You seem to be suggesting the Euros should tax their people with import tariffs, then give it back to them. Seems a waste of time and effort. They should simply take the subsidized imports and encourage Americans to increase their subsidized.
Tariffs favor producers over consumers - which are the entire population. Thus tariffs on motor vehicles favor our 200,000 or so auto workers at the expense of 280 million Americans.
Because of the stupidity, or venality of politicians, they concentrate on the highly visible help given to the Automobile Corporations and the Auto Unions and turn their eyes from the lowered standard of living of the rest of the American people.
And so it goes.
Harry
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pete wrote:
On Thu, 28 Feb 2002, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Christoph Reuss) wrote:
>On the contrary, the EU would be crazy to follow Keith's advice, because
>then the EU's domestic producers would sit on their products and need
>even higher subsidies (or lay off workers which then cost unemployment
>"subsidies").
It occurred to me reading Keith's note, that if the EU was really
perverse, and wanted to get the US's attention in the event they
did not respond to the WTO, they could levy the tax, and use
the proceeds to fund a matching subsidy for their goods. I don't
know what the long term result would be for the US or the EU, but
while this went on, all third party buyers would get a windfall
on prices. Of course, this is exactly what's been going on with
grain prices (minus the EU tax), and the result has been to
impoverish grain producers in third party countries, while consumers
everywhere get cheap bread. This has led to consolidation of
huge factory grain farms to maintain competitiveness... -PV
>Keith Hudson wrote:
>> it means that the EU, under WTO
>> rules, would then be entitled to retaliate by raising tariffs by $4
>> billion against American goods from May onwards. It seems that the EU
>fully
>> intends to do this.
>>
>> But such a gut response by the EU would be crazy. It would mean that EU
>> consumers would then have to pay more for American goods. It would be
>much
>> more sensible for the EU to play dumb -- even if the US Treasury don't
>act
>> as required -- because it would mean that the cheaper goods for the EU
>> customer would continue to be subsidised by the American taxpayer.
>>
>> This tit-for-tat response demeans the considerable benefits that are
>> obtained by lowering tariffs -- even if no-one else does. For example,
>if
>> only the EU would scrap tariffs on imported foodstuffs (now 30%), and
>> forget about African countries' tariffs against EU's goods for the time
>> being, then it would not only give a boost to poor African farmers, but
>it
>> would also reduce the average family's expenditure on food by about
>$1500
>> per year.
