THE Trump tariff shock is going to take a bit of time to sink in, though stock markets worldwide have already sunk. Altogether, 60 countries have been slapped with at least 10 per cent tariffs; those with large trade surpluses with the US will pay a much higher rate. Trump鈥檚 public argument was two-fold: force US trade partners with the highest surpluses to lower their tariffs on US imports, and encourage US and other multinational firms to move their manufacturing to the US.
Interestingly, the tariff announcement did not apply to Russia, North Korea, Cuba, and Belarus, supposedly because they don鈥檛 run a trade surplus with the US. Except that Russia does.