Misleading narrative in the trade tweets
By Glenn Kessler
May 15 at 3:00 AM
... As the trade war with China has heated up, the president’s itchy Twitter finger has been busy with a fusillade of false or misleading tweets ...
... countries do not “lose” money on trade deficits. A trade deficit simply means that people in one country are buying more goods from another country than people in the second country are buying from the first country. No matter what, people are receiving goods in exchange for their money.
Trump often claims that other world leaders say that no previous president has made such an issue of the trade deficit, but that is because they are puzzled by his obsession with the number. The more relevant figure is whether a country’s exports are growing. The Office of the U.S. Trade Representative says U.S. goods exports are up 73 percent since 2008, and all U.S. exports are up 527 percent since 2001.
... Trump tries to take credit for solving a problem he created. His initial round of tariffs led China to stop purchasing soybeans and other agricultural products from the United States, resulting in steep losses for farmers. So Trump then scrambled to arrange a rescue package ...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/05/15/misleading-narrative-trumps-tumble-trade-tweets/?utm_term=.fabd605d7331
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