The next generation of smarter and more powerful machines will rely on even more sophisticated semiconductors to achieve new capabilities. Pressure is on to “win” in the global chip race, which is why efforts to protect innovations in chipmaking are front and center in the current trade war – for better and for worse.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, technology keeps the world connected and allows global trade in services to continue. The WTO outlines four modes of delivery for services trade.
The political winds seem to be blowing in favor of a Congressional vote on the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Free Trade Agreement (USMCA) yet this fall. But before they vote, some Members of Congress want to talk over a few issues with the Trump administration’s negotiators. One is intellectual property protections for the U.S. biopharmaceutical industry. As important as it is, the issue of data protection for biologic drugs is not well understood.
U.S. footwear production dates as far back as 1750, but today 98 percent of shoes are manufactured abroad. Historically, footwear tariffs have been out of step with the United States’ general approach to free trade. High tariffs on products like shoes hit low-income families the hardest – particularly those with children – as these families spend the highest share of their incomes on home goods that tend to be imported.
Ethnic neighborhoods across the United States – from Little Havana in Miami to San Francisco’s Chinatown – allow us to experience elements of a culture and cuisine without needing to break out a passport. Read about how trade brings the best of Italy’s food to residents and tourists in Boston’s North End.
The announcement that trade talks in Beijing between the United States and China had been extended by a day sparked an uptick in stocks and renewed optimism that a resolution to the trade war might be in the offing. A minimal face-saving agreement should be possible before the March deadline, but this would only delay the ultimate day of reckoning. Friction points between China’s state-directed economic system and the United States’ ostensibly free market, free trade system will reassert themselves sooner rather than later.
Champagne is the drink of choice to celebrate many of life’s milestones and one country in particular benefits the most from this tradition: France. The European Union wants to ensure through trade agreements that only sparkling wines produced in the Champagne region of France can be labeled by law as Champagne.
Few Americans associate cheddar cheese with its ancestral home: Cheddar, in Somerset County, Britain. The name Cheddar, originally designating a unique geographic location, evolved into a generic description as the cheese was produced all over the world. And therein lies the heart of a modern trade dispute over “geographical indications,” or GIs for short.
The meeting between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping in Argentina in late November may prove to be a turning point for not only for the US-China relationship, but for global trade. Both leaders enter these discussions knowing the far more important question is whether there can be a sustainable co-existence between a Western market-driven economy with democratic ideals and a centrally-managed Chinese economy led by the Communist Party of China.
Among the many casualties of the 1958 Cuban revolution was the clear rights to Havana Club rum, which has been tied up in a decades-long trade dispute involving the United States, Cuba, and the European Union.
