U.S. Trade Partners Watch Warily as Trump Considers Steel Tariffs
Michael Strain, an economist at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, worries
that retaliation from China and Europe to any steel tariffs would be particularly painful for American exporters and could lead to job cuts when Mr. Trump is trying to bolster employment and labor force participation.
The fear is that Mr. Trump could abandon the trade organization entirely, essentially unraveling an institution
that has been instrumental in lowering trade barriers over the past two decades
They view it as a moment that will illuminate whether Mr. Trump is ready to make good
on his campaign promises to protect flagging American industries with tariffs.
“If he actually pulls the trigger, it could be highly disruptive to world trade,” said Stephen Moore, a Heritage
Foundation economist who advised Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign and helped craft his economic plan.
“There were many more workers who used steel to make things in the U. S. than who actually made the steel,” said Phillip L. Swagel, an
economics professor at the University of Maryland who was a senior economist for international trade during Mr. Bush’s first term.
“It’s not even going to really work in terms of helping American workers.”
In April, Mr. Trump signed an executive order calling for a sweeping investigation by the Department of Commerce into whether
steel imports were harming national security, employing a rarely used section of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962.
The tariffs could very well provoke a global trade war that could make all sides poorer.