After President Trump and China President Xi Jinping agreed to halt trade tariffs last weekend at a post-G20 meeting in Buenos Aires, we connected with Harlan Stone, founder of the American Consumers & Workers Justice Coalition (ACWJC) and president of the Multilayer Flooring Association (MFA), to get his take on what it means for the industry.
FT: What was your gut reaction to the news?
Stone: Having spent the last week in Washington, my gut reaction was very positive because I think that there's a lot of energy in the Congress to try to protect the American people from any collateral damage from a trade war. What I saw is the president wanting to assert his strength, which is appropriate with a large and powerful country like China. On the other hand, restraint to ensure that the negotiation is indeed a negotiation and that the effects are not inordinately a burden to American consumers, workers and small and medium sized businesses, which is what the law says it should make. So, I'm encouraged. I'm not just reading the headlines. I've been working on this project since July and we've been trying to engage as many of the elected officials as we can and we see a great movement across a bipartisan lines to limit the negative impact on the American economy and particularly consumers and workers in small and medium size businesses. It’s a little bit to me of a David and Goliath [story] and where we are the David and it feels like we're winning.