The TOI Correspondent from Washington:Trump tariffs are poised to torment the world. The US President on Sunday confirmed he will be imposing a uniform global tariff (basically taxes or duty on all imports into the US) on all countries — with no exceptions — on Wednesday April 2, which he has characterized as “Liberation Day.”
” We would start with all countries, so let’s see what happens”, Trump told investigators onboard the political aircraft, time after teasing a promise that he “may offer a lot of countries cuts” and saying “it’s going to work out very well” with New Delhi even though India is “one of the highest tariffing nations in the world”.
Rejecting information that there may be instances or mutual taxes for 10 or 15 states, dubbed the “dirty fifteen” by US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Trump said” We’ve been talking about all nations- no criteria”.
Trump’s general tax danger came despite a crucial US minister, assistant secretary of state Christopher Landau, predicting that a “golden years” for ties between US and India is coming up forward while indicating some improvement in trade talks between the two sides in New Delhi last month aimed at arriving at a bilateral trade agreement.
Trump aides indicated that there could be an across the board 20 per cent tariffs on all imports into US, regardless of product or origin in an effort to either compel countries to either lower their tariffs or pony up taxes which the US President has said will fill American coffers and make its people “even richer”.
At a broader level, Trump has argued that tariffs, an archaic word for taxes, will either fetch “billions and billions” of dollars for Washington or force countries to move ( or return ) manufacturing to the US. In a chat with reporters, he singled out pharmaceuticals– without specifically mentioning India– as one sector where he did not want the US to depend on any country, as it had to do during Covid.
New Delhi has an average trade-weighted tariff of around 12 per cent for imports from US, with some products taxed 50 per cent to 100 per cent compared to Washington’s 2.2 per cent on imports from India.
