This is Armchair Economics with Hamish McRae, a subscriber-only newsletter from The i Paper. If you’d like to get this direct to your inbox, every single week, you can sign up here.
The harsh truth remains that notwithstanding the trade deal agreed with the US earlier this year, the UK faces more trade restrictions than it did before the President’s tariffs took effect. The fact that the UK has better access to the US market than the EU is of some help – and it may be that European companies with British subsidiaries will export from here rather than from the Continent or Ireland. But, right now, it looks as though at best we will end up square – and there is ground to be made up. In the second quarter of this year, as the tariffs first hit, UK exports to the US fell to a three-year low.
square WORLD Jimmy Kimmel show taken off air after Charlie Kirk comments
Read More
“This will truly make the UK an AI maker, not an AI taker,” David Hogan, Nvidia’s head of enterprise sales for Europe, said ahead of the Trump visit.
Not to dismiss any of this, for it is all most encouraging. There are other big US investments taking place, notably in financial services. For example, J P Morgan Chase, the world’s largest banking group, is drawing up plans for what would – if they go ahead – become London’s biggest office building. It’s on the banks of the Thames, near Canary Wharf, and they have asked the famous architects, Foster + Partners, to draft some designs. A week ago, the Government announced a series of other investments from US financial service groups, including PayPal, Bank of America, Citibank and S&P Global Ratings.
One is that you have to ask whether these investments would have happened, anyway. Some undoubtedly would. These giant US corporations did not become so massive unless they were brilliant at exploiting every opportunity that they could see. They are not putting in the money now out the kindness of their hearts. They are investing because they think they can make a profit. If they see other – and better – opportunities, they will go elsewhere.
square TARIFFS The UK town where Trump's steel tariffs raise risk of 'devastating' job cuts
Read More
In addition, British companies are moving work from here and Europe to America in response to the tariffs. AstraZeneca, the UK’s most valuable company, announced last month that it will invest $50bn there, “building on America’s global leadership in medicines manufacturing and R&D”.
“They want to see if they can refine the trade deal a little bit,” he said. “We’ve made a deal – and it’s a great deal – and I’m into helping them …. They’d like to see if they could get a little bit better deal. So, we’ll talk to them.”
Anyone with a sense of history will know just how aggressively the US will pursue what it sees as its self-interest in commercial matters. There was the occasion after Japan surrendered on 15 August 1945 and Lend-Lease – which had enabled Britain to finance its huge war effort – was abruptly cancelled in September. We were bankrupt. We managed to negotiate a loan, the Anglo-American Financial Agreement (which was signed in December), but we were in a position of extreme weakness. The new Attlee government felt dismayed at the brutality with which the Americans negotiated, given the sacrifices that the UK had made. We had to make a series of trade concessions and only paid off the final tranche of the loan in 2006. There is a government commentary here, published five years ago, about the whole deal.
Read Next
square WORLDJimmy Kimmel show taken off air after Charlie Kirk comments
Read More“The United States was emerging enriched and industrially powerful from war. The US desire to leave the rest of the world to sort out their own problems was matched by ambitious plans for economic expansion and the attractions of exerting political leadership. Though there was much goodwill towards the UK, US negotiators harboured a perennial suspicion that the British were trying to outsmart them. They distrusted Attlee’s socialist government. In return for financial help, Britain must abandon imperial preference, make sterling convertible and effectively accept client status.”
My own feeling is simply that we should expect no special favours from the US whoever happens to be president – and that, in a funny way, the direct approach of Donald Trump is preferable to that of some previous administrations, where we have been led along to assume we will get more favourable conditions than are actually ever delivered. We know where we stand.
Hence then, the article about this is how much trump is already costing you was published today ( ) and is available on inews ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( This is how much Trump is already costing you )
Also on site :