Vocabulary

free trade – свободная торговля: международная торговля без каких-либо ограничений, таких как импортные пошлины, квоты, валютный контроль

trade sanctions – торговые санкции; unilateral sanctions – односторонние санкции

fast-track legislation – поцедура ускоренного рассмотрения торговых соглашений в Конгрессе США

trade agreement – торговое соглашение; to negotiate a trade agreement – вести переговоры о заключении торгового соглашения

trade barriers (curbs on trade) – торговые барьеры: tariff – тариф; quota – квота; duty – пошлина; surcharge – дополнительный налог; sanction – санкция; to reduce tariffs (quotas, duties) – сократить, уменьшить размер тарифов (квот, пошлин)

to implement new barriers to free trade – ввести, установить новые барьеры на пути свободной торговли

to offend – нарушить (закон, обычай); to offend labor standards (environmental standards) – нарушить трудовое законодательство, нормативы по труду (экологические нормы); offending nation (offender) – страна-нарушитель таких законов

to assess risks – оценить риски; risk assessment – оценка рисков

to ban smth – запретить ч-л, ввести запрет на ч-л; a ban against smth – запрет ч-л

to retaliate – предпринять ответные шаги; retaliation – ответные шаги, меры

Exercises

1. Pronounce the following:

legislation, legislator, amend, bipartisan, Burma, Burmese, politics, environmentalist, contemplate, applicable, Massachusetts, retaliate, coerce, chaos, wrath.

2. Explain the following in English:

a U.S. company cannot build its business beyond this single project; doing business in the targeted countries; eroding bipartisan support for free trade; religious prosecution; offending nation; unilateral trade sanctions.

Against Anti-Dumping

Protectionism is on the rise again – thanks partly to a hole in world trade rules

In the 1930s widespread recession bacame world depression only after countries retreated behind tariff walls and trade collapsed. Today the world economy wobbles and teeters, but most governments vow that they have learnt their lesson. Perhaps they have. Even so, it is reassuring that international trade rules make a return to protection harder and more expensive than it was in the 1930s.

Do not bank on it. For there is a big hole in those multilateral rules. Countries can slap duties on cheap imports that they judge are being “dumped” in their markets. And – surprise, surprise – there has recently been a surge in anti-dumping cases around the world, as companies such as America’s steel makers feel the pinch of slower growth and rising imports from crisis-hit economies.

Anti-dumping is a particularly pernicious form of protection, because it lurks beneath a veneer of respectability. Its apologists assert not merely that foreigners are stealing jobs at home – the usual protectionist line – but that they are doing so unfairly by selling their wares on the cheap, perhaps in the hope of driving domestic competitors out of business. Anti-dumpers claim to target only such cheats; and, moreover, to use objective calculations of what they ought to charge, making proper allowance for profit. Duties are imposed only to bring prices back into line with what they should be; if victims squeal, they can raise their prices instead.

Yet the practice is very different from the theory. Dumping calculations are a sham. Foreigners are almost always found at fault. Huge duties are imposed and rarely removed, even when conditions change. Worse still are the hidden costs of anti-dumpimg. A government that threatens any foreign firm offering the keenest prices is merely encouraging it and others to raise prices and cut sales. In effect, companies are being urged to collude at consumers’ expense.

But surely anti-dumping measures may be justified if foreigners are guilty of predatory pricing? Not usually. Genuine predatory pricing is extremely rare, because it relies on the unlikely ability of a single producer to dominate a world market. In any case, consumers gain from lower prices; so do companies that can buy their supplies more cheply abroad – General Motors, for example, in the case of steel. And even in the very few cases where foreigners might drive domestic producers out of business and raise prices once they corner the market, anti-dumping is a wrong response.