The World Trade Organization voted to allow the United States to begin heavily taxing European products shipped to the US in response to findings of illegal government subsidies which Europe has been granting their governments for years. The US plans to implement $7.5 billion worth of tariffs on European goods beginning October 18th, and Europe has threatened to tax $20 billion of US goods in response. Europe has attempted to settle this dispute without bringing additional tariffs upon goods, but that has been unsuccessful thus far. With the US engaging in large scale trade wars now with both China and the European Union, a recession which appears to be looming is only being encouraged to arrive sooner than expected. Not that the EU should be let off for breaking the trade guidelines, but a trade war would appear to not be the best way to address this situation.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/16/useu-trade-war-puts-world-straight-into-a-recession-itc-chief-says.html
It seems to me that the time has come for trade barriers to be broken down, not erected. Unfortunately it seems that not a single player on the international market has this in mind. China does deserve to be tariffed, boycotted, blacklisted, and blockaded for its blatant human rights violations, but Europe needs to learn from example, which the US is not doing a very good job of setting at the moment.
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