The patriotic spending spree that risks leaving us all poorer

A Tesla smashed in London. Shelves cleared of American booze in Canada. Holidays to the US cancelled en masse.

Donald Trump appears to have succeeded in reordering world trade – just not in the way he hoped.

The US president wanted his trade war to trigger lower imports, boost exports and bolster American manufacturing. Instead, an international “buyers’ strike” is emerging as grass roots groups and politicians pledge to buy local and boycott American goods.

The president seems to have forgotten that it is generally businesses and their customers whose decisions dictate large shares of world trade flows, not government diktats. And those customers are distinctly unhappy with claims they and their compatriots are “pathetic” and have “looted, pillaged, raped, and plundered” the US.

Trump’s threats to annex Greenland and make Canada the 51st state, as well as the insults and bitter complaints about allies, have ...
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