Experts say reciprocal tariffs will harm US

US President Donald Trump on Thursday signed a memorandum instructing his administration to devise a plan to raise US tariffs to align with the tax rates that other countries charge on imports, a move seen as increasing global economic tension and uncertainty.

"I have decided for purposes of fairness, that I will charge a reciprocal tariff — meaning whatever countries charge the United States of America, we will charge them no more, no less. In other words, they charge us a tax or tariff and we charge them the exact same tax or tariff," Trump said at the White House.

Howard Lutnick, Trump's nominee for commerce secretary, said that the administration would tackle each affected country individually and that studies on the matter would be finished by April 1, Reuters reported.

Experts believe this move could hurt the US economy and risk trade conflicts, prompting other countries to retaliate in response to US tariff hikes, thereby increasing global economic uncertainty.

Gary Clyde Hufbauer, a nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, told Xinhua News Agency that in World Trade Organization negotiations, "reciprocity" means an overall balance of concessions between each country and all its trading partners, but Trump has redefined "reciprocity" to apply on a line item basis, country by country, rather than maintaining an overall balance.

"With reciprocity, as defined by Trump, US tariffs would probably on average be 10 to 15 percentage points higher. In my opinion, tariffs actually hurt the US economy, so while they would raise revenue … they would reduce GDP growth," Hufbauer said.

Wang Xiaofeng, director of international cooperation at the Center for China and Globalization, a Chinese think tank, said that Trump's reciprocal tariff policy fails to account for the complexity of the global trade system.

"Since intermediate goods make up about 45 percent of total US imports, such tariffs would ultimately undermine the competitiveness of American companies by raising the cost of industrial inputs," she said.

Speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday, Trump also expressed a desire to reduce defense spending and nuclear weapons, saying that he wants to hold talks with China and Russia.

China stands ready to work with all parties to firmly support the multilateral arms control regime with the United Nations at its core and contribute to world peace and security, Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said on Friday at a regular news conference.

It is widely known in the world that the US and Russia combined own over 90 percent of the world's nuclear weapons. The US and Russia should earnestly fulfill their special and primary responsibility for nuclear disarmament, further make drastic and substantive cuts to their nuclear arsenals, and create necessary conditions for other nuclear-weapon states to join in the nuclear disarmament process, Guo said.

Agencies contributed to this story.