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**JULY 8, 2022**
Kuttner on TAP
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**** Biden's Striptease on
China Tariffs
Some aides keep hinting of coming cuts, while their leader dithers and
sends mixed signals.
President Biden met today with top advisers to discuss whether to cut
some of the existing tariffs on exports from China. It's a
spectacularly bad idea, since tariff cuts would not address the drivers
of inflation but would remove salutary pressure on Beijing to stop
abusing the trading system. The meeting was apparently inconclusive.
Biden told reporters around noon, just before the meeting began, that he
had not made any decision yet
.
As on student debt relief, kicking the can down the road has become a
Biden signature, a habit that manages to offend just about everyone,
while signaling weak leadership.
All week, the business press has been publishing leaks about possible
tariff cuts. Last Monday,
**The Wall Street Journal** ran a piece
titled "Biden Might Soon Ease China Tariffs."
On Tuesday, it was Bloomberg's turn
.
The Bloomberg piece added the tidbit that Treasury Secretary Janet
Yellen, who had previously called for tariff cuts, had discussed the
idea with China's Vice Premier Liu He in a conference call. In fact,
their call was about macroeconomic issues, and it was Liu who had raised
the issue of tariffs.
Then Politico
reported a possible token cut of $10 billion, out of $370 billion-and
added the confounding assertion that the administration is also
considering a full-scale investigation of China's massive export
subsidies under Section 301 of the 1974 Trade Act, which could lead to
more tariffs. It would make no sense to both do that investigation and
cut tariffs now.
Sources for Politico's story included "three industry officials and
former federal officials," which is to say lobbyists. In short, these
leaks come mainly from people pushing for tariff cuts, over the
opposition of the labor movement, National Security Adviser Jake
Sullivan, and U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai.
All this happened in a week when Biden was taking a carefully staged
trip to Cleveland to tout union workers
and domestic manufacturing. You have to wonder if the Biden
administration is so incompetent as to promote U.S. manufacturing and
cuts in China tariffs in the same week.
It's high time for Biden to put this away once and for all-and to
say in so many words that there will be no cuts in the China tariffs
until there is a total renegotiation of China's predatory role in the
trading system.
~ ROBERT KUTTNER
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