Once and future President Donald Trump will reenter office with a stronger mandate from voters, following his convincing election win. And yet—as was the case when he took office the first time—much remains uncertain about the exact shape of US policy, and what the results will be, under Trump 2.0.
Tariffs are expected, after Trump repeatedly promised them on the campaign trail. But read carefully, and it’s not exactly clear where the rates will ultimately settle. Trump has pledged 60% blanket tariffs on Chinese imports, plus 10% more unless Beijing clamps down on fentanyl exports. His headline-grabbing mentions of 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico are similarly tied to action on fentanyl and migration. Looming in the background is Trump’s proposal of 200% tariffs on some auto imports.
At the Financial Times, Alan Beattie deems “tariff” the single word that will encapsulate 2025—warning that tariffs are an outdated tool and noting uncertainty over their ramifications. “Most economists hate tariffs, thinking them distortive and damaging,” Beattie writes. “Most governments have moved away from using them on a large scale. Trump’s tariff obsession really does involve dusting down a weapon from a bygone era. We’re going to spend four years learning how a blunderbuss performs in a modern trade war.”
Vox’s Dylan Matthews suggests it’s almost 100% certain Trump will use presidential authority to impose new tariffs but only 20% likely that Congress will put a comprehensive tariff bill Trump’s desk. The New Yorker’s Benjamin Wallace-Wells wonders if tariffs—perhaps the most certain aspect of Trump’s policy agenda—are really so certain after all, given Elon Musk’s ability to swoop in and disrupt various Republican policy debates unexpectedly. On the most recent episode of New York Magazine’s Pivot podcast with Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway, the latter avers that Trump’s tariffs will be rolled back as soon as they cause inflation, as critics say they would.
The Economist’s editor-in-chief, Zanny Minton Beddoes, stresses that other big Trumpian concepts raise similarly big questions. Identifying the “three forces that will shape 2025,” Beddoes leans into Trump’s influence on them, writing: “What happens when the world’s biggest economy takes a sharp protectionist turn? When the global superpower decides that a transactional foreign policy beats alliances? And when the reset takes place as wars rage, menacing adversaries join forces and artificial intelligence (AI) is changing everything from health care to warfare? The world is about to find out.”
Wall Street expects a strong US economy, according to analysis issued by financial firms and collated by Bloomberg’s Sam Potter.
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