On April 3 EDT, the United States administration announced a proposed list of products subject to additional tariffs that covers about 1,300 Chinese exports worth $50 billion with a suggested tariff rate of 25%.

"Disregarding strong representations by China, US announced the tariff proposals that are completely unfounded," according to a spokesperson from the Ministry of Commerce (MOC) of China on April 4.

"(It's) a typical unilateralist and protectionist practice that China strongly condemns and firmly opposes."

The move not only goes against the interests of China, it also shoots the Unites States itself in foot.

It's well known that the US trade deficit stems from that the US investment rate is higher than the savings rate, resulting in capital surplus and trade deficit. Therefore, Trump's protectionist policies have done little and aren't the antidotes against the disease.

Experts say Trump's "headstrong" moves will not only make it difficult to reduce the deficit, but will also undermine the original trade stability.

Secondly, the tariff policy would undoubtedly push up prices for related goods and cause higher inflation at home. In fact, it taxed on American consumers themselves.

Not long ago, 25 well-known American retailers, including WAL-MART, Messi and BestBuy, sent a joint letter to Present Trump calling on the government not to impose tariffs on Chinese imports, so as not to damage the interests of American consumers, especially the wage earners, and to widen the gap between the rich and the poor.

Thirdly, it would hurt US's employment. Ironically, one of purposes Trump's tariff policy is to create jobs.

According to a research from American Global Market Services, Trump's tariff policy on steel and aluminum would protect US steel and aluminum jobs, but it would hit the downstream industries, which was equivalent to "losing at least five other jobs for one."

China will take targeted reciprocal measures against US imports, which may include slapping tariffs on US agricultural products, airplanes, automobiles and computer chips, said Wei Jianguo, a former minister of MOC.

Wei, also vice-president of the China Center for International Economic Exchanges, added the reciprocal measures will be "at the same level and the same scale", compared with what the US side proposed.

Tourism and other industries are also being taken into consideration, he said.

(Writing by Alex Guo   Editing by Harry Huo)
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