Trade with far off countries can't replace trade with EU

[Oliver Hardy]

I was going to tag this to a thread already going but thought it might get lost....

We are contently told that we can't replace lost EU trade with Africa, Asia, America and so on as they are to far away. Did we not trade with these places a ;lot more before the UK joined the EU, did we not trade with them 400 years ago, yet we can't in the modern world. Yet trade flows the other way, we have Japanese computers, Korean cars and Chinese everything else.

This is a question not a rant!

[PositronicRay]

Nothing to stop us, but trade with the EU used to be easier.

I was talking to an MD of a furniture manufacturer, they have Eastern factories and import loads. But also manfacture in the uk and export loads, China values made in Britain labels.

Madness.

[Rivenink]

Can we make up trading we lost by leaving the European Single Market by increasing trade with the rest of the world?

For many, the answer seems to be "no, we can't".

I can see why myself; there are many challenges to overcome.

Challenges such as:

Tariffs
Local Competition
Differing regulations and standards
Increased shipping costs

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:34

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:35

[Jenny Tailor]

Rivenink said:

Can we make up trading we lost by leaving the European Single Market by increasing trade with the rest of the world?

For many, the answer seems to be "no, we can't".

I can see why myself; there are many challenges to overcome.

Challenges such as:

Tariffs
Local Competition
Differing regulations and standards
Increased shipping costs

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:34

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:35

The EU sell to us more than we sall to them

Answer. Eay - Refuse to buy from them... It will get their attention.

[crankedup5]

We still trade with the EU zone, and we are expanding our trading into ROW. Win Win.

[Gecko1978]

Trade rules mean we have to apply Taff's universally in place of formal trade treaties so a lot of back and forth we could remove all tarrifs but unless others do our exports are then priced out an our domestic market flooded. So trade is tricky

[Dr Jekyll]

Gecko1978 said:

Trade rules mean we have to apply Taff's universally in place of formal trade treaties so a lot of back and forth we could remove all tarrifs but unless others do our exports are then priced out an our domestic market flooded. So trade is tricky

Removing our tariffs wouldn't cause our exports to me any more priced out than they already are, and having more choice at home is a good thing. So many people think the point of trade is exports, when the only purpose of exports is to pay for imports.

[glazbagun]

Oliver Hardy said:

I was going to tag this to a thread already going but thought it might get lost....

We are contently told that we can't replace lost EU trade with Africa, Asia, America and so on as they are to far away. Did we not trade with these places a ;ot more before the UK joined the EU, did we not trade with them 400 years ago, yet we can't in the modern world. Yet trade flows the other way, we have Japanese computers, Korean cars and Chinese everything else.

400 years ago isn't really comparable- trade was far less "free" than it is today, but "our" mercantile empire meant that we dictated to much of the world who got to trade what and with who, which you could do when you controlled their governments. It made our country rich and powerful, but also meant frequent war as other empires and countries would sometimes take exception to this. I say "our country", of course, but decisions were made by the elite to benefit themselves at the expense of other elites.

There is a lot that has been written about mercentalism over the years, but Wiki has a brief description:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_history_of_the_United_Kingdom#The_Age_of_Mercantilism

Today we are free to trade with most countries we want to, however everyone has their own sets of rules, tariffs, etc set to protect their own markets and economies. When we were part of the EU we were inside one set of those rules, now we're outside and so face greater costs and delays with our biggest trading partner.

The contention being made when people say we "can't replace" such trade is that any increased trade we make with the rest of the world due to abandoning EU rules won't be big enough to replace the loss in trade with the EU as the common rules of the EU were designed, in part by ourselves, for a very efficient internal market.

[Rivenink]

Jenny Tailor said:

Rivenink said:

Can we make up trading we lost by leaving the European Single Market by increasing trade with the rest of the world?

For many, the answer seems to be "no, we can't".

I can see why myself; there are many challenges to overcome.

Challenges such as:

Tariffs
Local Competition
Differing regulations and standards
Increased shipping costs

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:34

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:35

The EU sell to us more than we sall to them

Answer. Eay - Refuse to buy from them... It will get their attention.

Yeah... so you think that because we import more from the EU than we export to the EU, that gives us an upperhand. You'd be right if we were the only trading partner for the EU; and we wasn't dependent on those imports.

Further, you think sparking a trade war would both be beneficial to us, and would be something that we would win.

Sheer stupidity.

crankedup5 said:

We still trade with the EU zone, and we are expanding our trading into ROW. Win Win.

This "Win Win" conveniently ignores the fact that trade with the EU is down by more than we've expanded trading to ROW.

Until the trade with the ROW exceeds the lost trade with the EU, we're losing.

[crankedup5]

Rivenink said:

Jenny Tailor said:

Rivenink said:

Can we make up trading we lost by leaving the European Single Market by increasing trade with the rest of the world?

For many, the answer seems to be "no, we can't".

I can see why myself; there are many challenges to overcome.

Challenges such as:

Tariffs
Local Competition
Differing regulations and standards
Increased shipping costs

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:34

Edited by Rivenink on Wednesday 7th December 19:35

The EU sell to us more than we sall to them

Answer. Eay - Refuse to buy from them... It will get their attention.

Yeah... so you think that because we import more from the EU than we export to the EU, that gives us an upperhand. You'd be right if we were the only trading partner for the EU; and we wasn't dependent on those imports.

Further, you think sparking a trade war would both be beneficial to us, and would be something that we would win.

Sheer stupidity.

crankedup5 said:

We still trade with the EU zone, and we are expanding our trading into ROW. Win Win.

This "Win Win" conveniently ignores the fact that trade with the EU is down by more than we've expanded trading to ROW.

Until the trade with the ROW exceeds the lost trade with the EU, we're losing.

Rome wasn’t built in a day.
It takes lots of bricks to build a house and any person expecting a ‘light switch ‘ move from the EU into ROW trading is deluded. The EU is a diminishing World market, the need to access trade deals into emerging economies is obvious for long term prosperity.

[maz8062]

The world, for trade, is split into blocs. There’s the EU, BRICS, North America Alliance etc. A standalone country cannot compete against the blocs which are larger and will generally have their own rules of engagement, which will likely differ from bloc to bloc. The UK cannot hope to satisfy all of the blocs all of the time, so alignment to one always made sense.

We’re out of the EU, the US are not keen and I’m sure we’re not keen to align to the BRICS, so where does that leave us for growth? New Zealand? Australia? Japan?

[paul0843]

crankedup5 said:

We still trade with the EU zone, and we are expanding our trading into ROW. Win Win.

Is that from personal experience?
Are you actually involved in a company that trades or ever have been?

[Dr Jekyll]

maz8062 said:

The world, for trade, is split into blocs. There’s the EU, BRICS, North America Alliance etc. A standalone country cannot compete against the blocs which are larger and will generally have their own rules of engagement, which will likely differ from bloc to bloc. The UK cannot hope to satisfy all of the blocs all of the time, so alignment to one always made sense.

We’re out of the EU, the US are not keen and I’m sure we’re not keen to align to the BRICS, so where does that leave us for growth? New Zealand? Australia? Japan?

You're conflating completely different things. The EU is a customs union, NAFTA is a trade agreement alignment doesn't come into it. The BRICS aren't a bloc at all. Far from standing alone we are now free to reach agreements with all those countries and are well on the way to joining the Trans pacific partnership, (a trade agreement not a customs union).

We already have agreements with the EU, Japan and Australia.

Even before we left the EU we did more trade with the ROW than the REU, the USA being our biggest trading partner. More importantly it's the ROW where the growth is. Every barrier the EU puts up to trade with the ROW is an argument for being outside not inside.

[Ivan stewart]

paul0843 said:

Is that from personal experience?
Are you actually involved in a company that trades or ever have been?

We do a small amount of trade with the EU it’s not quite as easy as the rest of the world , it’s getting easier as we all get used to things being different,
The good thing about it is it makes it harder for casual Illegal and cowboy operators to undercut , for instance it’s made it a more level playing field for haulage companies who play by the rules . And goods are now being taxed and appropriate duties paid which protects U.K. companies from unfair competition..

Edited by Ivan stewart on Thursday 8th December 07:26