Donald Trump is seemingly doing his level best to create global turmoil, with the Dow Jones dropping by 10% in two days after he introduced steep tariffs on countries across the world – apart from Russia of course.
Who could have seen it coming? I am of course being sarcastic here, as anyone that paid attention during Trump’s election campaign, and listened to his apparent obsession with the word ‘tariff’, could very much have seen this coming.
More to the point, anyone with a GCSE-level grasp of economics could see how tariffs would slow up growth and create inflation in the US and abroad – but apparently 77 million Americans didn’t understand or care about it. It was baffling when they voted for Trump in November – based on his policies and the man himself – and it’s still baffling now.
The question is whether Trump will stick the course, as stocks and growth projections continue to sink. Even Fox News is starting to turn on their beloved leader, so perhaps the pressure will get to the man that apparently always knows better than the experts.
After the disasterclass in leadership that was Liz Truss’s short tenure as UK Prime Minister in 2022, can we now dispose of the myth that the ring wing are better at managing a country’s finances than the left? Low taxes, low public investment and a country that only looks inward is not a good recipe for growth – and the UK needs to go the opposite direction to the US if it’s to be a success.
The difference with the UK and US of course is we have a better functioning democracy than them. In the US the President clearly has far too much power to dish out executive orders and give political pardons – and who is there to kick out a leader that causes the economy to sink? At least more moderate Tory MPs were able to push Libertarian Liz out of office after she looked to borrow money to give tax cuts to the rich in her ‘mini-budget’, driving down the value of the pound in the process.
The Americans have got nearly four years of being led by a far-right wing administration ahead of them. They appear to lack any sense of perspective, as the right paints the extremely moderate Democratic Party as being on the hard left – and so at this point it would make sense for the world to regear their economies away from the US. Voting for Trump once can be seen as an anomaly, twice is a pattern. Nigel Farage may have some supporters in the UK, but I don’t think half the electorate would vote for him.
My hope is that Trump’s leadership signals to Canada that they should back Mark Carney, the Liberal leader and former Governor of the Bank of England, in its upcoming federal election on April 28. Carney would ensure Canada takes a different path to its southern neighbour, and could give Europe an effective ally and trade partner in North America. I think he’s a strong candidate, as the right will surely find it difficult to paint him as someone that’s bad with money, as David Cameron managed with the Labour Party after the global financial crisis. Carney’s role as a central banker and experience in finance clearly demonstrates his economic competence, contrasting with the man south of the border.
Before Carney replaced Justin Trudeau as Canadian Prime Minister the opposition Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre appeared to be a dead cert to win, but now it looks less clear cut. It’s unfair to paint Poilievre as another Trump, but his populist approach and focus on tax cuts suggest he’s playing from the usual right-wing playbook – and I’m not sure recent history suggests that’s what a country needs to thrive.
It’s going to be an interesting few months ahead, but I kind of wish things were a little duller.
