, Columnist
The Good Donald, the Bad Donald and the Ugly Market
Stock investors' reaction to the president's plan creates an internal conflict.
This article is for subscribers only.
Call it the tariff tantrum.
The big question investors should be asking during the market's plunge this week is how could the threat of tariffs -- which would affect only 2 percent of all U.S. imports, representing just 0.2 percent of GDP -- cause stocks to lose more than $600 billion. The answer is that either tariffs will sock a bigger punch to the economy than most economists think, or it's about more than just tariffs.