{"id":41404,"date":"2023-03-27T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thehub.ca\/?p=41404"},"modified":"2023-03-27T02:57:19","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T06:57:19","slug":"it-is-not-only-about-economics-bidens-friendly-visit-doesnt-change-the-protectionist-status-quo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thehub.ca\/2023-03-27\/it-is-not-only-about-economics-bidens-friendly-visit-doesnt-change-the-protectionist-status-quo\/","title":{"rendered":"‘It is not only about economics’: Biden’s friendly visit doesn’t change the protectionist status quo"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
A lot can change in seven years. Joe Biden\u2019s sleepover in Ottawa last week was the first state visit by a sitting U.S. president since June 2016, when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hosted Barack Obama during the first year of his premiership. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Just a few months after Obama\u2019s visit, Donald Trump won the 2016 U.S. election. Trump\u2019s protectionist policies, including tariffs and ending America\u2019s involvement in international trade treaties, upended a decades-long consensus on international free trade. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many Canadians breathed a sigh of relief<\/a> when Trump failed to win re-election in 2020, and was replaced by Biden. On matters of international trade, however, Canada and the U.S. have not returned to the status quo of 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trevor Tombe, a professor of economics at the University of Calgary and Hub<\/em> contributor, says that since Trump became president, the U.S. has been less willing to engage with international institutions and trade, both courses of action that are popular with the U.S. public.\u00a0A Gallup poll earlier this month suggested a record-low 65 percent of Americans<\/a> want the U.S. holding a leading or major role in world affairs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt’s potentially not a partisan issue or a personality-driven issue, but something that’s an important component of U.S. public sentiment, in terms of how they view their place in the world, or the relative merits of international trade agreements,\u201d says Tombe. \u201cI wouldn’t put any kind of disproportionate burden on Biden’s shoulders in terms of changing the economic relationship between Canada and the U.S., not at all.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Biden has not undone the protectionism that began in the Trump era. With a pandemic in early 2020, and then Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine two years later, the global economy was further rocked by severely disrupted supply chains and a world re-polarized between democracies and authoritarian regimes like Russia and China. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Biden also killed the Keystone XL pipeline and introduced hundreds of billions in tax credits and subsidies on green projects to achieve \u201cNet Zero\u201d carbon emissions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Canada itself has engaged in its own form of incentivizing green projects, with the federal and Ontario provincial governments spending a yet-undisclosed amount of money this year to ensure Volkswagen builds its electric vehicle battery plant in St. Thomas, Ontario. Estimates of the total cost range as high as $10 billion CAD<\/a>, and the project has been received with a mixture of praise and skepticism surrounding the cost and benefits of the plant. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Candice Chow, a professor at McMaster University\u2019s DeGroote School of Business, says the electric vehicle industry would have been an important topic during Biden\u2019s visit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAs the U.S. is seeking to bring jobs back, Canada needs to ensure with its vast natural resources, we do not become a country of commodity export, but secure our ability to take a leadership position in innovation and in green technology,\u201d says Chow. <\/p>\n\n\n\n With the electric vehicle industry growing and requiring new spaces and capabilities, Chow says it’s natural to reshore the industry within Canada. <\/p>\n\n\n\n