I understand why President Trump taking on the world's trading regimes and challenging nations to lower their tariffs.

However, I must disagree with him on a minor point. Europe has not cheated us. They have just been more clever businesspeople and better at persuading us that the status quo was worth protecting.

We Americans have been led down the primrose path by Trump's predecessor presidents who advocated for offshore investments in China, for example, to produce more affordable "U.S." products with cheaper labor to satisfy Americans' desire to save money.

Many of us knew this was a mistake.

The labor unions told us so, but American consumers didn't listen. We kept buying and buying and buying while more and more jobs left our shores for foreign sweatshops. We did not care as long as we could enjoy "Black Fridays" and save even more money on Chinese-made gimcrack while our neighbors down the street were collecting unemployment checks.

Our disposable income started to drop, but we still kept buying, even though our local Walmart store was busy stocking shelves with hundreds more foreign-made products.

Then came the coronavirus.

Our buying habits soon changed. Our stores experienced shortages due to production declines and distribution disruptions. Prices rose. And our disposable income declined even further.

Soon we were forced to buy anything we could find wherever we could find it.

Europeans were suffering, too, but not as much for three basic reasons: they were traditionally more cautious shoppers; they bought European-made products; and they were not as dependent on Chinese-made or other foreign-made products. They continued to sell to each other at favorable tariff rates, but also continued to sell to us at the same low tariff rates that we charged them while keeping their rates to our imports high.

Can we call this "cheating"? No. It is simply shrewd business dealings, charging what the market will bear.

So when President Trump says that the Europeans "were ripping us off," what he should be saying is that we have played ourselves for suckers by not doing something to bring down European tariffs through prior Republican and Democrat presidencies.

We either didn't know, were too lazy to try, were too comfortable buying foreign-made products, or too unwilling to confront the Europeans or take some personal responsibility for our buying habits and content with not getting our trade officials involved.

So, if we are truly engaged in a trade war, then we had better be ready to think creatively about how we are going to wage it.

If we truly want to bring back contract manufacturing from China or redirect production destined for European consumers from American-owned European subsidiaries, then we must be ready to go the distance and offer these subsidiaries some consideration for coming back "home."

Knowing that the transition will take time, we will need to make tax allowances for repatriation of investment. And, if we want the Europeans to invest in our country, they, too, will need some incentives. In the past, individual states lured foreign investment with tax breaks and short-cuts through the regulatory process by speeding up permits.

It may be time for the U.S. to consider offering a special program of incentives for foreign investors that does not disadvantage domestic companies but exists in tandem with that of the states' own incentives.

This will take time, especially since our relations with Europe have soured because of the trade/tariff war. If President Trump and the Republicans do not want to lose the midterm elections of 2026 (and they will if the average American cannot get economic relief from rising prices), then there is no time to lose.

Something must be done, quickly.

We must thinking creatively to trade creatively.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has repeatedly stated its intentions to "get Greenland … one way or the other."

To many Europeans, especially the Danish and their protectorate island, Greenland, these are frightening words, harkening back to colonial times, which is doing nothing to improve relations between the Danes, the Greenlanders, and in general among Europeans.

If the Trump administration really wants a rapprochement and to get back in the good graces of the Danes and the Greenlanders, he might wish to consider my suggestion:

Imagine that a special tariff dispensation for Europe were offered that would give Greenlanders a massive economic shot in the arm?

All European producers would have to do to receive a special tariff rate would be to redirect their shipments through Greenland ports, or if they did not choose to physically ship through Greenland, they could pay a surcharge equivalent to a prearranged tariff rate that the U.S. and Greenland would agree to.

The proceeds of the new tariff collections would be divided along a predetermined formula between the U.S. and Greenland and remain in effect for a specific period of time.

This special Make-Greenland-Tradeable tariff would help to repair relations between the U.S., Denmark, and Greenland and have a spillover effect with other European nations.

Every war has an end, but the victims of a trade war are often those at the lower end of the earning curve as the price rises that accompany it (even at the end of it) will remain in place and not decline, adding to the economic insecurity of ordinary families. To minimize the pain we owe it to ourselves to act creatively.

Stephen Helgesen is a retired career U.S. diplomat specializing in international trade who lived and worked in 30 countries for 25 years during the Reagan, G.H.W. Bush, Clinton, and G.W. Bush Administrations. He is the author of fourteen books, seven on American politics, and has written over 1,500 articles on politics, economics and social trends. He now lives in Denmark and is a frequent political commentator on Danish media. He can be reached at: stephenhelgesen@gmail.com.
   
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