Other countries are taking advantage of the U.S. Tariffs are the way to fix all of this. These beliefs shaped his whole first presidential campaign.
We have a $500 billion deficit, trade deficit with China. We're going to turn it around and we have the cards. Don't forget, we're like the piggy bank that's being robbed.
These same beliefs shaped his first presidential term.
I am taking action to impose safeguard tariffs on imported residential washing machines and all solar products.
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Chapter 2: What has Trump said about trade for decades?
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When Malcolm Gladwell presented NPR's Throughline podcast with a Peabody Award, he praised it for its historical and moral clarity. On Throughline, we take you back in time to the origins of what's in the news, like presidential power, aging, and evangelicalism. Time travel with us every week on the Throughline podcast from NPR.
Throughline It's Consider This from NPR. What you think of Trump's tariffs depends a lot on whether you agree with his core premise, and that is trade deficits are bad and we should eliminate them. Well, Jason Furman does not agree. He was the top economic advisor to former President Obama, and he's an economist at Harvard University. I talked with him about his views on trade deficits.
Okay, first, what is a trade deficit?
Just define it for us. A trade deficit is when you pay more money to another country in exchange for the stuff you're buying from them than they pay you in exchange for the things that they buy from you.
Okay, and then from an economist's point of view then, is it bad for the U.S. to have a trade deficit?
The one thing that is definitely not bad is trade deficits with any individual country. Even if overall we didn't have a trade deficit, there would still be some countries where we really love their products and we need them, and so we have a trade deficit with them, and some other countries where it's the opposite. So right now Brazil buys a lot of energy stuff from the United States,
So we have a surplus with them. France makes a lot of food and chemicals that we need here in the United States. And so we run a trade deficit. Overall, if the trade deficit is really, really large for a really long period of time, it can be unsustainable. Don't think that's where the United States has been.
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