Member-only story
Global Trade War: Is Trump Is Leading His Country and The Rest of The World To Perdition?
Or have we got things wrong?
Schadenfreude is not the perfect adjective to describe how most plutocrats are feeling about the tariffs imposed by the President.
It certainly wasn’t the word on their lips on the morning of the 6th of November 2024, when Donald Trump was declared the winner of the Presidential elections. In the last few days, a few of our wealthy friends have lost an absolute fortune, with the announcement of broadscale taxes on import items.
But for non-American commentators, Schadenfreude is the sentiment which we are feeling right now as the stock markets continue to tumble.
But then again, this is an incredibly parochial take from a ‘supposedly’ enlightened individual: in today’s globalized world, decisions made in Washington are felt everywhere.
And the United Kingdom isn’t different.
If anything, it is highly likely to be worse as we do not have the European Union cocoon to fall back on.
Our isolation from the strongest political bloc means that we will bear the severity of the arbitrary increase in taxes by the Trump administration, a phenomenon which makes my schadenfreude slightly misplaced.