Tariffs on Southeast Asia will go up at least two-fold by August 1 from the current rate of 10%, based on screen-shot letters President Trump shared on his Truth Social account on Monday.
A Market Access Charge (MAC) might be the perfect addition to the tariff agenda; a surgical tool to tax capital inflows.
Following April’s trade deficit data, which showed a complete freefall in trade during the “Liberation Day” tariff month, May’s trade deficit rose by 18.7% on a monthly basis to $71.5 billion, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).
Tariffs were supposed to be inflationary, but so far, they’ve been proven wrong. Inflation over the last several months was not caused by 10% tariffs on Southeast Asia, nor by the short-lived 145% tariffs on China.
Last year, it wasn’t even in the Top 10. This year, they’re number one. General Motors was ranked as the most China-exposed U.S. multinational by Strategy Risks, a political risk consultancy in New York.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stepped into somewhat hostile territory in the Senate Finance Committee hearing on Thursday. But despite dramatic criticism from Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-OR) and other top Democrats on the Committee, Bessent took an early victory lap on tariffs.
U.S. based generic drug makers need government support to expand – and maybe even to survive – the onslaught of imports nearly every member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Subcommittee on Health said in a hearing on Wednesday.
The second round of the early 2000s ‘China Shock’ will impact the rest of the world more than it will the United States. Tariffs and industrial policies – like the CHIPS Act and the Inflation Reduction Act – have somewhat protected the U.S. from China’s relentless exports.
At a June 4 hearing before the House Natural Resources Committee’s Water, Wildlife and Fisheries Subcommittee, lawmakers and industry representatives expressed growing frustration with what they described as an overregulated domestic seafood industry that is steadily losing ground to foreign competition.
Importers slowed their buying frenzy that occurred prior to the ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs and now April’s trade figures show a not-surprising 16.3% drop for the month to $351 billion.
