Economics
Tariffs Become New Normal as Trump Moves to Next China Demands
- President signs deal and says duties to remain until another
- Doubts persist U.S. strategy will be bear fruit in next phase
This article is for subscribers only.
Sign up here to receive the Davos Diary, a special daily newsletter that will run from Jan. 20-24.
As he signed an initial trade deal with China on Wednesday, President Donald Trump promised further negotiations to tackle some of U.S. companies’ most long-standing complaints would begin “very, very shortly” and that tariffs on some $360 billion in imports from China would remain in place as leverage.
What he didn’t say is that almost no one thinks those negotiations aimed at getting China to rein in its vast web of industrial subsidies and reduce the role of state-owned companies in the economy are likely to either be easy or come to fruition anytime soon.