By Jeff Ferry, CPA Research Director The US trade deficit grew 6.8% in November to $45.2 billion, its worst monthly figure in nine months. The November report hammered home the challenge of a large and growing manufacturing deficit and large bilateral deficits with many trading partners. The deficit growth was driven by a small decline…
President-elect Trump has named two deputy directors of the new National Trade Council he announced last month, one to steer “Buy American, Hire American” efforts and the other focused on the defense industrial base. [Daily News | January 5, 2017 |Inside US Trade] The council, to be led by economics professor Peter Navarro, will advise…
A Republican proposal aimed at cutting tax rates and keeping jobs in the U.S. risks whacking the earnings of big U.S. retailers by driving up the cost of imported clothes, furniture and other goods. [SUSAN PULLIAM, SARAH NASSAUER and RICHARD RUBIN| January 6, 2017 |Wall Street Journal] Among the companies whose earnings are calculated to take a hit…
Ushering in the New Year, President-elect Trump named Robert Lighthizer, a veteran trade negotiator and “harsh critic of China’s trade practices,” to be his lead trade negotiator. Trump’s trade rhetoric has been blood and thunder. He has threatened 45 percent retaliatory tariffs against China and other trade partners that are not living up to their…
The U.S. distributor of Corona beer is already planning ways to avoid raising prices if Congress boosts the tax bill on the company’s Mexican imports as part of a broader tax overhaul, said company chief executive Rob Sands. [VIPAL MONGA and JENNIFER MALONEY | January 5, 2017 |Wall Street Journal] Republicans, who are set to take full…
Washington ~ The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) released a report today showing that the US trade deficit rose by nearly 7% compared to October “America continued, last November, losing the international competition for good jobs and industries,” said Michael Stumo, CEO of the Coalition for a Prosperous America. “The Obama-Bush-Clinton trade agreements promised export…
House Democrats, relegated to the chamber’s minority for a fourth consecutive Congress, are eyeing a drastic rewriting of the nation’s trade policies as a potential area in which they can wield relevance in President-elect Donald Trump’s new administration. [David Catanese| January 3, 2017 |US News] On the first day of the 115th Congress, a group…
Wilbur Ross, President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Commerce Department, told the Senate Commerce Committee this week that expanding exports and cutting the U.S. trade deficit are among his top priorities if he is confirmed for the role. [Daily News| January 4, 2017 |Inside US Trade] In responses to a questionnaire he received from the…
U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman views the negotiation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a crowning trade achievement of the Obama administration despite the deal’s highly uncertain future, suggesting in an “exit memo” this week that the incoming Trump team use it to “shape” globalization. [Daily News| January 7, 2016 |Inside US Trade] Agreements like TPP…
In Global economic forces conspire to stymie U.S. manufacturing, Brookings’ David Dollar contends that job loss in manufacturing derives primarily from technological change, not from trade. If this were truly the sole cause, why have virtually all our trading partner been able to better deal with these technological changes and avoid the increasing trade deficit that the…
