American farmers and consumers deserve freer trade.
This week, the European Union (E.U.) announced a host of new retaliatory tariffs on nuts, fruit juices, seafood, and liquor from the United States. The tariffs, long expected, are intended to punish the U.S. for propping up flailing domestic airplane manufacturer Boeing, a practice the WTO deemed illegal. These E.U. tariffs are the latest «tat» in a tedious, ongoing, international tit-for-tat game that has no winner. Last year, the Trump administration imposed billions of dollars in new tariffs, as I explained here, on a host of E.U. food imports, including Scotch, liqueurs, wines, pork products, cheeses, fruits, and seafood. Those tariffs, like this week’s, came in the wake of a WTO ruling—the earlier one dinged the E.U. for doling out subsidies to Airbus, the E.U. plane manufacturer that is Boeing’s chief competitor. All these tariffs, just like earlier Trump administration tariffs targeting Chinese goods, have hurt consumers, farmers, and food producers of all sorts, at home and abroad. In the case of China, Trump’s tariffs caused China to retaliate, I explained in a 2018 column. Those tariffs «cost jobs; hurt domestic and foreign producers, consumers, and taxpayers; put the petty interests of government over those of the public; and are prone to spinning out of control.» After President-elect Joe Biden’s victory in last week’s U.
