Defying Chinese anger and White House warnings, the US Senate was set yesterday to approve legislation to punish China for alleged currency manipulation widely blamed for costing US jobs.
The proposal, powered by a tide of US voter frustration at a sour economy and high unemployment ahead of elections in November next year, envisions retaliatory duties on Chinese exports if the yuan’s value is unfairly “misaligned.”
The Democratic-held Senate was due to approve the measure after 5:30pm, shifting the spotlight to the Republican-led House of Representatives, where Speaker John Boehner has condemned the “dangerous” bill.
“You could start a trade war. And a trade war, given the economic uncertainty here and all around the world — it’s just very dangerous, and we should not be engaged in this,” Boehner said recently.
US President Barack Obama last week stopped well short of backing the legislation and worried it could violate WTO rules even as he mounted an unsparing attack on China’s trade policies.
“China has been very aggressive in gaming the trading system to its advantage and to the disadvantage of other countries, particularly the United States,” he said at a White House press conference.
Few in Washington dispute the charge that China keeps the yuan unfairly low against the US dollar, giving its goods as much as a 30 percent edge over similar US products, widening the US trade deficit and costing US jobs.
However, the measure’s opponents say it risks sparking a trade war with China, and add that a rise in the yuan would boost manufacturing and therefore jobs in countries such as Vietnam or Malaysia — not in the US.
They also say that, if successful, the bill would increase the cost of commodities or consumer goods from China, hurting rather than helping US businesses and families.
The legislation’s backers, an unusual coalition of Democrats and Republicans, have said it is time for Washington to take on Beijing, and say a boost in the yuan would make Chinese workers wealthier and more likely to buy US goods, thus creating jobs and narrowing the trade gap.
They also say that current US law and multinational dispute mechanisms have failed to curb what they call Beijing’s unfair practices, which also include favoring Chinese producers for government contracts and tolerating rampant intellectual piracy.
Republican House leaders have pointed out that the US Department of the Treasury under Obama has refrained from labeling China a currency cheat and said they have no plans to bring the legislation up for a vote, effectively killing it.
However, House aides say it could return to life if the issue somehow became a core dispute as Obama faces off with his as-yet-undetermined Republican foe ahead of next year’s elections.
The bill would empower US businesses and, in some cases, labor unions to trigger a US government investigation into alleged currency manipulation and seek retaliatory duties on the offending country’s exports.
It also aims to make it harder for the US Treasury to stop short of labeling China a currency manipulator and to restrict the White House’s ability to waive the resulting sanctions.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
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