Will USMCA Calm Industry Jitters?

摘要

News that House Democrats and the Trump administration have come to an agreement on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) provided a bit of calm in the storm over trade policies that have roiled the construction market since 2017. The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) praised the Dec. 10 announcement, noting that "by modernizing and strengthening free trade with our largest trading partners, the U.S. International Trade Commission predicts [it] will create more than 175,000 new jobs, add about $70 billion to the econ-omy and boost wages for American workers." David Logan, NAHB director of tax policy analysis, says important effects of the deal are providing some level of certainty to U.S. trade policy with key partners and increasing business confidence, which give President Donald Trump "a desperately needed political win," he says. "Otherwise, he pledged on the campaign trail to withdraw from the North American Free Trade Act treaty (NAFTA), if it wasn't renegotiated. The fallback would have been to withdraw before the election to fulfill his campaign promise. That would have been disastrous."