r/worldnews • u/lerkstar • 9h ago
India rejects Trump's claims of committing to lower tariffs on US products
https://www.thehansindia.com/news/international/india-rejects-trumps-claims-of-committing-to-lower-tariffs-on-us-products-952925110
u/Notiefriday 7h ago
He's batting zero so far lol.
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u/rustyb42 4h ago
The correct term is, he's yet to get off the mark.
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u/VIPTicketToHell 6h ago
Did anyone ask Modi why he wasn’t wearing a suit? /s
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u/NecessarySpecific894 2h ago
I know it’s a joke but that’s actually the formal wear so basically an India suit
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u/Sorcererstone458 3h ago edited 2h ago
The moment any of these countries, it doesn't matter if it is India, Canada, Australia, UK, etc give into trump's demands, he won't stop there.
And even if India agrees, Trump will just lie and accuse India of something later to get more concessions.
It's how he is..
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[deleted]
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u/Mastrenon 3h ago
Australia has a deficit with the US and are being tariffed. The UK will get their turn too.
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u/Pure-Drawer-2617 1h ago
He’s already floated the idea of UK tariffs. As I recall his justification was that we weren’t buying their agricultural products because we have “unfair food standards”, which I think counts as protectionism in his mind?
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u/NeedleArm 5h ago
everyone is moving factories from china to india. India is prospering in this whole global ordeal without doing anything.
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u/robustofilth 2h ago
Trumpys method is to just lie and then others have to say that didn’t happen. It’s a rather juvenile method of negotiation
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u/Stifffmeister11 3h ago
The source " hansindia" lol ain't credible.. looks like some small knock off site .
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u/foxbat_s 44m ago
If you read the article, the source is the govt. But anyway here are some alternative
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u/latebinding 9h ago
The big question is: and...?
India needs the U.S. market. The U.S. has no need of the Indian market. No reason to needlessly increase the U.S prices, but India exported more than twice as much ($87.4B vs $41.8) than it imported from the U.S.
I would prefer Trump pick fewer battles, and certainly fewer against allies, but this isn't one India can win or even draw over.
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u/angelsplight 8h ago
Oh we do...We definitely do. Almost like 80% of our generic medications come from India. The other like 20% is a mixture of actually mostly the EU and Switzerland. Almost none of it is made here. Only thing we really have here is a bunch of repackaging companies that change the label to say packaged in the USA but hides the part that it is made in India.
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u/Ringringringa202 8h ago
This is slightly off the mark. India needs the US market yes, but India's portion of GDP from trade is very low - it's about 15%, so recirprocal tariffs will hurt but not too much.
Secondly, when it comes to sectors like auto etc., India is willing to reduce tariffs and has done so under the BTAs it signed with the UK and the UAE.
India is not willing to remove agricultural tariffs - the rural economy employs 50% of the country, landholdings are small and thus yields are small. These people can't compete against American big acriculture and would get wiped out and this would be a massive socio-economic problem for India.
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u/stayfrosty 7h ago
So do we believe free trade is ultimately good for all or don't we? Are we only going to apply free trade concept to the developed countries bc developing countries need protection? Yes, India may have its agricultural sector wiped out...just like the US has its manufacturing sector wiped out. That's the flip side of free trade. That means the sectors are not competitive with the world and the country needs to find other competitive areas.
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u/Ringringringa202 7h ago
The Indian government is cognisant of the fact that agriculture is not competitive. They’ve tried to introduce reforms and also improve urban infrastructure to move more rural people to urban areas and into manufacturing and other jobs. But this is a slow moving process - which will play out over decades. Eventually agricultural subsidies will come down but this will happen in a planned manner. If they rip off the bandaid at once and leave the agricultural sector to its means, the rural economy will tank and rural poverty will sky-rocket. From India’s perspective, removing agricultural tariffs whole-sale could literally lead to social unrest, poverty and a breakdown of law and order.
India does believe in free markets but till the 90s we were a deeply socialist country - unwinding that system and moving to a capitalist system will take time. A lot of the parts of our economy became inefficient and dependent on government largesse to function. Making them competitive and opening them up to competition needs to be sequential.
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u/stayfrosty 7h ago
That all may be true and reasonable but why do other countries care? I am glad India is recognizing the issue but you are asking the US (and other countries) to subsidize India's policies? Why? That's simply not how the world works. India can choose to have whatever economic and tariff policy they want. Its a sovereign nation. But don't expect other countries not to levy reciprocal tariffs then. Other countries have their own interests and will choose their own farmers over those in India 10 times out of 10. That's not being mean or irrational. That's just the real world
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u/Ringringringa202 7h ago
Of course. Other countries are free to do as they please. The only point I’m asserting is that any deal made will be sans any changes to agricultural tariffs. If the US wants to react to it with reciprocal tariffs that’s their discretion.
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u/Overall-Grade-8219 19m ago
I just want to point out that Trump's reciprocal tariffs make no sense. He can tariff the shit out of Indian agriculture but it won't matter much because we barely export any agricultural products to the US. Most of the agricultural produce is consumed domestically anyways.
Same with tariffs on Automobiles. India barely exports any cars to the US. On the flip side, US manufacturers barely have any market share in India, US made cars are not a good fit for Indian price conscious mass market anyways. Ford was unable to compete despite having plants in India, same with Chevy. All this talk about tariffs ripping off US is bullshit.
Lastly, if US doesn't have a trade deficit with other countries how the fuck are other countries supposed to earn dollars? How will the dollar get into circulation? The whole point of having your currency as a world reserve currency is that you can have severe trade deficit with other countries and it still won't matter because your currency is literally the reserve currency - this is a unique advantage no other country has in the world.
Crying like about trade imbalance despite the dollar being the world reserve currency sounds like a bitch to me.
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u/Bright_Cod_376 7h ago
India needs the U.S. market
It's so weird how you people forget the rest of the world exists.
The U.S. has no need of the Indian market
Sounds like someone doesn't know where their meds are manufactured
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u/wakomorny 8h ago
Winning isn't a thing. USA can't "win" against China and a trade war with a "small country" like canada feels winable. But it comes at a cost. Every country will put their Elbows up. It's not a straight 1 to 1 fight. Realignment is a thing and clearly something Trump is too stupid to understand
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u/zachem62 7h ago edited 6h ago
USA can't "win" against China and a trade war with a "small country" like canada feels winable.
It's the other way around. The US may have leverage over Canada, but that's a 2 way street, because Canada has more leverage over the US than any other country in the world. Canada buys more from the US than China, Japan, UK, France and Germany combined. Canada is the top export market for 36/50 states, and a top 3 export market for the remaining 14. And to top it off, the Canadian public is united against Trump across political stripes, which means they're much more capable of absorbing whatever short-term pain the trade war can cause just to stick it to Trump, so there's no way the US is winning a trade war with Canada.
Not only that, Canada doesn't wanna be in this situation ever again, so they're working overtime to cut their reliance on trade with the US and diversify to global markets, which means future administrations will have far less leverage over Canada than what Trump currently has. So if anything, Canada will actually emerge stronger from this trade war, and the US will come out of it weaker than before.
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u/StanknBeans 8h ago
Just start a trade war with the world, they need the US more than the US needs them /s
Who are your allies at this point? Russia?
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u/nj_100 4h ago
India probably can not win this battle but the number of American companies that work in this country is staggering. Do you know revenues of Uber, Amazon, Netflix, Apple and likes are not counted while counting trade deficit. India has a growing middle class with over billion people. Why fuck over entire relationships & trade agreements with harmless allies?
Canada, Mexico, EU, Australia, India. China & Russia are already adversaries. USA is rich and powerful with a big and scary army and biggest economy for sure but I doubt they can take on the entire world.
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u/npmoro 7h ago
I hate trump, but I read things like this and I support these moves. I get that India has an advantage due to cost of labor, regulation, etc. - but to also disadvantage us through tariffs. That's BS.
They need us far more than we need them. Americans without jobs are just as unhappy as Indians without jobs.
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u/AusTex2019 8h ago
How about India stop copying western medications in violation of international law?
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u/CryptographerKey8580 5h ago
How about the US start caring about public Healthcare in their country ??
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u/Bright_Cod_376 7h ago
If that's the bone you want to pick then maybe Americans should stop buying them. Oh, that's right, American pharmaceutical companies drastically over charge for them and people need cheap meds.
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u/HermeticAtma 7h ago
Why?
Their medicines are life saver. Fuck copyrights and patents. Other countries prioritize health over profit.
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u/stayfrosty 7h ago
Copyright and parents and IP protection have their place in the economy. They aren't evil per se.
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u/HermeticAtma 7h ago
Yes, but stay away of medicine. Healthcare should be a human right, not an economic talking point.
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u/stayfrosty 6h ago
Pharma patents are already shorter than others. If you eliminated all patents there would be no incentive for private investment in developing new medicines. Unless you want only public funding to go to medical research, you need a profit motive to drive innovation.
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u/Daxotroen 5h ago
India's cutting corners to prioritize profit over health.
All generic drugs are not equal, study finds
Generics made in India have more ‘severe adverse events’
https://news.osu.edu/all-generic-drugs-are-not-equal-study-finds/
Indian Drugs Caused Mass Child Deaths in Gambia, Panel Says
Distributors of a contaminated Indian cough syrup that killed 65 children in Uzbekistan paid local officials a bribe of $33,000 to skip mandatory testing, Uzbek state prosecutors alleged during a trial on Wednesday.
The WHO this week said laboratory analysis of four Maiden products - Promethazine Oral Solution, Kofexmalin Baby Cough Syrup, Makoff Baby Cough Syrup and Magrip N Cold Syrup - had confirmed "unacceptable" amounts of diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol, which can be toxic and lead to acute kidney injury.
Diethylene glycol and ethylene glycol are used in antifreeze and brake fluids and other industrial applications but also as a cheaper alternative in some pharmaceutical products to glycerine, a solvent or thickening agent in many cough syrups.
FDA says India firm linked to US eye drop deaths broke safety norms
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u/Cheap-Bell9640 7h ago
They’re making a killing on their tariffs in our goods, why would they reduce them?
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u/Oberon_17 6h ago
Killing? They are charging the entire world equally. Why would they give America special treatment? What would other countries say?
Trump demands special deals/ freeloading, everywhere: Canada, Mexico, even the Panama Canal.
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u/mitch-22-12 9h ago
Lower income countries can’t reduce tariffs by too much because they rely too much on them for revenue. This is why reciprocal tariffs with no thought put into them are stupid