Since taking office, Trump has neglected to strengthen ties with Canada and instead focuses on threats of tariffs and economic annexation. As the U.S. and Canada share a vital trade relationship, Canada's response to Trump's rhetoric has become increasingly cautious. The stakes are high due to the economic integration and security arrangements they share. Trump's perception of trade as a zero-sum game misrepresents the nature of trade dynamics, leading to erroneous claims of economic subsidization which can jeopardize the stability and cooperation that benefit both nations.
Trump is a mercantilist obsessed with the balance of trade. He sees commerce as a zero-sum game. In his view, if the US buys more from a country than it sells in return, it's getting ripped off.
We pay hundreds of Billions of Dollars to SUBSIDIZE Canada,” Trump raged on social media in early February. “Why? There is no reason. We don’t need anything they have.”
With a trade relationship worth nearly a trillion dollars a year, a deeply integrated and interoperable defense arrangement, and enduring cultural ties, the disintegration of connections would be cataclysmic—particularly for Canada.
An economic illiterate, Trump's claim that the US subsidizes Canada on trade is nonsense. For one, the 2024 US-Canada trade deficit was $63 billion (US), not hundreds of billions.
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