Raising duties on imported cars could prove trickier than on steel and aluminum imports
Volkswagen AG , BMW AG and Daimler AG, which makes Mercedes—have built factories in the U.S. and Mexico in recent years that are geared to export to Europe and China, not just to sell to Americans.
The German manufacturers employ around 36,500 Americans at their factories in South Carolina, Alabama and Tennessee. If U.S. exports face retaliatory tariffs and it becomes more difficult or uncompetitive to export cars from the U.S., European auto makers would likely have to shift those jobs to Mexico or bring them back to Europe.
.. Fears of a global trade war is leading Volvo Cars Corp., the Chinese-owned Swedish auto maker, to reconsider the scope of a new plant that it is building near Charleston, S.C
.. “If the factory in South Carolina could not export, it would be half the size. It would not employ 4,000 people anymore but just 2,000,”
.. Steven Armstrong, president of Ford’s European business, dismissed Mr. Trump’s claims that American auto makers were blocked from selling cars in Europe.
“He obviously hasn’t seen our booth this morning,” Mr. Armstrong said on the sidelines of the Geneva Motor Show. “If the product fits the market, consumers will buy it.”
Trump targets European car-makers with big plants in states he won
President Donald Trump, expressing his ire over trade imbalances this weekend, made a peculiar choice: He focused his criticism on two European brands, BMW and Mercedes-Benz, that have significant investments in two of the nation’s most Trump-friendly states.
“Open up the barriers and get rid of your tariffs,” Trump said of the European Union’s trade policies in a wide-ranging and rollicking address in Pennsylvania Saturday. “And if you don’t do that, we’re going to tax Mercedes-Benz, we’re going to tax BMW.”
.. Trump’s latest attacks, meant to stir up populist enthusiasm, could backfire politically if they instead spur fears that jobs in Trump country might be in jeopardy... Trump likely hopes tariffs on European car imports would spur the German companies to make more vehicles in the U.S. But he said the unpredictability of Trump’s trade policies would more likely have the opposite effect... “A countervailing factor would be a reluctance of the Germans to ‘reward’ this behavior, especially if it’s unclear where trade policy is going,” Ikenson told POLITICO. “His unorthodox and sometimes erratic behavior ultimately discourages investment in the United States.”.. “Should we get tariff walls, it would have an impact on jobs in the United States,” BMW CEO Harald Krueger said last week.. “China wins when we fight with Europe,” Graham said. “China wins when the American consumer has higher prices because of tariffs that don’t affect Chinese behavior.”
Trump Threatens to Impose Tariffs on European Cars
Trade tensions heat up as president vows to penalize EU if it retaliates against U.S. metals duties
.. “They make it impossible for our cars (and more) to sell there. Big trade imbalance!”
.. Imposing a tax on the imports of European cars would be more difficult than Mr. Trump’s tweet suggests.
.. The European Union’s executive arm responded Friday that it would retaliate against any metals tariffs, saying it had put together a package of penalties that would affect a total of $3.5 billion in U.S. exports, including Harley-Davidson motorcycles, bourbon and denim.
.. “I don’t like to use the word ‘trade war,’ but I can’t say how this wouldn’t be warlike behavior.”
.. Mr. Trump has raised the prospect of taxing European cars before. In January 2017, he threatened impose a 35% import tariff on exports by German auto companies from Mexican plants to the U.S., singling out BMW AG, the Munich-based maker of luxury sedans and sport-utility vehicles.
“I would tell BMW if they want to build cars in Mexico and sell in the U.S.A. without a 35% tax, they can forget it,”
How Would Jesus Drive?
the people who have the most influence on society are actually the normal folks, through their normal, everyday gestures being kind in public places, attentive to the elderly. The pope called such people, in a beautiful phrase, “the artisans of the common good.”
.. The pope focused especially on driving, praising those people “who move in traffic with good sense and prudence.” As Richard Reeves of the Brookings Institution points out, driving is precisely the sort of everyday activity through which people mold the culture of their community.
.. If you speed up so I can’t merge into your lane, you’re teaching me that the society around here is basically competitive, not cooperative. If, on the other hand, you give me a friendly wave after I let you in, you’re teaching me that this is a place where a kindness is recognized and gratitude is expressed.
.. The safest drivers live in Kansas City, Kan.; Brownsville, Tex.; Madison, Wis.; and Huntsville, Ala.
.. It finds that drivers in Phoenix, Tucson and Memphis are the most aggressive and those in Honolulu; Portland, Ore.; and Seattle are the least.
.. Driving puts you in a constant position of asking, Are we in a place where there is a system of self-restraint, or are we in a place where it’s dog eat dog?
.. BMW drivers are much less likely to brake for pedestrians at crosswalks. Prius drivers in San Francisco commit more traffic violations. People who think they are richer or better than others are ruder behind the wheel.
.. Driving also puts you in a position where you are periodically having to overrule your desire for revenge. When somebody cuts you off, you want to punish the jerk and enforce all that is right and good. But that only leads to a cycle of even worse driving, so it’s better, as Francis would say, to turn the other cheek. How would Jesus drive?