USA

U.S. President Donald Trump has shown the world how to take the Chinese bull by the horn. Within three months of taking over office, he has cornered Beijing in the tariff war and has also taken control of the strategic Panama Canal from China. Wresting control of the Panama Canal was the first priority of the Donald Trump government. Located in the backyard of America, U.S. naval ships are a frequent user of the canal and 40 percent of the U.S. container traffic uses the Panama Canal route. Beijing had gained control of the strategic canal through CK Hutchison Holdings, a Hong Kong – based Chinese company with controlling stake in The Panama Ports Company that operated the ports of Balboa and Cristobal on either end of the waterway. Finally, however, Li Ka-shing, the Hong Kon...

The United States economy stands at a critical juncture, grappling with a delicate balance between cooling inflation, slowing growth, and rising political interference, according to a recent report by Quantace Research titled US Economy at a Crossroads: What You Need to Know. While inflation pressures appear to be easing — with headline CPI falling to 2.4 per cent in March, the first time below 2.5 per cent since 2021 — broader economic signals remain mixed. The Atlanta Fed’s real-time GDP now-cast points to a contraction of 0.3 per cent quarter-on-quarter, indicating growth is losing altitude. Meanwhile, the labour market continues to flash warning signs, with initial unemployment claims at 215,000 and continuing claims reaching the highest level since 2022. Retail sales rose by 1....

Trump’s Trade Levy Could Repeat 1930s Market Freefall, Warns HankeOn the social media platform X, American economist Steve Hanke—celebrated for his applied economics research, currency-reform work and monetary policy expertise—has been unabashedly voicing his disdain for Trump’s tariff measures. On Sunday, he took to X and said, “According to my friend and former colleague David Stockman, [President] Trump’s proposed tariffs will increase input costs for American businesses by $500 [billion].” He then added that “tariffs [equal] an economic wrecking ball” in all capital letters. In another X post which features a video of Hanke, the economist cautions that current economic policies mirror those of the early 1930s, when the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act took effect. “And it’s something akin t...

Since the US began rolling out multiple rounds of tariffs on Chinese goods earlier this month, Beijing has urged exporters to pivot to the domestic market. But for Li, a bicycle manufacturer with a long-term exclusive focus on American buyers, the shift has been anything but smooth.She signed up for an initiative on JD.com, one of China’s largest e-commerce platforms. The company promised to funnel 200 billion yuan (US$27.41 billion) to help exporters transition to domestic sales. But days later, her application still hadn’t been processed. “We reached out to JD to open a store, but they told us the policy only applied to merchants already running self-operated shops,” she said. “Customer service hadn’t even heard of any special support measures for export companies like us.” The co...

Xi Jinping has announced a plan to counter China’s continuing economic problems and the impact of the US trade war, as reports swirl that it could drop tariffs on some US products, including semiconductors. Friday’s meeting of the politburo was convened to discuss China’s economy, which since the pandemic has faced difficulties fuelled by a housing sector crisis, youth unemployment and Donald Trump’s tariffs on all Chinese imports to the US. A readout of the meeting published by the official state media outlet Xinhua said China’s economy had showed a “positive trend” with increasing social confidence in 2025, but “the impact of external shocks has increased”. “We must strengthen bottom-line thinking, fully prepare emergency plans and do a solid job in economic work,” it said.In a...

The United States and China are locked into an escalating trade war with broad implications for U.S.-China relations, the global economy, supply chains, and global governance. After several rounds of retaliation, both sides have put in place extensive tariffs that jeopardize bilateral trade, and China has introduced new export controls on critical minerals, including certain rare earth metals, among other things. The trade war could impact China’s and the world’s clean energy transition. China, the world’s largest greenhouse gas emitter, is responsible for over 30 percent of global emissions but is also a clean energy technology juggernaut with record deployment of renewables and electric vehicles (EVs). China also supplies much of the world with EVs, batteries, and solar panels. Conseque...

Beijing has warned its trading partners against succumbing to US pressure to isolate China in President Donald Trump’s tariff war, as part of its carrot-and-stick approach to win over countries caught between the world’s two largest economies. Commenting on recent media reports about the Trump administration’s plans to pressure countries into restricting trade with China in exchange for exemptions from US tariffs, a spokesperson for China’s Commerce Ministry said on Monday: “Appeasement does not bring peace, and compromise does not earn respect.” “Seeking temporary self-interest at the expense of others — in exchange for so-called exemptions — is like asking a tiger for its skin. In the end, it will achieve nothing and harm both others and oneself,” the spokesperson said in a statem...

We hear every day from our member companies—of every size and industry, across nearly every state—that they’re facing challenges trying to find enough workers to fill open jobs. The U.S. Chamber is capturing the trends on job openings, labor force participation, quit rates, and more for a quick understanding of the state of the workforce in our America Works Data Center.  Read on for an analysis of the state of the workforce on the national level.Why are we in a worker shortage?At the height of the pandemic, more than 120,000 businesses temporarily closed, and more than 30 million U.S. workers were unemployed. Since then, job openings have steadily increased while unemployment has slowly declined.In 2023, employers ended up adding 3.1 million jobs. A strong jobs market is good news, bu...

U.S. trade with China has grown enormously in recent decades and is crucial for both countries. Today, China is one of the largest export markets for U.S. goods and services (second to Mexico), and the United States is the top export market for China. This trade—much of which grew after China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001—has brought lower prices to U.S. consumers and higher profits for U.S. corporations. But it also comes with costs, notably the loss of American jobs due to import competition, automation, and multinational companies moving manufacturing overseas. After President Donald Trump began a so-called trade war with China in 2018, economic tensions between Washington and Beijing have been on the rise. Chinese officials have warned that there are “no winners...

The trade imbalance in goods between China and the United States is both an inevitable outcome of structural issues within the US economy and a consequence of comparative advantages and international division of labour between the two countries—not a result of China’s deliberate pursuit of a trade surplus, a Chinese white paper outlining its position on US tariffs stated on Wednesday. As US imposed a cumulative 145 per cent tariffs on Chinese goods due to high trade deficit and unfair practices, China argued that the benefits derived from economic and trade relations between the two countries are “generally balanced”, and that a comprehensive and nuanced assessment is required to determine whether China–US bilateral trade is indeed balanced, as it cannot be judged solely on the basis o...