BERLIN: Donald Trump’s pledge to impose massive trade taxes on China has put Germany on alert.
According to Der Speigel Magazine, experts in the Finance Ministry and Economics Ministry are preparing for Trump to turn his attention East, since Germany’s account surplus is higher than ever. Plus, the United States is the highest consumer of German exports.
“If Trump can enact the trade limits he has announced, the damage would be substantial,” Clemens Fuest, president of Germany’s Ifo Institute for Economic Research, told the Wall Street Journal.
According to the WSJ, Germany shipped $125 billion in goods to the U.S., more than double that of second and third-ranking EU countries, and 2.5 times what it imported. Germany’s current account surplus, or positive difference between its savings and investment, is 8.5 percent of gross domestic product. That number will climb higher than 9 percent, according to Der Speigel, which would be larger than China’s.
