Why Doesn't Britain Offer Every Country In The World A 0% Trade Deal?

[reddog]

I'm very economically liberal, why not show how open we are to the world and offer everyone a zero percent trade deal.

It will save all that negotiating are be good for us.

[Timak]

It depends if the rest of the world will play by the rules.

If we produce steel at £500/unit and China can do it at £300/unit then our steel industry will close.

If the British steel company improves and can offer it for £250/unit then the Chinese government sell steel at £200/unit until our industry closes.

[reddog]

It depends if the rest of the world will play by the rules.

If we produce steel at £500/unit and China can do it at £300/unit then our steel industry will close.

If the British steel company improves and can offer it for £250/unit then the Chinese government sell steel at £200/unit until our industry closes.

well that is happening already inside the great EU.

The world trade organisation is meant to stop dumping anyway ( maybe it does a bad job, the EU hasn't done a great job of fixing it)

We already important tons of Chinese tat, I generally don't think it would make any difference.

We might actually look dynamic

Also in case where there is no trade deal in place, trafifs average under 2% (heard it on the radio this morning, it was definitely 1.something%)

Edited June 28, 2016 by reddog

[winkie]

If our cost of living, for example the cost of our homes was less we could afford to earn less thus sell our goods for less.....if we held less debt we could make things for less sell for less and we would not require top up state borrowed benefit help to live.......if the world was more equal we would not be in competition or have to protect ourselves from the rest of it.

[dgul]

We can offer 0% trade to everyone - promise to import all their stuff without any import tax as it arrives. Easy to do.

Negotiating that they will import our exports with 0% import tax on their side would take much more work.

[Bloo Loo]

0% for stuff we need from skills abroad.

stop them coming % for stuff we make here.

We must stop the globalist rot.

[200p]

We can't beat China on making "stuff", but can beat on "financial" stuff because of our location, time zone, and language.

[reddog]

We can offer 0% trade to everyone - promise to import all their stuff without any import tax as it arrives. Easy to do.

Negotiating that they will import our exports with 0% import tax on their side would take much more work.

That was one of thoughts, I think in this sense the uk is a lot more dynamic than other supposedly liberal economy's.

Like the Brexit video shows, the EU is more about dying uncompetitive countries wanting to mainly compete with other dying uncompetitive countries.

[evetsm]

We can't beat China on making "stuff", but can beat on "financial" stuff because of our location, time zone, and language.

precisely! it's called division of labour, or specialization. You don't compete on what you cannot compete on, you find specializations that you become expert in and sell that. Then there would be no such term as "dumping" and then there would be 0% tariffs everywhere. That's called a free market. eg. the Germans can't out-make the Chinese for widgets, but they can make the machines that make the widgets better than anyone else.

There is a market with 7 billion people out there, there must be something that we can specialize in!

The problem with Brexit-Remain is that the arguments are mostly economic illiterate and we end up making daft decisions that could sink our economy completely.

[Uncle_Kenny]

It depends if the rest of the world will play by the rules.

If we produce steel at £500/unit and China can do it at £300/unit then our steel industry will close.

If the British steel company improves and can offer it for £250/unit then the Chinese government sell steel at £200/unit until our industry closes.

In such a case the Chinese are providing us with foreign aid.

[Digsby]

It depends if the rest of the world will play by the rules.

If we produce steel at £500/unit and China can do it at £300/unit then our steel industry will close.

If the British steel company improves and can offer it for £250/unit then the Chinese government sell steel at £200/unit until our industry closes.

The point has been made, I think, but if a British steel company cannot compete on price with a Chinese steel company, then it is good that the British steel company should close - it is inefficiently producing steel that the Chinese can produce more efficiently. We loose the jobs but we get cheaper steel = more money to invest in business we are better at.

[Guest TheBlueCat]

I've thought this too. I think a small modification or two might make it work:

Start with zero percent in each import category but increase it to match whatever the other country charges on our imports if they don't reciprocate within a reasonable period.

For goods that are subsidised by a foreign country, set an import tariff rate to neutralise the subsidy.

Apply anti dumping legislation rigourously to all good regardless of where they are produced.

[Guest TheBlueCat]

The point has been made, I think, but if a British steel company cannot compete on price with a Chinese steel company, then it is good that the British steel company should close - it is inefficiently producing steel that the Chinese can produce more efficiently. We loose the jobs but we get cheaper steel = more money to invest in business we are better at.

On pure economic terms, yes. Strategically speaking we need at least a small local steel industry in case we need to ramp up in a hurry (trade embargo, war etc.) Edited June 28, 2016 by TheBlueCat

[200p]

There is no Brexit plan. In fact there has been no plan for the last 5 years or so. What do we want to be in the world?

Maybe become the worlds No 1. offshore tax haven. We must continue to pay whatever we need to have banking passports to do business in the EU, and give generous incentives to our EU partners to put their money here where it will be "safe".

We have the developments in blockchain technology, and lots of other developments in finance such as selfie pay, biometric pay etc. We have a global stock market also. "Money" isn't going to go away any time soon, whether it be coins, digital or capital.

Other parts of the UK need to have a financial role, to boost standard of living for the masses in the North which have largely missed out on the London-centric boom, and they are firmly upset about the "Establishment". This is the Labour core vote.

There's an old saying. If you are a baker, you are covered in flour, if you are a dustman, you are covered in rubbish, if you work in finance you are covered in money.

Edited June 28, 2016 by 200p

[Bloo Loo]

We can't beat China on making "stuff", but can beat on "financial" stuff because of our location, time zone, and language.

All things must pass.

one day, we will be beating China at many things....but as globalism is rife, the next China will outChina China

[porca misèria]

I'm very economically liberal, why not show how open we are to the world and offer everyone a zero percent trade deal.

It will save all that negotiating are be good for us.

Tariffs are the easy bit of trade negotiation.

The more interesting bit is what you accept. For example, the EU are, one imagines, playing hardball with the US over TTIP, so what finally emerges will address European concerns - like not importing food stuffed with growth hormones.

The UK, by contrast, will be desperate for whatever trade agreements it can get, so will just roll over and take US terms. So, not just a free market in those hormones (not to mention all kind of GM), but a ban on practices that would sabotage sales - like labelling anything to say "GM Free".

[zugzwang]

We can't beat China on making "stuff", but can beat on "financial" stuff because of our location, time zone, and language.

Yeah, financialisation. It's worked out so well for us. Let's have some more!

[Silverfinger]

We can't beat China on making "stuff", but can beat on "financial" stuff because of our location, time zone, and language.

Agreed. I would suggest that the UK focuses on services, such as doing nails and selling houses to one another. Simply import the rest at 0% customs.

[200p]

Also Gold.

We could be the No1. worlds private gold store, and public store for central banks of the world (would they really ship their gold for us to store here? Maybe!). We already have bullion vault and goldmoney (Jersey). And there's already that big ICBC vault that contains $80bn. We rent out the "gold", collect the annual fees and insurance.

This gold centre could be in the Northern part of the UK. Bigger than fort Knox, bigger than the Federal Reserve Bank. It would employ a few thousand just to stand guard, count and polish the metal. It would also be a tourist attraction, so people can look at the tourist area which they can see a handful of plated bars.

[South Lorne]

Tariffs are the easy bit of trade negotiation.

The more interesting bit is what you accept. For example, the EU are, one imagines, playing hardball with the US over TTIP, so what finally emerges will address European concerns - like not importing food stuffed with growth hormones.

The UK, by contrast, will be desperate for whatever trade agreements it can get, so will just roll over and take US terms. So, not just a free market in those hormones (not to mention all kind of GM), but a ban on practices that would sabotage sales - like labelling anything to say "GM Free".

...no ...TTIP will not be around if DT gets in ...he will bust this US establishment machine.....

[rahhhh]

A world free trade zone would be a much better idea. Zero tariffs, open to anyone, but keeping customs duties, national rules on regulations, standards etc

[cock-eyed octopus]

That was one of thoughts, I think in this sense the uk is a lot more dynamic than other supposedly liberal economy's.

Like the Brexit video shows, the EU is more about dying uncompetitive countries wanting to mainly compete with other dying uncompetitive countries.

Yes! That's exactly what I thought the first time round; what's the point in a bunch of nations all trying to flog each other the same stuff when we could trade with old style Commonwealth countries who would complement each other.

I actually believed there was a moral dimension to this as well, as we could have paid decent, stable prices for raw materials & would have had the knock-on effect of increasing knowledge based industries in poorer countries. Assuming we were doing OK, I'd have voted for a party with such a programme.

But I suppose Paris & Rome are much more glamorous places for our leaders to visit.

[Digsby]

On pure economic terms, yes. Strategically speaking we need at least a small local steel industry in case we need to ramp up in a hurry (trade embargo, war etc.)

OK point taken, I'm an idealist and a hippy (despite what label certain deluded remainers try to pin on me). But thank heaven not everyone in this country is like me, thank you.

[crashbaby]

A world free trade zone would be a much better idea. Zero tariffs, open to anyone, but keeping customs duties, national rules on regulations, standards etc

The bold part is not as easy as it looks. This is also why the EU has unified regulations on products (remember the Euro Sausage?

). A bigger market has a considerable advantage here.

Of course, there's nothing stopping countries outside the EU from adopting the same regulations so the same products are accepted in both markets. The biggest drawback would probably be that you can't influence the standards from outside the EU, so they could one day decide that the British sausage is no longer good enough and then you need to update the production lines or take the economic hit.

[porca misèria]

A world free trade zone would be a much better idea. Zero tariffs, open to anyone, but keeping customs duties, national rules on regulations, standards etc

National rules?

Think just a moment. Suppose you want to trade throughout the EU. Currently you have to deal with one set of standards, aka EU red tape. Would you rather have to deal with 28 separate sets of red tape? Especially for a complex product: for example, it takes millions to get a medical product approved: multiply that by 28 and just imagine the effect on the NHS budget!