06-20-2018, 12:58 AM
Good article describing the folly of the trade warriors:
But before evaluating the policy prescriptions for this problem, we must first consider the starting point, which is flawed. The current $370 billion deficit estimate does not account for value-added. When looking at the value-added content of Chinese exports, the U.S. deficit with China is actually only half of what it seems. And if we then add back the U.S. surplus in "invisibles" and how much money the United States brings back from investments in China, the U.S.–China deficit shrinks from 2 percent of U.S. GDP to 0.8 percent, a report from Oxford Economics revealed.
In the case of the Apple iPhone, this means that China's exports balance accounts for the full $500 iPhone value, when China adds only approximately $15 to $30 of the value to the phone. Most of the iPhone value accretes to Samsung in Korea ($150) and to Apple — the brand owner and engineer. This highlights how the normal accounting of trade flows is inherently distorted under the current trade-deficit estimates. So maybe the deck has only 25 not 52 cards.
The iPhone example also points to an area of weakness in the president's policy prescription: If the United States introduces tariffs on China's high-tech goods, U.S. companies and consumers could indirectly end up footing part of the bill. This is because the high-tech industries that Trump's tariffs are focused on is where Chinese value-added has the lowest share. If Trump were really interested in impacting the true trade imbalance and not just the misleading headline estimate, he would introduce tariffs on those sectors where China's value-added is highest. This would include sectors like textiles, where 75 percent of value-added is really "made in China."
Why China “holds all the aces” in a full-blown US-China trade war