Chart of the week: US protectionism hurts everyone

According to research carried out by the US Federal Reserve (Fed), trade-policy uncertainty in the first half of 2018 lowered the level of global GDP growth by 0.8% into the first six months of 2019. But this uncertainty is hurting Americans most of all, according to research by the National Bureau of Economic Research, which estimates that real (inflation-adjusted) US incomes fell by $1.4 billion per month over the first half of 2018. Shielding a country’s industry from foreign competition through tariffs and other barriers to free trade brings large, ostensible gains to relatively small industries or segments of the population. But at the same time, it delivers a small, hard-to-quantify loss for every member of a large and silent majority. Read more about the economic impact of trade uncertainty in ‘Trade wars’, an article in our latest Investment Insights.