Date: Tue, 26 Dec 2006 14:14:57 -0500
Reply-To: Jack R <jack007@COMCAST.NET>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Jack R <jack007@COMCAST.NET>
Subject: Re: Awesome new Westfalia
In-Reply-To: <5.2.0.9.2.20061226133303.03ad9148@mail-hub.optonline.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Time to write your Senator, Congressman etc. Read below...
Ending the "Chicken War": The Case for Abolishing the 25 Percent Truck
Tariff
by Daniel Ikenson
Daniel Ikenson is a policy analyst with Cato's Center for Trade Policy
Studies.
Executive Summary
In 1962, the European Economic Community (EEC) raised tariffs on imported
chicken, effectively shutting U.S. producers out of a growing and lucrative
poultry market. One year later, after failing to resolve the issue
diplomatically, the United States retaliated by boosting tariffs on four
products important to European exporters: potato starch, dextrin, brandy,
and light trucks. The "chicken war" was underway.
Forty years later, the truck tariff still stands at a whopping 25 percent.
While the other retaliatory measures were lifted over the decades, the truck
tariff remains, and nobody quite knows why. It's a policy in search of a
rationale.
The retaliatory purpose of the truck tariff was served. Volkswagen, the
intended target, no longer even produces the vehicles subject to the tariff.
U.S. producers, whom the tariff presumes to protect, dominate the market
regardless of the tariff. Despite the fact that a the large Japanese
nameplate producers manufacture pickup trucks in the United States - a fact
related to the existence of the tariff in the first place - the Big Three
hold 87 percent of the U.S. pickup truck market.
The concern that imports would run roughshod over domestic producers in the
absence of the tariff is hollow. All of the world's major producers are
already operating in the United States. Having made huge investments in U.S.
truck production, they're not about to leave even if the truck tariff were
eliminated. After all, foreign carmakers continue to invest in new U.S.
production facilities even though the duty on automobiles is only 2.5
percent. The bottom line for cars and trucks is that producers want to
manufacture in their biggest markets.
If the truck tariff has any justification at all, it is a bargaining chip in
trade negotiations. But since the major foreign pickup truck producers
already manufacture in the United States, the truck tariff's value as a
bargaining chip is minimal. A U.S. offer to remove the tariff is of limited
commercial value to foreign countries, and thus is unlikely to "buy" too
much in the way of reciprocal market-opening offers.
Meanwhile, the truck tariff actually works to weaken the U.S. bargaining
position by undermining the credibility of overall U.S. trade policy.
Maintaining a tariff peak of 25 percent - almost 10 times the average U.S.
tariff - is unfair to consumers and is jarringly inconsistent with the
general U.S. commitment to open trade and ongoing liberalization of trade
barriers. The truck tariff should be eliminated as soon as possible.
-----Original Message-----
From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of
Tim Demarest
Sent: Tuesday, December 26, 2006 1:35 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Awesome new Westfalia
The 25% tariff imposed on trucks imported to the US may have something to
do with it too... that's going to bump up VWs price point quite a bit. That
gives anything domestically built on a truck chassis a *huge* price
advantage.
If it was a car, it would only get hit with a 2.5% tariff.
Tim
At 10:03 AM 12/20/2006 -0800, Anthony Egeln wrote:
>In speaking with a VW sales manager, he says that VW won't import the
>California here because for what they cost, most Americans would rather
>buy a (bigger) RV instead of a van based camper. I think that when the
>Vanagon Westys were on the market here, there wasn't nearly the variety of
>RVs available as today. The price of fuel must also have something to do
>with the popularity of van based campers in Europe.
>Anthony
>'89 Syncro GL (Hidalgo)
>
>
>Kimmons Anthony <vanagon@ANTHONYKIMMONS.COM> wrote: HA! Of course we have
>the "Eurovan"!
>
>Wondering if there is anything we could do to bring these to this
>market?
>Do any good to write letters? Seems like VW has pretty much abandoned
>this market here.
>Not that I could afford one, but if I start saving now... hmmm??
>
>
>
>
>
>On Dec 19, 2006, at 2:48 PM, Sharon Mendonca wrote:
>
> > Don't you love how the new campers are called "California" and yet
> > they're not available anywhere in the U.S.!!!
> >
> > Sharon Mendonca
> >
>
>
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