Merkel could hit back at Trump’s tariffs with attack on Amazon, Airbnb, and Uber

Friday, June 15, 2018
By Paul Martin

GERMAN Chancellor Angela Merkel has sent the clearest signal yet that Germany will protect its car industry against President Donald Trump’s punitive trade tariffs and hit back in turn with an attack on US tech giants.

By DAVID DAWKINS
Express.co.uk
Fri, Jun 15, 2018

Mrs Merkel, speaking at an event to mark 70 years of Germany’s “social market” economic model, gave a clear indication of EU leaders’ preparation plans to defend themselves and then retaliate against US tariff measures on goods.

The EU is preparing to push back against President Trump’s claim that the US steel and aluminium industry must be protected for reasons of “national security” and has identified the German car industry dominated by giants Volkswagen, Mercedes and BNW as having equivalent “significance” for the EU.

She said: “We should think about the strategic significance of the auto industry for the European Union so we can prepare an exchange with the US.”

On how the EU will take the fight to Trump, Mrs Merkel pointed at US tech giants, and without mentioning specific names, the so-called “platform economy” of firms like Amazon, Airbnb, and Uber.

Mrs Merkel said: “The platform economy is a big problem.

“It challenges both our competition authorities and the EU’s, and raises the question of whether they need to get involved in the matter of the big concentration of big platforms from the US.”

Chancellor Merkel also slammed President Trump’s long-held view that Germany takes advantage of the US with a massive trade surplus, claiming that if the repatriated European profits of US internet giants – Google, Amazon and Apple – were included, then the US would actually be in account surplus with the EU.

However, despite hinting at retaliatory measures that might be in the offing if the US stuck to its hard line on trade, she stressed that she would prefer to stick to a multilateral path alongside path alongside Mexico, Canada and potentially Japan.

The Rest…HERE

Leave a Reply

Join the revolution in 2018. Revolution Radio is 100% volunteer ran. Any contributions are greatly appreciated. God bless!

Follow us on Twitter