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Is Trump More Flexible on China Than His Hawkish Cabinet Picks Suggest?

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President-elect Donald J. Trump is assembling a team of aides bent on confrontation with China. But he also has advisers who do business there, including Elon Musk.They are the new class of cold warriors, guns pointed at China.President-elect Donald J. Trump has chosen cabinet secretaries and a national security adviser who stress the need to confront China across the entire security and economic spectrum: military posture, trade, technology, espionage, human rights and Taiwan.Those choices could open a new era of conflict with a nuclear-armed nation that has the world’s largest standing army and second-largest economy, and where many top officials see the United States as a superpower in decline.Mr. Trump’s hawkish advisers so far include Marco Rubio, a Florida senator named as secretary of state; Michael Waltz, a Florida congressman tapped for national security adviser; and Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News television personality designated to be defense secretary. Cabinet secretaries must be confirmed by the Senate, although Mr. Trump has floated the idea of getting around that by using recess appointments.Those men are more explicitly hostile to China than their counterparts in the Biden administration, though President Biden has taken an aggressive tack with China and continued some of the policies from Mr. Trump’s first term. A consensus has solidified among Democrats and Republicans in Washington that China must be constrained because it is the nation most capable of upending American global dominance.Yet there are signs that Mr. Trump might consider a more moderate approach on trade, perhaps to avoid upsetting a roaring stock market nurtured by Mr. Biden.Mr. Trump with President Xi Jinping of China in Beijing in November 2017. Mr. Trump hosted Mr. Xi at Mar-a-Lago earlier that year, but their budding relationship eventually fell apart over a trade war that Mr. Trump started.Doug Mills/The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    After Flurry of Cabinet Picks, Trump Rethinks Candidates for Treasury Secretary

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    President-elect Donald J. Trump is expected to invite the contenders for the role, including Kevin Warsh and Marc Rowan, to Mar-a-Lago this week.President-elect Donald J. Trump is eyeing a new candidate for Treasury Secretary amid internal debate over who should have the role: the former Federal Reserve governor Kevin Warsh.Mr. Trump is also considering the Wall Street billionaire Marc Rowan.Mr. Trump had been expected to pick either Howard Lutnick, the chief executive of the Wall Street firm Cantor Fitzgerald, or Scott Bessent, the founder of the investment firm Key Square Capital Management and a former money manager for George Soros. And he had been seen as likely to make the selection late last week.But he has been having second thoughts about the top two candidates, and has slowed down his selection process. He is expected to invite the contenders to interview with him this week at Mar-a-Lago.Mr. Lutnick, who has been running Mr. Trump’s transition operation, has gotten on Mr. Trump’s nerves lately. Mr. Trump has privately expressed frustration that Mr. Lutnick has been hanging around him too much and that he has been manipulating the transition process for his own ends. A person familiar with the process, who spoke on condition of anonymity, described the battle between Mr. Lutnick and Mr. Bessent as a knife fight, with Mr. Lutnick as the primary aggressor.Mr. Bessent is said to still be under consideration, and has also been raised by people in Mr. Trump’s economic circles as a possible contender to lead the White House’s National Economic Council. Elon Musk, a close adviser to the president-elect, on Sunday called Mr. Bessent a “business-as-usual” choice for Treasury secretary in a post on his social media platform, X, while throwing his support behind Mr. Lutnick.Mr. Trump and Mr. Lutnick met on Sunday, and it wasn’t immediately clear what came of the discussion, according to two people briefed on the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss personnel matters. Mr. Bessent has also met with Mr. Trump. The other two — as well as any other new names that emerge — are likely to be asked to meet with Mr. Trump this week, according to one of the people briefed on the matter.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Biden and China: Administration Rethinks Relations

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    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential InaugurationHighlightsPhotos From the DayBiden’s SpeechWho Attended?Biden’s Long RoadAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBiden on ‘Short Leash’ as Administration Rethinks China RelationsThe Biden administration is under intense pressure to maintain former President Donald J. Trump’s curbs on China, even as it tries to develop a more comprehensive and effective strategy.President Biden faces an enormous challenge in trying to formulate a strategy to deal with China at a time when much of Washington treats any relations with Beijing as toxic.Credit…Doug Mills/The New York TimesFeb. 17, 2021, 2:22 p.m. ETWASHINGTON — Biden administration officials have tried to project a tough line on China in their first weeks in office, depicting the authoritarian government as an economic and security challenge to the United States that requires a far more strategic and calculated approach than that of the Trump administration.They have also tried to send a message: While the administration will be staffed by many familiar faces from the Obama administration, China policy will not revert to what it was a decade ago.These early efforts have not concealed the enormous challenge President Biden faces in trying to formulate a strategy to deal with China at a time when any relations with Beijing are treated as thoroughly toxic in Washington. Political adversaries, including Republican lawmakers, have already begun scrutinizing the statements of Mr. Biden’s advisers, ready to pounce on any effort to roll back President Donald J. Trump’s punishments, including tariffs and bans on exporting technology.Ted Cruz, the Republican senator from Texas, has placed a hold on the confirmation of Gina Raimondo, Mr. Biden’s nominee for commerce secretary, delaying a vote on her confirmation, for declining to explicitly commit to keeping the Chinese telecom company Huawei on a national security blacklist. Some Republican lawmakers have also criticized Linda Thomas-Greenfield, Mr. Biden’s pick for U.N. ambassador, for giving a speech at a Confucius Institute, an organization some have described as disseminating Chinese propaganda, and painting a rosy picture of China’s activities in Africa.Several Republicans, including Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, also put out statements last week criticizing a move by the Biden administration to withdraw a rule proposed during the Trump administration that would require universities to disclose their financial ties to Confucius Institutes, organizations set up to teach Chinese language and culture in American schools.“The Biden administration is going to be on a very short leash with respect to doing anything that is perceived as giving China a break,” said Wendy Cutler, a vice president at the Asia Society Policy Institute and a former U.S. trade negotiator.Mr. Trump’s supporters credit him with taking a far more aggressive approach than his predecessors to policing China, including dusting off many rarely used policy tools. That includes placing major tariffs on Chinese goods, limiting Beijing’s access to sensitive American technology exports, imposing sanctions on Chinese officials and companies over human rights violations and securing economic concessions from China as part of a trade deal.But Mr. Trump’s critics, including many in the Biden administration, say his spate of executive orders and other actions were inconsistent and piecemeal, and often more symbolic than effective.Even as Mr. Trump issued harsh punishments on some fronts, he also extended a lifeline to the Chinese telecom company ZTE, delayed sanctions related to human rights violations in China’s Xinjiang region and publicly flattered President Xi Jinping of China as he sought his trade deal. Many of the executive actions Mr. Trump took against China were left incomplete, or were riddled with loopholes.And his policies may have worsened American competitiveness in some areas, according to a report published Wednesday by the consulting firm Rhodium Group and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce China Center. The report found steep costs from the kind of economic “decoupling” that Mr. Trump pursued, including a $190 billion annual loss in American economic output by 2025 if all U.S.-China trade was subject to the type of 25 percent tariff that Mr. Trump imposed on $250 billion of Chinese goods.Daniel Rosen, a founding partner at Rhodium Group, said the Biden administration needed to consider more than politics or ideology when forging China policy, including carefully weighing the cost of its approach to industry.“Obviously politics is king right here in this moment, with nobody in leadership or aspiring to leadership wanting to get outflanked on who is tough on China,” he said. “We’re not going to serve the American interests if we don’t consider commercial interests and national security interests at the same time.”The Biden administration has argued that by being more strategic in how it addresses China, it will ultimately be more effective than the Trump administration. It has laid out an ambitious task as it looks to not only crack down on China for what it sees as unfair trade practices but also develop a national strategy that helps build up America’s economic position to better counter Chinese competition.Speaking at the Atlantic Council in late January, Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, said the United States first needed to “refurbish the fundamental foundations of our democracy” by dealing with issues like economic and racial inequity, as well as making investments in emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, quantum computing and clean energy.Mr. Biden has also emphasized the importance of working with allies and international institutions to impose a tougher global stance, so companies do not sidestep strict American rules by taking their operations offshore.Mr. Biden held his first call with Mr. Xi on Feb. 10, in which he talked about preserving a free and open Indo-Pacific and shared concerns about Beijing’s economic and human rights practices, according to a White House readout.In a town hall-style forum broadcast by CNN on Tuesday night, Mr. Biden, who knows Mr. Xi well from meetings during the Obama administration, said he had taken a tough line on human rights and other issues during their two-hour call.“There will be repercussions for China, and he knows that,” Mr. Biden said. “What I’m doing is making clear that we, in fact, are going to continue to reassert our role as spokespersons for human rights at the U.N. and other — other agencies that have an impact on their attitude.”Mr. Biden has begun staffing his cabinet with officials who have deep experience with China. Katherine Tai, the Biden administration’s nominee for trade representative, was in charge of litigating cases against China at the World Trade Organization during the Obama administration, and has promised to take a tough line on enforcing American trade rules.President Donald J. Trump criticizing the government of China in May at the White House. Mr. Trump’s supporters credit him with taking a far more aggressive approach than his predecessors to policing China.Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York TimesMr. Biden’s top foreign policy advisers have also espoused views critical of China’s practices, though many see potential for cooperation on issues like the coronavirus pandemic and climate change. That includes Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, Mr. Sullivan and Kurt Campbell, the National Security Council’s “Asia czar.”Ms. Raimondo, the commerce secretary nominee, will also have purview over economic relations with China, particularly those related to technology. While she had harsh words for China during her confirmation hearing, her refusal to commit to keeping Huawei on a government blacklist drew criticism from Republican lawmakers like Mr. Cruz.Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen, who is expected to play a pivotal role in relations with China, took a hawkish tone at her confirmation hearing last month, vowing to use the “full array” of America’s tools to combat “illegal, unfair and abusive” practices. She has also criticized China’s practices of stealing intellectual property and subsidizing state-owned enterprises, but said she did not regard Mr. Trump’s tariffs as “the proper focus” of trade policy.The new administration has given few concrete details about how it will put its strategy into practice, including whether it will implement the many China-related executive orders Mr. Trump introduced, like new restrictions on investments in Chinese companies with ties to the military and bans on Chinese-owned apps, like TikTok, WeChat and Alipay. Instead, the administration has said it would carry out a comprehensive review of Mr. Trump’s tariffs, export controls and other restrictions before making decisions.Another uncertainty is how Mr. Biden and his team will handle Mr. Trump’s initial trade deal with China given that Beijing continues to fall short of its promise to buy hundreds of billions of dollars in American products. The administration may face the choice of using the deal’s enforcement mechanisms — which include consultations and more tariffs for Chinese products — or scrapping the agreement altogether.Scott Kennedy, a senior adviser in Chinese business and economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said the Biden administration had clear foreign policy goals and a large toolbox of measures at its disposal, but had not yet “figured out how to merge strategy and tactics.”On American competitiveness with China, “there’s a much larger conversation that needs to be had,” Mr. Kennedy said. “Are they going to be willing to engage in that conversation and do that thorough analysis and come up with something new? Or are they going to be fearful of political backlash and pull their punches?”Mr. Biden’s plan to engage more closely with U.S. allies to put pressure on China may also be easier said than done.In an interview in January, shortly before he left office, Robert Lighthizer, Mr. Trump’s top trade official, pointed to a recent investment agreement the European Union signed with China, against the wishes of the Biden administration, as “the first piece of evidence” that such multilateral cooperation would be difficult.Chinese officials are already strengthening ties with U.S. allies like New Zealand and South Korea in an effort “to divide and conquer,” Ms. Cutler said.China has emerged from the early stages of the pandemic emboldened, with its factories and businesses outpacing those in the United States and Europe, where the coronavirus continues to hamper the economy. While Chinese leaders are seeking to reset relations with Washington after a tumultuous period under Mr. Trump, they have continued to make sometimes hard-edge statements.In an interview with CBS News on Feb. 7, Mr. Biden said the two countries “need not have a conflict. But there’s going to be extreme competition.”“I’m not going to do it the way Trump did,” Mr. Biden added. “We’re going to focus on international rules of the road.”Alan Rappeport More

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    Biden Appointments Signal a Trade Approach That Hews to the Left

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    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential InaugurationHighlightsPhotos From the DayBiden’s SpeechWho Attended?Biden’s Long RoadAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBiden Appointments Signal a Trade Approach That Hews to the LeftMany appointees who will fill the ranks of the Office of the United States Trade Representative have close ties to congressional Democrats and a focus on worker rights and enforcing trade deals.Several new appointees have worked closely with Katherine Tai, the Biden administration’s nominee for United States trade representative.Credit…Hilary Swift for The New York TimesFeb. 8, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ETWASHINGTON — The Biden administration announced a number of personnel appointments on Monday for the Office of the United States Trade Representative with close ties to the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, in a signal that the new administration is likely to pursue what it calls a “worker focused” approach to trade.Biden officials have said they want to seek a trade policy that benefits economically disadvantaged Americans. But it has remained unclear whether the administration would cater more to unions and the left wing of the party, which emphasize strong labor rights and trade rules that protect American workers, or to the moderate Democrats, who typically prefer lower trade barriers and a freer approach to trade.The personnel appointments, which were first viewed by The New York Times, are one of the strongest signs yet that the Biden administration is seeking to take a different approach to trade policy than past Democratic administrations, which focused more on promoting American exports and geopolitical influence through striking trade deals. Mr. Biden, by contrast, has said he does not intend to begin negotiating new free-trade agreements until his administration has helped to subdue the coronavirus pandemic and made major investments in American industry and infrastructure.Instead, his trade staff may focus more on ensuring that American trade rules are adequately enforced and that they promote rather than impede other parts of Mr. Biden’s agenda, including fighting climate change and encouraging domestic investment. The picks include several key staff members to congressional Democrats who helped to revise and pass the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. That suggests that a major task in the coming months will be ensuring that the North American Free Trade Agreement’s successor, which raises labor standards and requires new unions at Mexican factories, is fully put in place and enforced.The team will also have to decide what to do about the legacy of higher trade barriers and large tariffs on a variety of foreign products, including goods from China, left behind by President Donald J. Trump. Mr. Biden has said his administration is still reviewing the effects of those tariffs and other trade policies issued by Mr. Trump. But on Feb. 1, Mr. Biden reinstated tariffs on aluminum from the United Arab Emirates, a move that pleased unions but disappointed industries that have argued that the tariffs raise costs.Several of the appointees worked closely with Katherine Tai, the Biden administration’s nominee for United States trade representative, on revising the new North American trade deal, which was negotiated by the Trump administration and replaced NAFTA last year.That includes Nora Todd, a former adviser for Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, who will serve as chief of staff, and Greta Peisch, a former counsel to Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, who has been appointed general counsel. Shantanu Tata, a former adviser to Representative Suzan DelBene of Washington, will serve as executive secretary and adviser, and Samuel Negatu, a former legislative director for Representative Jimmy Gomez of California, will serve as director of congressional affairs.Other appointments include Sirat K. Attapit, who previously worked for Attorney General Xavier Becerra of California, as assistant U.S. trade representative for intergovernmental affairs, and Adam Hodge, a former Obama administration official, as assistant trade representative for media and public affairs. Jan Beukelman, a staff member for Senator Thomas R. Carper of Delaware, will serve as assistant U.S. trade representative for congressional affairs, while Jamila Thompson, who served on the staff of Representative John Lewis of Georgia, will be senior adviser.The administration also named Brad Setser, an Obama administration Treasury official, as counselor to the U.S. trade representative. Mr. Setser has written extensively on the role of both currency and taxation in trade, suggesting that the new administration could take a more expansive view on changing tax and currency policy to boost American exports and benefit workers.Mark Wu, a professor and vice dean at Harvard Law School with an extensive background in intellectual property, digital trade issues and China, was appointed as senior adviser to the U.S. trade representative. In the position, he could help the office create new trade rules to govern the digital economy and constrain trade practices from China that the United States deems unfair.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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    Biden Outlines $1.9 Trillion Spending Package to Combat Virus and Downturn

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    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Coronavirus OutbreakliveLatest UpdatesMaps and CasesA Future With CoronavirusVaccine InformationF.A.Q.TimelineAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBiden Outlines $1.9 Trillion Spending Package to Combat Virus and DownturnThe president-elect detailed plans for an initial effort to fight the coronavirus and a subsequent one to address economic recovery.President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. on Thursday unveiled a $1.9 trillion spending package aimed at combating the health and economic crises of the coronavirus pandemic.Credit…Amr Alfiky/The New York TimesJim Tankersley and Published More

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    Even With $900 Billion Stimulus, Biden Faces Fragile Economy

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    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential TransitionliveLatest UpdatesElectoral College ResultsBiden’s CabinetInaugural DonationsAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story$900 Billion Won’t Carry Biden Very FarDespite new pandemic aid, he confronts an economic crisis unlike any since he last entered office in 2009. And political headwinds have only stiffened.The challenges greeting President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. rival those of the Great Recession, when he became vice president.Credit…Amr Alfiky/The New York TimesJan. 4, 2021Updated 5:48 p.m. ETWith his presidential inauguration just weeks away, Joseph R. Biden Jr. is confronting an economic crisis that is utterly unparalleled and yet eerily familiar.Millions of Americans are out of work, small businesses are struggling to survive, hunger is rampant, and people across the country fear getting kicked out of their homes. The moment was similarly perilous exactly 12 years ago, when Mr. Biden was the vice president-elect and preparing to take office.“I remember the utter terror,” said Cecilia Rouse, who was an economic adviser in the Obama White House and has been chosen to lead Mr. Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers.The $900 billion pandemic relief plan that moderate lawmakers powered through Congress last month provides the incoming administration with some breathing room. This second tier of aid will deliver $600 stimulus checks, assist small businesses and extend federal unemployment benefits through mid-March.But as Mr. Biden has made clear, it is simply a “down payment” — a brief bridge to get through a dark winter and not nearly enough to restore the economy’s health.Roughly 19 million people are receiving some type of unemployment benefit, and many business owners wonder whether they will be able to survive the year. The coronavirus crisis has worsened longstanding inequalities, with workers at the lower end of the income spectrum — who are disproportionately Black and Hispanic — bearing the brunt of the pain.At the same time, bottlenecks in the Covid-19 vaccines’ rollout as well as fears about a much more transmissible variant of the virus could further delay the revival of large swaths of the economy like restaurants, travel, live entertainment and sports.“We are in for some choppy waters, even as we continue to get to the other side of the pandemic,” Ms. Rouse said.Yet despite the scorched earth left by the coronavirus, the economy is on a more stable footing in several ways than it was at the start of 2009.Instead of hurtling down a hole with no clear view of the bottom, Mr. Biden is taking office when the economy is on an upward trajectory. However anemic the growth, most analysts predict that 2021 will end better than it began even if there are stumbles along the way.While this pandemic-related recession was larger in terms of initial job losses and closings, it is what Ms. Rouse labeled “collateral damage” from a health emergency and not a crack in the underlying global financial system.“Now we know what to do: Provide the kind of social safety net for households, businesses and communities so they can get to the other side of the pandemic intact,” Ms. Rouse said.The Biden administration will also focus on attacking the deep-rooted inequalities that this crisis aggravated, she added.Volunteers distributing food donations in Bradenton, Fla. Four million U.S. workers have been unemployed for at least six months.Credit…Eve Edelheit for The New York TimesA closed flower shop in Tampa, Fla. The pandemic has shut down more businesses than the Great Recession did.Credit…Eve Edelheit for The New York TimesAdding to the positive side of the ledger, many households have socked away money, lifting the savings rate to a 40-year high. In contrast, the Great Recession razed storehouses of wealth, in retirement accounts and homes, virtually overnight.“Walking in this time, there is at least a cushion,” said Jason Furman, who led President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers and is now an economist at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.The Presidential TransitionLatest UpdatesUpdated Jan. 4, 2021, 6:43 p.m. ETSenator Kelly Loeffler of Georgia says she will join the vote to overturn Biden’s electors.The leader of the far-right Proud Boys was arrested in Washington.In Georgia, Jon Ossoff warns Trump not to ‘mess with our voting rights.’But if the Biden administration will have a bit more running room on the economy, it is likely to have a lot less politically than Mr. Obama did in the first two years of his presidency, when his party controlled both houses of Congress.If the Democrats retake control of the Senate by winning both seats in the Georgia runoff election on Tuesday, Mr. Biden’s path will be much easier. Otherwise, the new president will have to deal with a Republican Senate led by Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who has stymied legislation from the Democratic-controlled House.In that case, the administration will have an uphill slog persuading lawmakers to approve more aid when this round ends. With a Democrat headed for the Oval Office, many Republicans who put aside their concerns about debt when it came to cutting taxes in 2017 have rediscovered their inner deficit hawk.Mr. McConnell successfully resisted President Trump’s calls — echoed by Democrats — to increase the latest stimulus payments to $2,000 from $600.The failure to extend or expand federal aid when it expires this spring not only would cause significant hardships and needless suffering but could seriously scar the economy, said Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize-winning economist.Even though economic activity will most likely be on an upswing, the economy will remain weakened, Mr. Stiglitz said. Eviction moratoriums and mortgage forbearance have prevented families from losing their homes, but their housing debt has been accumulating even if it has not yet shown up on household balance sheets.Covid-19 vaccinations are crucial to getting the economy back on track.Credit…Alex Welsh for The New York TimesA coronavirus testing site in Los Angeles. Cities and states also have a big role to play in distributing vaccines. Credit…Alex Welsh for The New York TimesMany small businesses, particularly in the hard-hit service sector, which has been a source of low-wage jobs, will not survive. Economic inequality will increase.“There’s been a lot of long-term damage,” Mr. Stiglitz said.At the same time, the ranks of workers who have been unemployed for six months or longer have swelled to more than four million, increasing the chances that they may never find another job. Growing numbers of men and women are also dropping out of the labor force altogether.None of those problems can really begin to be addressed without widely distributing the vaccines and reopening the schools so that parents, particularly mothers, can return to the work force.That is why economists say that funneling direct aid to state and local governments is so crucial.“That sector has been gutted,” said Abigail Wozniak, a labor economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, but it “is the sector that allows all the other sectors to operate.”States and localities will play a critical role in the vaccine rollout and in providing emergency medical personnel. They will also be responsible for sending teachers back to classrooms that are safe, and helping disadvantaged students regain lost ground.Senate Republicans have been dead set against providing that kind of direct aid. Mr. McConnell has criticized it as a “blue-state bailout,” even though many red and blue states — and rural areas in particular — have lost revenues and public sector jobs.Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican majority leader, has opposed direct aid to state and local governments.Credit…Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesEconomists say Congress and the White House must recognize the differences as well as the similarities between the pandemic and the Great Recession.Credit…Stefani Reynolds for The New York TimesEconomists on the right and left agree that while there are echoes from the Great Recession, there are also important distinctions. Restoring the economy this time, they warn, will require a kind of economic serenity prayer: recognizing the similarities, identifying the contrasts, and having the wisdom to know the difference.For Michael R. Strain, an economist at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, the economy has repaired itself more quickly than expected. He worries that some aid proposals, particularly those that prop up specific industries, would keep some dying businesses alive and “slow down the process of adjustment to a new post-virus economy.“The faster that process happens, the faster the economy heals,” Mr. Strain said.Many liberal economists, though, including those on the Biden team, warn against ignoring a crucial lesson from the last recession: Failing to move quickly to provide sufficient money to the people and businesses that need it can damage the economy far into the future.Brian Deese, whom Mr. Biden has picked to lead the National Economic Council, where he worked as an assistant during the Obama administration, said making public investments was necessary to ensure economic growth.“We’re in a moment where the risk of doing too little outweighs the risk of doing too much,” he said.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

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    How Biden Can Move His Economic Agenda Without Congress

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    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential TransitionliveLatest UpdatesElectoral College ResultsBiden’s CabinetDefense SecretaryAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyHow Biden Can Move His Economic Agenda Without CongressUnion leaders and policy experts say the next administration could do plenty on behalf of workers through regulation and other powers.President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. may be able to achieve his goals on labor policy even without a cooperative Congress.Credit…Hilary Swift for The New York TimesDec. 15, 2020, 9:00 a.m. ETPresident-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s ability to reshape the economy through legislation hinges in large part on the outcome of the two Georgia runoffs in January that will decide control of the Senate. But even without a cooperative Congress, his administration will be able to act on its agenda of raising workers’ standard of living and creating good jobs by taking a series of unilateral actions under existing law.“If you pay attention to what Trump did and go about it from a different viewpoint, you can accomplish a lot,” said Thomas M. Conway, the president of the United Steelworkers union. Much of this work will fall to the incoming labor secretary, whose department has the authority to issue regulations and initiate enforcement actions that could affect millions of workers and billions of dollars in income.Mr. Biden’s labor secretary could substantially expand eligibility for time-and-a-half overtime pay. In 2016, the Obama administration extended that eligibility to salaried workers making less than about $47,500 a year, but a federal court suspended the Obama rule, and President Trump’s Labor Department set the cutoff at roughly $35,500 rather than continue to appeal. The Biden administration could make millions more salaried workers eligible for time-and-a-half overtime pay by reviving or expanding the Obama criterion and defending it in court.The Labor Department will also have an opportunity to fill several monitoring and enforcement positions created under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement that are likely to go unfilled during the Trump administration. The accord, a revision of the North American Free Trade Agreement, allows the United States to block imports from facilities in Mexico that curtail workers’ rights to unionize and bargain collectively. Pursued aggressively, the enforcement could help mitigate downward pressure on U.S. manufacturing wages stemming from unfair competition with Mexico.Mr. Biden’s Labor Department is likely to be more assertive in a variety of other enforcement efforts than its predecessor, which ended an Obama-era policy of typically trying to collect double the amount of wages that lawbreaking employers failed to pay workers under minimum-wage or overtime requirements.“Just getting back wages in small amounts doesn’t provide any incentives for companies to comply,” said Catherine Ruckelshaus, general counsel of the National Employment Law Project, which has ties to the Biden transition team. The Biden administration is likely to revive the Obama approach.Revisiting Labor RulesUnion membership, which has dropped to 10 percent of U.S. workers from roughly double that figure in the early 1980s, could receive a significant boost during the Biden administration, which has signaled that it intends to work closely with the labor movement.Under Mr. Biden, the National Labor Relations Board is likely to be far more aggressive in punishing employers that appear to break the law while fighting union campaigns. It can issue a regulation making it easier for the employees of contractors and franchises to hold parent companies accountable for violations of their labor rights, such as firing workers who try to unionize.According to Benjamin I. Sachs, a Harvard Law School professor, the board could also seize on a legal provision that allows the federal government to cede jurisdiction to the states for regulating labor in certain industries. That could enable a state like California or Washington to create an arrangement in which gig workers, with the help of a union, negotiate with companies over wages and benefits on an industrywide basis in that state, a process known as sectoral bargaining.Under such a system, a union would have to show support from a fraction of workers in the industry, such as 15 or 20 percent, to be able to negotiate with multiple gig companies on behalf of all workers. By contrast, under federal law, the union would typically have to win majority support among the workers it sought to represent, a daunting challenge in a high-turnover industry like gig work.Other labor experts, like Wilma B. Liebman, who led the labor board in the Obama administration, affirm that the board can cede its authority to states but are more skeptical that it would do so in the case of gig workers.Helping Home-Care WorkersThe federal government, through its control of the Medicaid program, could accomplish something similar for home-care workers, who usually work independently or for small agencies that have little power to raise pay because states set the rates for their services. The agencies sometimes resist union campaigns aggressively for fear that allowing workers to bargain for higher wages will put them at a competitive disadvantage.A handful of Democratic-leaning states, like Washington, have addressed this issue by allowing workers to bargain with the state for rate increases that effectively apply industrywide, eliminating the downside that a single agency would face if it raised wages unilaterally.The Service Employees International Union, which represents home-care workers across the country, believes that the Biden administration could encourage other states to create such industrywide bargaining arrangements — for example, by making additional money available to states that adopt this approach. Hundreds of thousands of additional home-care workers could benefit.The federal government, under a provision in the Medicaid law that requires states to keep payments high enough to ensure an adequate supply of home-care workers, could also intervene directly to raise wages and benefits for these workers.“We look forward to working with the Biden administration to make changes to the Medicaid program that can turn home-care jobs into good union jobs,” said Mary Kay Henry, the president of the service employees union.The Presidential TransitionLatest UpdatesUpdated Dec. 15, 2020, 6:45 p.m. ETBiden will name Gina McCarthy as the White House’s climate coordinator.Dominion’s C.E.O. defends his firm’s voting machines to Michigan lawmakers, denouncing a ‘reckless disinformation campaign.’Biden will nominate Jennifer Granholm for energy secretary.Using Federal Contract CloutOutside of specific agencies like the Labor Department, the Biden administration will have considerable leverage over the working conditions of the roughly five million workers employed by federal contractors and subcontractors.President Barack Obama signed executive orders raising the minimum wage for these workers to $10.10 an hour and entitling them to at least seven days a year of paid sick leave. Mr. Biden could raise the minimum wage for contractors much further — some are urging $15 an hour — while also mandating that they receive paid family leave and paid vacation days, as proposed by Heidi Shierholz, a senior Labor Department official under Mr. Obama.Mr. Biden could also use the federal government’s buying power to create more domestic manufacturing jobs, a goal he highlighted during the campaign. One approach would be to sign an executive order laying the groundwork for a Buy Clean program of the sort that California introduced in 2017.Under the program, contractors bidding on state infrastructure projects, like steel makers and glassmakers, must adhere to a certain standard for so-called embodied emissions, essentially the amount of carbon emitted when the material is produced, transported and used in construction. Tighter limits tend to favor domestic manufacturers over competitors in countries, like China, that are farther away and where production is often less environmentally friendly.“The incoming administration has broad power to put forth an idea like Buy Clean,” said Mike Williams, deputy director of the BlueGreen Alliance, a coalition of unions and environmental groups. That includes establishing a way to measure emissions and creating a database in which manufacturers are required to disclose them.Promoting Job CreationWhile existing law requires the federal government to favor domestic suppliers in procurement, a variety of waivers allow agencies to award contracts to overseas companies. Mr. Biden noted during the campaign that the Defense Department spent billions on foreign construction contracts in 2018, and he has pledged to close such loopholes.The most aggressive version of this approach would be to revoke a broad waiver that allows agencies to treat purchases from dozens of countries with which the United States has trade relations — including Japan, Mexico and many in Europe — as though they were made in America. Mr. Biden has indicated that he is more likely to try to negotiate new rules with trading partners to address this issue.The Biden administration could also instruct contracting officers to broaden the criteria they use to assess bids. A set of contracting rules laid out in a 1984 law, along with Washington’s growing preoccupation with spending cuts in recent decades, led administrations of both parties to focus on seeking the lowest upfront price.But the Biden administration could elevate value over price — under the same logic that says a $30,000 Cadillac may be a better deal than a $25,000 Ford Focus. The approach would favor companies whose workers are better paid but also better trained and more productive than competitors’.Mr. Biden could set some of these changes in motion through an executive order stating that federal agencies should focus more on quality and working conditions when assessing value. But because executing many of these shifts would be a question of day-to-day management rather than sweeping changes, some policy experts have proposed that the Biden White House create a dedicated office to oversee procurement across the administration.Anastasia Christman, an expert on government contracting at the National Employment Law Project, compares the idea to the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives that George W. Bush created in the early 2000s, whose goal was to scour the federal bureaucracy for ways that religious organizations could compete for government funds. In this case, Ms. Christman said, the objective would be to ensure that contracting officers across agencies are using the right criteria in awarding contracts.“It would help contracting offices think differently about how to do the assessment,” Ms. Christman said. “How do you ask right kind of follow-up questions? Why is this bid lower than all others? 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    Biden Picks Katherine Tai as Trade Representative

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    #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential TransitionLatest UpdatesFormal Transition BeginsBiden’s CabinetDefense SecretaryElection ResultsAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyBiden Picks Katherine Tai as Trade RepresentativeMs. Tai, a chief trade lawyer in the House, has extensive experience with China and played a key role in hammering out the new North American Free Trade Agreement.Katherine Tai appeared before the House Ways and Means Committee last year. If confirmed, Ms. Tai would be the first woman of color to serve as U.S. trade representative.Credit…C-SPANPublished More