WASHINGTON — How did the U.S. calculate the sweeping “reciprocal tariff” rates announced by President Donald Trump on Wednesday? The method may be more unorthodox than the White House has indicated, according to a Nikkei analysis.
The administration says that it calculated each country’s effective tariff on U.S. goods based on the country’s total “trade barriers” against American products, including currency manipulation, value-added taxes, export subsidies and intellectual property theft. It then divided that number by two to reach its own reciprocal tariff rate.
