To my surprise, Trump’s tariffs on Chinese imports had no apparent effect on inflation. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen didn’t make that point when questioned on last night’s PBS NewsHour, but she’s confident that Biden’s additional tariffs will likewise not directly hit American consumers.
The policy talk seems to have shifted from intellectual property theft by China to excess productive capacity. The bigger issue is, it’s a little late to undo the effects of 40 years of free trade globalization. Will protectionism motivate American manufacturers to stop looking at the quarterly bottom line, and start figuring out better ways to compete?