Trump’s rogue America

Donald Trump has thrown a hand grenade into the global economic architecture that was so painstakingly constructed in the years after the end of World War II.

The attempted destruction of this rules-based system of global governance — now manifested in Trump’s withdrawal of the United States from the 2015 Paris climate agreement — is just the latest aspect of the US president’s assault on our basic system of values and institutions.

The world is only slowly coming fully to terms with the malevolence of the Trump administration’s agenda.

He and his cronies have attacked the US press — a vital institution for preserving Americans’ freedoms, rights and democracy — as an “enemy of the people”.

They have attempted to undermine the foundations of our knowledge and beliefs — our epistemology — by labelling as “fake” anything that challenges their aims and arguments, even rejecting science itself.

Trump’s sham justifications for spurning the Paris climate agreement is only the most recent evidence of this.

For millennia before the middle of the eighteenth century, standards of living stagnated. It was the Enlightenment, with its embrace of reasoned discourse and scientific inquiry, that underpinned the enormous increases in standards of living in the subsequent two and a half centuries.

With the Enlightenment also came a commitment to discover and address our prejudices.

As the idea of human equality — and its corollary, basic individual rights for all — quickly spread, societies began struggling to eliminate discrimination on the basis of race, gender and, eventually, other aspects of human identity, including disability and sexual orientation.

Trump seeks to reverse all of that.

His rejection of science, in particular climate science, threatens technological progress.

And his bigotry towards women, Hispanics and Muslims (except those, like the rulers of Gulf oil sheikhdoms, from whom he and his family can profit), threatens the functioning of American society and its economy, by undermining people’s trust that the system is fair to all.

As a populist, Trump has exploited the justifiable economic discontent that has become so widespread in recent years, as many Americans have become downwardly mobile amid soaring inequality.

But his true objective — to enrich himself and other gilded rent-seekers at the expense of those who supported him — is revealed by his tax and healthcare plans.

Trump’s proposed tax reforms, as far as one can see, outdo George W. Bush in their regressivity (the share of the benefits that go to those at the top of the income distribution).

And in a country where life expectancy is already declining, his health-care overhaul would leave 23 million more Americans without health insurance.

While Trump and his Cabinet may know how to make business deals, they have not the slightest idea how the economic system as a whole works.

If the administration’s macroeconomic policies are implemented, they will result in a larger trade deficit and a further decline in manufacturing.

America will suffer under Trump. Its global leadership role was being destroyed, even before Trump broke faith with over 190 countries by withdrawing from the Paris accord.

At this point, rebuilding that leadership will demand a truly heroic effort.

We share a common planet, and the world has learned the hard way that we have to get along and work together. We have learned, too, that cooperation can benefit all.

So what should the world do with a babyish bully in the sandbox who wants everything for himself and will not be reasoned with?

How can the world manage a “rogue” US?

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel gave the right answer when, after meeting with Trump and other G-7 leaders last month, she said that Europe could no longer “fully count on others” and would have to “fight for our own future ourselves”.

This is the time for Europe to pull together, recommit itself to the values of the Enlightenment and stand up to the US, as France’s new president, Emmanuel Macron, did so eloquently with a handshake that stymied Trump’s puerile alpha-male approach to asserting power.

Europe cannot rely on a Trump-led US for its defence. But, at the same time, it should recognise that the Cold War is over — however unwilling to acknowledge it America’s industrial-military complex may be.

While fighting terrorism is important and costly, building aircraft carriers and super fighter planes is not the answer. Europe needs to decide for itself how much to spend, rather than submit to the dictates of military interests that demand 2 per cent of GDP.

Political stability may be more surely gained by Europe’s recommitment to its social-democratic economic model.

We now also know that the world cannot count on the US in addressing the existentialist threat posed by climate change.

Europe and China did the right thing in deepening their commitment to a green future — right for the planet, and right for the economy.

Just as investment in technology and education gave Germany a distinct advantage in advanced manufacturing over a US hamstrung by Republican ideology, so, too, Europe and Asia will achieve an almost insurmountable advantage over the US in the green technologies of the future.

But the rest of the world cannot let a rogue US destroy the planet. Nor can it let a rogue US take advantage of it with unenlightened — indeed anti-Enlightenment — “America first” policies.

If Trump wants to withdraw the US from the Paris climate agreement, the rest of the world should impose a carbon-adjustment tax on US exports that do not comply with global standards.

The good news is that the majority of Americans are not with Trump.

Most Americans still believe in Enlightenment values, accept the reality of global warming and are willing to take action.

But as far as Trump is concerned, it should already be clear that reasoned debate will not work. It is time for action.

The writer, a Nobel laureate in economics, is professor at Columbia University and chief economist at the Roosevelt Institute. His most recent book is “The Euro: How a Common Currency Threatens the Future of Europe”. ©Project Syndicate, 2017. www.project-syndicate.org