Active Stocks
Thu Mar 28 2024 15:59:33
  1. Tata Steel share price
  2. 155.90 2.00%
  1. ICICI Bank share price
  2. 1,095.75 1.08%
  1. HDFC Bank share price
  2. 1,448.20 0.52%
  1. ITC share price
  2. 428.55 0.13%
  1. Power Grid Corporation Of India share price
  2. 277.05 2.21%
Business News/ Opinion / Trump White House’s economic potential
BackBack

Trump White House’s economic potential

The administration has a pro-business attitude and is committed to deregulation

Donald Trump has often condemned countries like China and Germany because he views their surpluses as direct corollaries to America’s deficit. Photo: AFPPremium
Donald Trump has often condemned countries like China and Germany because he views their surpluses as direct corollaries to America’s deficit. Photo: AFP

President Donald Trump’s unpredictable approach to policymaking has fuelled widespread concern about where the US is headed. Yet America’s stock market has performed well since Trump’s election, faltering only when his administration’s political future appears to be in doubt. That is no accident: On the economic front, Trump’s approach might have some redeeming qualities.

From the outset, the Trump administration has maintained a pro-business attitude, exemplified by his commitment to deregulation, raising hopes among investors of a boost to the US and global economies. Sure, efforts to roll back, say, environmental protections, will do serious harm but the administration’s eagerness to free financial markets of excessive regulation may ultimately prove beneficial for all.

When regulations become too cumbersome, they can do more harm than good. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, signed into law by president Barack Obama in 2010, is a good example. The legislation impeded the functioning of the international monetary market: by raising US dollar funding costs for foreign banks, the rule compromised so-called covered interest parity.

For Japan, this undermined the transmission of monetary easing in international financial markets—a mechanism that was already strained by risk-averse investors flocking to the Japanese yen as a safe-haven currency. With Trump removing friction-causing regulations and inspiring stock-market confidence, the Bank of Japan may finally be able to limit the yen’s appreciation, thereby spurring inflation, employment, and the stock market.

Another reason for optimism about the US and world economies is rooted in the Trump administration’s $1 trillion plan to rebuild America’s infrastructure. Unfortunately, Trump’s equivocation about white supremacist violence in Charlottesville destroyed the last traces of goodwill he may have had in the US Congress.

But political disarray is far from the only threat to Trump’s economic success. His administration’s trade policy is based on serious misconceptions. Trump and his advisers seem to believe that only balanced bilateral trade is fair and, therefore, desirable. In fact, such balance is very difficult to achieve in an open trading system, and pursuing it would actually be damaging, as it would undermine the overall benefits gained through trade.

After World War II, high inflation in Japan undermined confidence in the yen’s stability, leading many Japanese to barter. Tokyoites, for example, traded their precious garments, from wedding dresses to fine kimonos, with rural farmers for rice and vegetables. The system worked, because, at that moment, demand and supply happened to be exactly matched.

But that balance was coincidental; it could not be expected to endure changing economic circumstances. That is why barter economies are inefficient—and obsolete. Modern systems use money, because, as a store of value, it serves as a kind of buffer, removing the need for a perfect balance between supply and demand, and enabling all actors to get what they need from trade.

As Trump attempts to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) with Canada and Mexico, he would do well to remember this. As it stands, his administration seems eager to impose limits on US imports from Nafta countries. If the only thing that changed about Nafta members’ behaviour was that they exported less to the US, America workers could benefit, with US farmers or manufacturers—including much of Trump’s own electoral base—becoming more competitive within the US market.

But that is not going to happen. Instead, America’s Nafta partners will respond strategically to limit their exports, adjusting their trade relationships with each other and with others, in order to mitigate the impact of US import controls.

To develop a more effective trade policy, the Trump administration must acknowledge what current-account balances are and are not. Trump has often condemned countries like China and Germany, because he views their surpluses as direct corollaries to America’s deficit. He assumes that they are somehow “ripping off" the US—taking advantage of America’s market, while undermining the competitiveness of its companies.

But, as Martin Feldstein and George Shultz recently put it, “if a country consumes more than it produces, it must import more than it exports. That’s not a rip-off; that’s arithmetic". And, in fact, if the US managed to negotiate a reduction in, say, China’s trade surplus vis-à-vis the US, the US would simply have to increase its deficit with some other country to make up for it.

A better way to understand a current-account surplus (or deficit) is as a measure of a country’s saving (or dissaving) towards the future. In other words, a country’s current account reflects how it allocates its income between the present and the future. If the US wants to reduce its own deficit, it should start saving more.

The US is facing serious political challenges, exacerbated by a mercurial, polarizing and brash administration. But, economically, the country remains on sound footing. If US policymakers want to strengthen the economy, they are in a good position to do so, benefiting not just the stock market, but ordinary Americans as well. ©2017/Project Syndicate

Koichi Hamada is professor emeritus at Yale University and a special adviser to the Japanese Prime Minister.

Comments are welcome at theirview@livemint.com

Unlock a world of Benefits! From insightful newsletters to real-time stock tracking, breaking news and a personalized newsfeed – it's all here, just a click away! Login Now!

Catch all the Business News, Market News, Breaking News Events and Latest News Updates on Live Mint. Download The Mint News App to get Daily Market Updates.
More Less
Published: 31 Aug 2017, 11:45 PM IST
Next Story footLogo
Recommended For You
Switch to the Mint app for fast and personalized news - Get App