Since returning to office last month, U.S. President Donald Trump has initiated numerous tariffs and made even more frequent threats to impose levies on imported goods.

Including VAT s in reciprocity would lead to hefty increases in tariffs. Goldman Sachs, a bank, says that if America adopted only mirror-image tariffs without retaliation, its levies would rise by an average of two percentage points. Many European vat rates exceed 20%.

Since the 1960s, tariffs — or import taxes — have emerged from negotiations between dozens of countries. Trump wants to seize the process. “Obviously, it disrupts the way that things have been done for a very long time,