US President Joe Biden and his predecessor Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee in November’s presidential election, are competing to portray themselves as tough on trade and China.
Biden has already imposed a 100 per cent tariff on Chinese-made electric vehicles, and Trump has vowed to impose a 200 per cent tariff on Chinese cars manufactured in Mexico, along with a range of other protectionist measures affecting steel, solar panels, semiconductors and batteries. The European Union is likely to follow suit, albeit more cautiously.
Arvind SubramanianDevelopment economistArvind Subramanian, a former chief economic adviser to the government of India, is a senior fellow at Brown University and a distinguished non-resident fellow at the Center for Global Development.
