Russia and Ukraine flashpoint

[crissindahouse]

PDF said:

crissindahouse said:

China's exports already exceeds USA's by a lot. USA's imports are still higher but considering that comparable products from China are cheaper I would guess the sheer amount of goods traded between China and the rest of the world is already much higher so that China is more important to keep the world running. And that will just increase when the economies of African and Asian countries get stronger. Especially with USA stopping their softpower programs there...

And all those tarrifs will also "help" countries to look for other trade partners.

Where USA is probably still much stronger from a financial standpoint is their internal market but that's not that relevant for the rest of the world. A higher GDP doesn't mean much for other countries when it's only from a huge internal market

It's one thing to find other countries to buy things from (you can build another factory somewhere else) but it's much more difficult to find new markets to sell to.

US Market is & will still be very important for many EU & Asian Companies. The tariffs will hurt US consumers and foreign MNCs, as will the retaliatory tariffs.

Yeah didn't want to downplay USA's importance. They are still at least the second most important country for worldwide trade but some Americans still seem to think that they are by far the leader for ww trade and that's just not true. Losing trade with USA would hurt almost every country a lot. That's after all the reason why Trump is and can be such a bully.

But this will backfire to USA over the next decades if those following after Trump will keep this attitude.