Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?

How should economists interpret current trade wars and the recent U.S. trade actions that have initiated them? This paper offers an interpretation of current U.S. trade actions that is at once more charitable and less forgiving than that typically...

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Main Authors:	Mattoo, Aaditya, Staiger, Robert W.
Format:	Working Paper
Language:	English
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2019
Subjects:	TRADE WARS TRADE POLICY WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION MULTILATERALISM INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION BARGAINING TACTICS
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/147771555968441512/Trade-Wars-What-Do-They-Mean-Why-Are-They-Happening-Now-What-Are-the-Costs http://hdl.handle.net/10986/31584

id	okr-10986-31584
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-315842022-09-19T12:17:07Z Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs? Mattoo, Aaditya Staiger, Robert W. TRADE WARS TRADE POLICY WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION MULTILATERALISM INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION BARGAINING TACTICS How should economists interpret current trade wars and the recent U.S. trade actions that have initiated them? This paper offers an interpretation of current U.S. trade actions that is at once more charitable and less forgiving than that typically offered by economic commentators. More charitable, because under this interpretation it is possible to see a logic to these actions: the United States is initiating a change from "rules-based" to "power-based" tariff bargaining and is selecting countries with which it runs bilateral trade deficits as the most suitable targets of its bargaining tariffs. Less forgiving, because the main costs of these trade tactics cannot be avoided even if they happen to "work" and deliver lower tariffs. Rather, the paper shows that the main costs will arise from the use of the tactics themselves, and from the damage done by those tactics to the rules-based multilateral trading system and the longer-term interests of the United States and the rest of the world. 2019-04-25T16:01:18Z 2019-04-25T16:01:18Z 2019-04 Working Paper http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/147771555968441512/Trade-Wars-What-Do-They-Mean-Why-Are-They-Happening-Now-What-Are-the-Costs http://hdl.handle.net/10986/31584 English Policy Research Working Paper;No. 8829 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	English
topic	TRADE WARS TRADE POLICY WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION MULTILATERALISM INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION BARGAINING TACTICS
spellingShingle	TRADE WARS TRADE POLICY WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION MULTILATERALISM INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION BARGAINING TACTICS Mattoo, Aaditya Staiger, Robert W. Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?
relation	Policy Research Working Paper;No. 8829
description	How should economists interpret current trade wars and the recent U.S. trade actions that have initiated them? This paper offers an interpretation of current U.S. trade actions that is at once more charitable and less forgiving than that typically offered by economic commentators. More charitable, because under this interpretation it is possible to see a logic to these actions: the United States is initiating a change from "rules-based" to "power-based" tariff bargaining and is selecting countries with which it runs bilateral trade deficits as the most suitable targets of its bargaining tariffs. Less forgiving, because the main costs of these trade tactics cannot be avoided even if they happen to "work" and deliver lower tariffs. Rather, the paper shows that the main costs will arise from the use of the tactics themselves, and from the damage done by those tactics to the rules-based multilateral trading system and the longer-term interests of the United States and the rest of the world.
format	Working Paper
author	Mattoo, Aaditya Staiger, Robert W.
author_facet	Mattoo, Aaditya Staiger, Robert W.
author_sort	Mattoo, Aaditya
title	Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?
title_short	Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?
title_full	Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?
title_fullStr	Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?
title_full_unstemmed	Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?
title_sort	trade wars : what do they mean? why are they happening now? what are the costs?
publisher	World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate	2019
url	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/147771555968441512/Trade-Wars-What-Do-They-Mean-Why-Are-They-Happening-Now-What-Are-the-Costs http://hdl.handle.net/10986/31584
_version_	1764474661574279168

Trade Wars : What Do They Mean? Why Are They Happening Now? What Are the Costs?

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