Lessons for President Trump’s China Negotiators: Remember the Structural Impediments Initiative

Back in the late 1980s, the American government was frustrated by the size of Japan’s trade surplus with the United States and launched negotiations called the Structural Impediments Initiative (SII). The theory of President George H.W. Bush’s trade team was that Japan had structural barriers that prevented American companies and others from selling more parts […]…

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Reflections from Jackson Hole–Before The Economists Get Here

The Federal Reserve is about to stage its annual gathering of economists and other policy-makers in Jackson Hole later this month but I beat them here (seen above on Jackson Lake.) Which means that I get to help set the stage with these informal reflections on China, the environment, tourism, immigration and the like. CHINA: […]…

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Sixty percent of China’s Exports to the U.S. Are From Non-Chinese-owned entities

I have never heard of Mary Lovely of Syracuse University but she offers some welcomed rational thinking in this op ed in today’s New York Times. I recently estimated that more than 50 percent of China’s exports to the United States were not manufactured by Chinese entities. But she estimates that 60 percent of China’s […]…

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