British media article: the United States launched a trade war with China at the expense of others an

Original title: British media article: the United States launched a trade war with China at the expense of others and ourselves
Reference News Network reported on December 31 that on December 29, the website of the British economist weekly published an article entitled "new research to calculate the cost of Sino US trade war", saying that the US launched a trade war with China at the expense of others and ourselves. The full text is excerpted as follows:
The first two years of the "phase I" economic and trade agreement between the United States and China are coming to an end. Now is a good time to evaluate the economic results of the Sino US trade war.
As more and more studies show, the trade war has seriously damaged the American economy. The two superpowers began to attack each other with tariffs at the beginning of 2018, so that economists obtained complete data about two years before COVID-19. During that period, the average tariff of the United States on goods imported from China surged from 3% to about 19%, while the average tariff of China on goods imported from the United States increased from 8% to about 21%. This has had a huge impact on one of the world's largest bilateral trade relations.
Pablo faigelbaum of Princeton University and Amit canderwa of Columbia University estimate that these tariffs have a greater impact on trade than the notorious smoot Hawley tariff in 1930. Smoot Hawley tariff has led to a series of international retaliation and may have worsened the situation of the great depression. Fortunately, the Sino US trade war did not cause such a disaster.
At the beginning of the trade war, a common assumption was that both sides would bear the cost of tariffs: Chinese suppliers would price their goods lower and American importers would pay higher. However, early studies by economists, including Gita gopinat, who now works for the International Monetary Fund, found that U.S. importers actually bear more than 90% of the cost of U.S. tariffs. The obvious explanation is that they have no choice but to rely on Chinese suppliers, at least in the short term, and they cannot reduce prices through negotiations. In addition, the price paid by consumers has hardly changed, which means that retailers bear the cost by reducing profits.
Gopinat and his colleagues wrote that this could not last: at some point, American importers would pass on higher costs to customers. Some economists point out that the current surge in inflation in the United States means that this is happening. To some extent, they are right - tariffs can lead to inflation, which even US Treasury Secretary Yellen admits.