Outside In | Trump’s tariffs plan: his most crass and counterproductive malaprop yet
There’s no evidence of a trade war – especially one waged in the rear-view mirror – ever having been ‘good’, and even less of any ‘being easy to win’
It must surely go down as one of the most breathtakingly crass comments ever made by someone in serious high office: “Trade wars are good, and easy to win.”
I sense as the history books get written, Donald Trump will be remembered for many epic malaprops, but this will surely be among the hardest to live down.
The president announced he is pressing ahead with the imposition of 25 per cent tariffs on steel imports and 10 per cent for aluminium on Thursday, but exempted Canada and Mexico, backtracking from earlier pledges of tariffs on all countries.
Let’s be clear Mr Trump: there is no evidence of a trade war ever having been good, and even less of any trade war being easy to win.
Most have inflicted deep harm on all protagonists. Most have cost consumers dear. Many have ended not in trade war, but real war. It is surely not the way to make America great again.
As the World Trade Organisation’s Roberto Azevedo commented in the wake of Trump’s astonishing tweet: “An eye for an eye will leave us all blind, and the world in a deep recession.”