A new “wave” of tariffs was announced Thursday by Donald Trump, who signed a memorandum Thursday essentially requiring his advisers to calculate new tariff levels for other countries globally.
As the New York Times reports, President US instructed his advisers to come up with new tariff levels that take into account a range of trade barriers and other economic approaches adopted by America’s trading partners.
This includes not only the tariffs that other countries impose on the United States, but also the taxes on foreign products, the subsidies they give to their industries, their exchange rates, and other behaviors that the president considers unfair.
The president said the step was necessary to balance America’s “unfair” relations and stop other countries from taking advantage of the U.S. in trade.
He made clear, however, that his ultimate goal was to force companies to bring production back to the United States.
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