Well, I think what’s really striking about this whole tariff policy is not just the sheer stupidity of it, which I think you’ve already highlighted the impact that is taking place in the rich countries, but the fact — the wanton cruelty of it, because the formula that’s used is bizarre. It has nothing to do with the actual kind of protection that these countries afford themselves. But many of them are really the poorest, most debt-stressed, most climate-impacted countries in the world. And to actually attack them in this completely unnecessary way is quite unbelievable.
In my own region, in South Asia, we have Sri Lanka — I’ve just come back from Sri Lanka — Bangladesh, Pakistan, which are facing very, very high tariff rates. They are all struggling with massive debt burden. They can barely generate enough foreign exchange to import the most essential items. They, on top of that, have to pay very, very heavy debt service, and they’ve not really managed significant restructuring. All of them are under IMF programs. And yet, you get then this completely unnecessary, wanton kind of attack on a little bit of foreign exchange that they’re generating, because the U.S. is a major market for all of them.
