Trump, Tariffs, and Trade War

[This Just In]

[This Just In]

Rattner is not being honest because the problem is more complicated than he is presenting it. The parties to NAFTA do not use the same accounting principles when recording trade with countries outside NAFTA that are then shipped to a NAFTA country without any value added. So maybe we don't know what the true numbers are.

US-Canda Trade Facts

Canada's Trade with G7 Countries 
Canada has run a cumulative surplus totaling $1.1 trillion (US $843 billion) since 1999 according to Canadian figures

[tashoya]

I love when these discussions ignore the fact that the US hasn't been a manufacturing country for probably 30 years. I remember a case study in college (maybe 93) focused on how to qualify the Chevy Caprice classic because, while we claimed it as an American car, at the time, about 54% of the parts were built outside of the States (a large percentage of which were manufactured in Canada).

When your country produces, comparatively, very little, and, what they do produce they produce at a, comparatively, exorbitant price, what do you expect the trade numbers to look like? The trade deficit isn't nearly as simple as the value of imports and exports. To present it as such is both a waste of time and disingenuous.

[hoya9797]

The US is a huge manufacturing country. It's at or near the largest part of our economy, we produce the second most of any country behind only China, and we produce more than we ever have and we seem to break that record every year. What we are not is a manufacturing employment country,