"If Trump is not the biggest fool in Washington, it could be Peter Navarro"
(Larry Remer - Assistant to the Navarro Congressional Campaign for San Diego)
Although the irony of decades of man's views on many of the most important trade and economic issues in the United States has not succeeded in discouraging him from repeating his ideas again and again in the various media and in his books and articles, nevertheless the crisis in dealing with the views of " Peter Navarro "is not only about being far-reaching and out-of-date views, but also about reshaping the current US trade and economic system to suit its own orientations on particular issues." (1) Most economists see "old, misleading, and wrong."
That was not always the case. The Septuagint economist, who heads the Bureau of Trade and Industrial Policy in the current administration, and Trump's assistant economist, known as the mastermind of the US trade war on China, was a staunch defender of free trade principles. Pro-poor, demanding that the rich be taxed to ensure the redistribution of wealth to all people and, paradoxically, Navarro was, for more than two decades, a democrat.
This was before China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, a step that was not only significant for the Chinese economy, making it the number two globally, but for Navarro, whose economic studies have since focused on China's "unfair" trade policies (2). As he describes it, which has harmed both the US economy and Americans directly and indirectly, causing the trade deficit to increase and Americans losing their jobs as a result of the large number of American companies and factories moving to China to work in a cheap and state-subsidized work environment there, as well as by polluting the environment and not providing Proper working environment Workers.
| By Peter Navarro |
This prompted Navarro in 2006 to release his first book, The Coming China Wars, on China's economic ascent and its impact on his American counterpart through what he observed in his personal and societal scope when his pupils began schooling. The evening at the University of Irvine, California, is losing their morning jobs, despite their proficiency as he saw it, which Navarro linked directly, and perhaps unconsciously, to the Chinese penetration of American markets, and what he saw as a warning bell for what might turn into a trade war with China, and perhaps even military.
| Peter Navarro's Coming China Wars |
Navarro's theories on China became more complicated and he released his second and most important book in 2011 with the participation of American business academy Greg Otry, Death by China, which a year later turned into a documentary by Navarro himself warning Americans and the world China's trade policies threatening the economy and the environment. While only a handful of economists agreed with Navarro's views in both the book or the documentary, he drew the attention of one of America's most famous businessmen, who would become president eight years later.
| Peter Navarro's "Death by China" (Websites) |
Navarro's production came to pass in the same billionaire as Donald Trump (3), and from then on he began to have a strong friendship between him and Navarro, a friendship that combined the convictions of two men who agreed not only that China's trade policies were "wrong and harmful," but that the only solution to confront Its global expansion lies in the exorbitant taxation of Chinese goods imported into America, prompting China to adjust its policies, and binds it to free trade principles; principles Trump himself did not recognize the impact from the start, unlike his companion whose views changed controversially at the time, but Contrary to what some believe, Trump is unaware of the effects His current trade war on China, both domestically and globally, Navarro knows that a trade war between two economic powers, such as America and China, threatens not only the world's two largest economies, but the entire world as the biggest economic and commercial recession since the Great Depression.
Navarro between two decades
Navarro's origins did not differ much from the average American born in a middle-class family where the father worked as a musician and the mother was a secretary. The parents separated to live with his mother in Florida. The teenage man worked in several jobs up to Tufts University, where he completed a scholarship. He spent three years as a US peacekeeper in Thailand and returned to the US in the late 1970s to go to Harvard to pursue his postgraduate studies in economics and public policy, two areas he then taught at Irvine University in California a year ago. 1989, and for several years before becoming a world politician.
That period of Navarro's life contributed in several ways to his way into the White House years later.During not only did he pursue an academic career, he published several books on wealth, markets and economics, and was active in energy studies and environmental advocacy. San Diego called "Prevent Los Angelization Now" (Los Angeles is the city of angels and the group's title is "Preventing San Diego's Transformation from Other Los Angeles"), attacking what he called "developers" whom he sees as "greedy and looting the environment." He then tried to exploit and support his environmental activity with an elected post when he ran for Mayor of San Diego in 1992.
Navarro's election campaigns have turned into successive concerts of "angry screaming" so to speak, which contributed to the loss of all of them
Not only were the developers attacked by Navarro at the time, but it was argued that he had made his way to fame by attacking the Republican Party, both in his writings, books, television interviews and public debates about his campaign, and Navarro executed no reason or screams against his rivals. Republicans speak of virtue and prosperity, but they are “a bunch of greedy and fraudsters,” as well as “extremely intolerant, closed-minded and very dangerous when it comes to the storm of religiously trained personalities who have a big impact on He described the Republican Party as "enslaved to a group of clowns, mental patients and fanatics such as: Newette Jenrish, Rush Limbaugh, and Ralph Reed," while he considered that the party's economic policies "consist of tax schemes to increase the richness, and can not trust its leaders to do Anything but polluting the environment under the false flag of economic progress. "
Navarro's election campaigns have turned into successive parties of "angry screaming," so to speak, which contributed to his loss for all of them, beginning with the loss in 1992 to his Republican rival, Susan Golding, who attacked her to convict her ex-husband on charges related to money laundering, to announce that Golding Navarro's "fierce smear campaign" made her cry in tears in the final debate ahead of the election, and what Navarro lost this election and possibly after, the 1993 San Diego City Council elections, and then the city's "district supervisor" elections. One year, ending with organic elections The House of Representatives in 1996.
Navarro later described himself as having acquired the trait of "the most cruel and malicious son" who ran for mayor of San Diego, and the Focus Groups - in explaining the reasons for his loss - described him as "angry, cruel, and arrogant", which seemed He admires Navarro, despite losing time and time again, not only as a Democrat politician at the time, but as someone who "once again seems to be like war", which will become even more evident by the 2000s when China begins its new economic standing. In the world by capturing Navarro's interest and his entire life.
Prince of Commercial War
Most economists agree that China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001 was the so-called “China Shock” of the US economy: a flood of cheap goods that swept the market and replaced Chinese products with clothing, furniture, electronics, and other US products. This led not only to a sharp decline in manufacturing jobs in the United States, but also to the widening gap between now and then between Beijing's imports to Washington and vice versa.For the past year 2018, for example (5) America imported from China $ 3.1 billion worth of goods and services, while It exported $ 2.5 billion.
The difference between these two figures is called the US "trade deficit" with China, or the main point of disagreement between the views of mainstream economists and Navarro when Beijing is mentioned. While the first group believes that the Chinese shock to the US economy is a preliminary stage that then recedes to leave its place. An area of mutual benefit for both countries, and for America in particular, is to open up vast new Chinese markets to US companies with far fewer restrictions than in Europe, for example, and are found in thousands of cheaper goods for lower-income consumers. / Limited in America.
While Navarro does not believe that such benefits have benefited the US economy as much as they have hurt him, he believes that China is using its state-backed economy and the ruling Communist Party to impose its goods on the US economy instead of the more expensive and more expensive US goods. Beijing is keeping its currency cheap, forcing US companies to cede "intellectual property rights" to their products as a prerequisite for entry into Chinese markets, that they are not interested in preserving the environment in their frenzied pursuit of cheap goods, and the Chinese government is persecuting its own people to provide workers For material cheaper to foreign companies and factories coming to it.
Navarro sees these policies as "unfair and unequal" for the US economy; they cause the aforementioned trade deficit to widen from 2001 to the present, as well as a lack of industrial employment, and the departure of US companies and factories to China, but more importantly what Navarro believes that every dollar paid for Chinese goods inside America and in China is used to arm and strengthen the Chinese army and poses a direct threat to US national security.
Navarro called for taxing China to pressure it to adjust its trade policies, and that was one of the main thrusts of Trump's economic program.
Such ideas would not have made a difference, perhaps at the time or now, if they had not converged with Trump's counterparts, who had already been ahead of Navarro when he announced in 1989 the Morton Downey talk show on the second economy. Globally, Japan, Tokyo's trade policies "absorb the spirit" of the US economy, he says, that they - the Japanese - kill Americans, and that the only solution to stop their economic progress at the expense of America is to impose high taxes on Tokyo's trade with Washington.
Taxation policies came as the most important point of agreement between Trump and Navarro in his new millennial version, although the latter opposed the "economic protectionism" policies of former US President "Ronald Reagan" during the 1980s when he pressed Japan to reduce its exports of cars to America, Reagan's policies hurt consumers, threaten global stability, and could lead to a trade war that could cause an unstoppable downward spiral in the world. Yet it was Navarro himself who called for taxing China to pressure it to adjust its trade policies. The most important axes Economic Program for Trump, who brought him to the presidency in 2016.
Trump and Navarro had not met before the year since their relationship began in 2011 after the book "Death by China" and the documentary Trump praised on a Chinese channel, saying that he was "his favorite," which is perhaps the same reason that prompted Trump to choose Navarro from the start After his success, when there was no official position for Navarro, he created the position of director of the National Trade Council, which Navarro has held since early 2017, as well as an economic adviser to the president, a position with which some believed he would compete for influence within the administration. National Economic Council, and maybe the National Security Council, While that comparison seemed exaggerated, Navarro proved from day one that he came to stay in the White House.
The economy of Navarro
Navarro's presence in the White House has been a nuisance for many. His ideological alignment with Trump on China has put many obstacles in the way of anti-clash economic advisers with the world's second-largest economy, one of America's largest trading partners, and, on the other hand, Republicans in Congress, who tried to push Trump to focus on cutting interest rates and taxes at home rather than raising tariff rates, has worked at least during Trump's first year in the Oval Office.
Reports from the White House in 2017 were saying that fierce battles were taking place behind Trump to prevent him from continuing his plan to impose more tariffs on U.S. imports from China, or in other words: neutralize Navarro's role in the administration. These battles may have achieved their purpose with someone else, but Navarro was known for his stubbornness and somehow had Trump's ear. The man was known to wait for his official working hours - during the first year - to meet and talk to the president after being banned from attending important administration meetings. He copied the letters of Chief Economic Adviser Gary Cohen to the President on important issues.
Cohen did not withstand much in the end against Navarro.He resigned in March last year after Trump insisted on moving ahead with excessive import duties on goods and aluminum, and a month after the resignation of Secretary of State Rob Porter - on charges of violence. Domestic - to leave both doors wide open for Navarro to set aside 10 with Trump's mind and hearing.
Navarro is known for being overthrown by anyone who opposes or criticizes him in the administration, influencing the principle of safety to be overthrown. Second, he began his own battle in rebuking and insulting his opponents, writing harsh memos against them, and striving to prevent their voices from reaching Trump. One of his main priorities is to raise tariffs on China's goods, although Trump added some other issues such as withdrawal or renegotiation of international trade agreements, the most important of which is the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). (NAFTA), and K. He accused the Fed and its president, Jerome Powell, accusing him of not pursuing his plans for a rate cut, implicitly calling him "a bigger enemy than Communist Chinese leader Chi Jinping" as he tweeted on August 1. .
The efforts of Navarro bear fruit, therefore, almost a year and a half after the start of the US trade war on China, which began at the end of March 2017 when Trump issued 12 executive orders, one reviewing the US trade deficit and its causes, and the other tightening tariffs on anti-subsidy trade issues. Trump's orders were nothing more than a declaration of war followed by a 100-day truce in which the two countries would discuss attempts to reach a compromise, and Trump's decisions continued thereafter, starting with the imposition of tariffs on January 22 last year on washing machines such as Solar energy panels imported from abroad are "a large proportion of them from China", not ending March 8 of the same year by raising tariffs (25%) on all steel imports and 10% on aluminum imports, which China could not. Sabra also announced on April 2 the imposition of tariffs of up to 25% on 128 US products.
Frequent talks between the two economic powers have failed to end the ongoing trade war, as evidenced by the 15 percent US tariffs that took effect on September 1 for $ 300 billion of Chinese goods, to which China responded with 75 billion tariffs. The price of some tariff-targeted goods, such as shoes, increased by 11% and others by 67%, and prompted more than 170 shoe makers to send a letter to Trump on August 28. 13 Implementation of tariff decision , With little success.
Navarro considers China to be the "most efficient planet killer," something ecologists and some economists agree with, but the difference lies in the way they both see the solution.
The shoe companies' speech opened a line of calming attempts between Washington and Beijing, led later by a group of businessmen (14) and companies whose work was directly affected by the recent escalation of tariffs, and even an international coalition (15) of financial officials from Australia, Canada, Indonesia and others has taken The pressure is part of Washington's announcement that nearly 400 Chinese goods will be excluded from existing tariffs and that a new phase of negotiations will be launched in the hope of completing them early next month. To a solution Somehow the crisis is not expected to reach a radical solution in the near horizon of the crisis that suits what Navarro aims and believes over the years.
Navarro considers China to be the "most efficient planet killer," something ecologists and some economists agree with, but the difference lies in the way they both look at the solution. While at the outset, when he co-wrote Trump's economic campaign, Navarro focused on As tariffs are the only way to put pressure on China, others say there are other ways, some of which are to restrict Beijing from acquiring more US companies, especially technology, that are of interest to China more than anything else, a solution that had begun. Already implemented under former President Barack Obama , Before Trump came up with a more aggressive approach.
Navarro also argues that China's policies directly cause the US trade deficit to increase, and consequently result in a continued lack of capacity in the US economy to provide manufacturing jobs, which most economists consider to be exaggerated. Bad in itself, the error is compounded when the trade deficit with a particular country is viewed in the same way that Trump and Navarro do with China.
Such a view pushes Trump to see that the only solution to the current trade crisis is to buy China a huge and surplus of need and desire of American goods to compensate for the difference between imports and exports to and from the United States. More than once - it is a "fair agreement" with Beijing. But this contrasts somewhat with Navarro's desire to curtail China's entire economy and prevent it from becoming a global competitor to his US counterpart.
The continuation of the Navarro war seems no longer an option after Trump's announcement that the war is over and a comprehensive trade agreement with China is reached a few weeks later.
In July, the readings (17) of China's industrial production (4.8%) were the worst in 17 years, one of the direct consequences of the ongoing trade war, which in turn weighs on the European economy as one of the largest trading partners. But the most important for the US administration is the shadow of this war on the Americans themselves, in this case the American farmers who were affected by China's decision, the world's largest buyer of soybeans, to stop buying soybeans from America against the backdrop of tariff hikes.
It seems like a vicious circle of losses. The stagnation of the Chinese economy will lead to another European, and since Europe is one of the largest trading partners of the United States, it will also be affected by its own trade war. In any case, the most affected by all this is the consumer, especially the American, a fact that Navarro knows it best. He himself wrote in 1984 in The Policy Game that, as history painfully teaches, once protectionist wars begin, the expected outcome is often an immediate and deadly downward spiral of the economy. The whole world, and ultimately the biggest loser in the game Aiah are the consumers. "
Navarro probably does not realize that such trends he has been pursuing for years will not be the biggest obstacle on the road to China, which he wants to pay for what he regards as his “trade sins.” In the worst-case scenario, Beijing had only to go beyond what happened. It is possible that Trump will leave either next year or after his second term, even if he succeeds in winning it, but now it seems that the continuation of the Navarro war is no longer an option after Trump's announcement on October 11 War and reach a comprehensive trade agreement with China a few weeks later, a long-term agreement Its deal includes intellectual property, financial services and a large number of agricultural export and import services between the two parties, an agreement that seems to come in an attempt to lift the current economic pressures on the American consumer, which may push both Trump and Navarro outside the White House (20) in the next elections if not remedied, This is something that Trump might anticipate, as he always does, on his way with one of his favorite advisers and the trade warlord, a war that is finally on the verge of extinguishing after what it did in the American consumer and the global economy in the past two years indiscriminately. The wind blew up against a Chinese express train that no one is likely to stop anytime soon, even if the US president is himself after all.