Tariffs Won’t Advance Goal of Changing China’s ‘Harmful’ Practices, Say Groups

The U.S. Trade Representative’s proposed 25 percent tariffs on Chinese imports and the Trump administration’s “escalating” threats to raise the tariffs even higher “will not effectively advance our shared goal” of changing China’s “harmful” trade practices “in a durable, verifiable, and enforceable manner.” So said joint comments filed Friday in docket USTR-2018-0005 by dozens of business and consumer tech trade groups, including CTA, the Information Technology Industry Council, the National Retail Federation and Telecommunications Industry Association. “We believe the proposed tariffs will be counterproductive and undermine” the administration’s efforts “to change China’s policies and practices” through face-to-face negotiations, said the groups. “Tariffs are taxes,” they said. “Imposing wide-ranging tariffs will negate the economic and jobs benefits of the recent tax reform and tax cuts by offsetting those benefits with the costs embedded in the tariffs. These costs will be paid by the U.S. consumer in the form of higher product prices and by U.S. businesses in the form of higher costs.” Though the tariffs haven't taken effect, “the very discussion” of them creates “uncertainty across the U.S. business and farm community,” and “already harmed U.S. companies, farmers, consumers, and markets,” said the groups. “China’s threat of retaliation further exacerbates business and farm uncertainty.” The groups understand the tariff threat “is intended to create leverage to change the direction of the Chinese economy, but that provides little comfort to those businesses, farms, and workers whose livelihoods are being put at risk.” CTA also filed its own 28-page comments submission Friday in which it said it “categorically opposes the imposition of tariffs on the products identified in USTR’s proposed list.” CTA specific comments on 193 "line items" on the list, asking that they be removed because tariffs on them would "cause disproportionate harm to our member companies."