For a certain number of countries, which Trump said were more responsible for the US trade deficit, that number was set higher, the president calling them "reciprocal" tariffs: 20% for the 27 nations that make up the European Union, 26% for India, 24% for Japan and so on. Trump's own claim that these new rates were derived by halving the tariffs already imposed against the US by certain countries was widely disputed, with critics noting that some of the numbers listed for certain countries were much higher than the actual rates, and some countries had tariff rates listed despite not specifically having tariffs against the US at all. In a post to X that spread fast across social media, finance journalist James Surowiecki said that the new reciprocal rates appeared to have been reached by taking the trade deficit the US has with each country and dividing it by the amount the country exports to the US.
Author: Thomas Kika
Published at: 2025-04-07 22:30:00
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