TRUMP TARIFFS
Wrong decision on land could kill off SA’s US trade ties
Trump’s trade tariff announcement may be a source of considerable angst, but even more so are pronouncements on land expropriation without compensation, writes Richard Tren
US President Donald Trump has set the cat among the pigeons with his proposed steel and aluminium tariffs. Over several decades global trade has steadily increased and has been a driver of economic growth and rising prosperity around the world. Poverty in India and China declined rapidly after those countries liberalised their economies and opened up to global trade. Trump’s belief that the US can "win a trade war" is misguided. No one wins a trade war and it is the poor who would suffer. As President Cyril Ramaphosa develops his economic strategy for SA he would do well to bear this in mind and focus on those policies we know will help the poor. One of the benefits of the end of apartheid and the National Party rule’s was the re-entry of this country into the global trading system. According to the Fraser Institute’s Index of Economic Freedom, SA’s freedom to trade globally increased significantly between 1990 and 2000, and this must have been an important driver of the economic gr...
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