Putting pressure on China probably won’t help U.S. workers. Here’s what might.
But diagnosing China’s sins is not the same as stopping them. The question is whether Trump, at this week’s summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping and in the future, can hit upon a strategy that actually helps U.S. workers.
.. Method two stands a better chance. It is to welcome China to the top table of the international system, and then demand that China play by the rules. After his failed bilateral experiment, this is what Clinton came around to: He brought China into the World Trade Organization. Since then, China’s behavior has not been perfect, but Beijing has abided by its WTO commitments more than reasonable commentators expected.
.. For the past three years or so, Chinese leaders have claimed interest in international law and China’s contribution to it.
.. Given China’s concern to be seen as a respectable superpower, the best way to constrain it is to promote international rules. Trump’s first instinct has been the opposite: He has denigrated the WTO, asserting that bilateral pressure is better. But there are signs that Trump is mellowing. He may be open to a better way.
.. China’s trade surplus with the United States is an extremely poor measure of misconduct: It reflects factors ranging from the dollar’s reserve-currency status to China’s tendency to import parts from third countries, assemble them, and sell the finished products to America, so that a Korean semiconductor might show up as a Chinese export to the United States. Unless the Trump team discards its bilateral metric, it will discredit its China policy by sounding clueless.
.. But that still leaves room for getting tough. Appealing to China’s professed belief in a fair international system, Trump could propose a cut to China’s auto tariff, which, at 25 percent, is fully 10 times higher than the auto tariff imposed by the United States. He could warn China against aggressive use of subsidies and procurement muscle as it builds its next generation of industries in tech and aircraft.