What's in store after the US elections?
Much is being said about the public appearances of the two US presidential candidates, as well as their scandals in the US election campaign. Commentators on both sides of the Atlantic now take a closer look at the economic policy proposals of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.
Both candidates pose a risk to US economy
Neither candidate bodes well for US economic policy, Dagens Nyheter believes:
“Protectionism could be the worst evil of this presidential election. Trump has threatened to rescind Nafta and other free trade agreements and to drastically increase tariffs on goods from China and Mexico. The entire world is supposed to comply with the conditions set by the US, and an economic war is increasingly likely. American consumers will be hit by higher prices. The lost jobs in industry will hardly return from abroad, even if Trump bans robots and technological innovations. Clinton, too, would opt for trade barriers - against better judgement. That's what the unions and leftist democrats were demanding in the primaries, and Trump was egging her on. Now she's against the TTIP and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. If that's just election tactics, a new change of course will be a hard sell.”
Trump's tax plans indefensible
The tax policy proposals of the Republican candidate don't hold water on closer analysis, writes editor Derek Thompson in The Atlantic:
“Trump’s advocates would like to shift the analysis of their candidate away from his chequered personal history and toward his ideas. But most of his policies wilt under the punishing light of numerate analysis. Trump presents himself as a 'blue-collar worker' who rails against special interests and condemns a tax code made crooked by the coastal elite. But on paper, Trump promises fresh benefits to the most special interest in his life: Trump, Inc. His tax plan is indefensible, both by any standard interpretation of the public’s will and by his own standard of raising taxes on the rich. But I suppose that when you’re a star, you can do anything.”