Biden Can Fight Inflation by Repealing Trump's Tariffs. Why Hasn't He?

[brooklynite]

New York Magazine

Inflation is, by far, President Biden’s gravest problem. It is eating up the wage gains thrown off by the hot labor market and forcing the Federal Reserve to risk triggering a recession by raising interest rates. It is the main cause of his anemic approval ratings and the terrifyingly high probability that a dangerously authoritarian Republican Party will win the 2024 election.

There isn’t a button Biden can push to make the whole problem go away. But there is a button he can push to make some of the problem go away. The mystery is why he hasn’t pushed it.

That button is to rescind the tariffs imposed by his predecessor, which were created by executive order, and could be reversed the same way.

Donald Trump started a trade war with various countries he didn’t like for various reasons. Some of Trump’s hostility to various countries had a solid basis (China has long stolen American intellectual property) and others did not (he seems to favor countries that enriched him personally).

Biden campaigned against the Trump tariffs as a tax on the middle class. Once in office, he held off on rescinding them. His reason for hesitating was not crazy. Biden recognized that Trump’s opposition to trade had helped him in the Midwest, and he wanted to position his party as an ally of the industrial Midwest rather than as an automatic ally of free trade.

[leftstreet]

1. And why hasn't Congress reversed Trump's tax cuts?

[BSdetect]

4. I asked this months ago. Needs an answer.

[Budi]

2. Where's our budget director?

[everyonematters]

3. In the long run, we want more manufacturing in the United Sates.

Then we won't have to worry about an international supply chain being clogged up. Both parties are responsible for this.

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. I was under the impression he was lifting them

eg the Airbus-Boeing dispute, and wine and Scotch whisky: https://fortune.com/2021/03/06/biden-eu-tariffs-wine-cheese-boeing-airbus-trump-trade-war/
and steel with the UK: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-and-us-resolve-steel-and-aluminium-tariffs-issue

[Xolodno]

6. Little more complicated than that.

Due to Covid lockdowns in China, they aren't exporting (probably intentional) as quickly. And some of the markets we had in China are significantly reduced because of Trump's stupid trade war.

Add to that, the Ukraine war and associated sanctions are also attributing to inflation. Our trade with Russia was fairly negligible, but for other European nations, it wasn't. And we trade with them, its a domino effect. They lose the energy and natural resources they need to manufacture, then they can't turn around and sell as much to each other, the USA, etc.

[BigmanPigman]

7. Good explanation, thanks.