Opinion | Donald Trump’s new tariffs expose one of Canada’s weakness. This is how to fix it - Toronto Star

Paying careful attention to what is tariffed reveals something important. 

President Donald Trump claims he does not need Canadian products. The careful application of tariffs suggests that may not be true, writes Barry Appleton.

Barry Appleton is Interim Director of the Balsillie Legal Advisory Centre at the Balsillie School of International Affairs, Adjunct Professor at Wilfrid Laurier University, Managing Partner of Appleton & Associates International Lawyers LP, and Distinguished Adjunct Professor of Law and Co-Director of the Center for International Law at New York Law School.

There are two ways to read a tariff list. One line at a time, which is how it gets reported, or all at once, which is how it was written.

Read the American one all at once, and it tells you something no line tells you alone.

Canadian aluminum extrusions are on it. So is Canadian structural steel. As of one minute past midnight both carry a second American duty stacked on the first. On extrusions that takes the combined rate past 90 per cent. It was 40 before.

Unwrought aluminum, the metal itself, is not on that list and has never been on it. Canada supplies nearly 60 per cent of what the United States imports.

There is the policy, in two paragraphs. The metal is taxed once. The thing made from the metal is taxed twice.

Once you see it you see it everywhere. Bulk whisky crosses free. The bottle is taxed today and banned on the twenty-ninth, and the line is drawn at four litres. That is the difference between a tanker and a bottle.

Wood in the rough crosses free. Canadian furniture and lighting are taxed across seventy tariff classifications. Ore crosses free. Nothing made from ore does. Rod parts cross free. Finished rods are taxed.

As U.S. tariffs squeeze small businesses, New York tourism from Canada has plummeted, leaving hotels and local shops fighting to survive.