Big conversation about policy over China. Joining us now to discuss as the former World Bank President David moultpas, David, good morning. It's going to see as always good morning. Everybody has the spread between sound economic policy and the kind of campaign promises that get you elected. Has it ever been wider?
Well, there's a huge fight over what we should do in which way should we should go. So that's a wide divide from the market standpoint. I think they take it with a grain salt and say we're going to figure out a way to get through this. So bottom line comes out to earnings. You know, we know that old game, how do you make money within a within a volatile environment? And I think the markets are showing they're able to do that. Plus they've got the FED
put behind them. We have to realize what's going on. As markets get dicey, the FED steps in and so that changes really the value of everything and addresses what Lisa is talking about the on the bond yield.
Before we get to the economic bank, drop, just want to spend a bit of time talking about specific policies. Can we talk about Nippon Steele. Nippon Steele to us is a great example of where we are right now in this country. It feels like there's a big divide between doing the right thing and doing the kind of
thing that gets you elected. Nippon Steele, We're talking about a Japanese ally looking to take over a US company, and no one on the campaign trail wants to entertain it because they know if they do, they won't win the election in November. How problematic is that because that doesn't feel isolated, that feels like policy across the country.
Yeah, and it's a excuse me, a change in the US direction of inviting foreign investment into the US. But it's a Biden administration really pushing that. I've been disappointed in that they're the ones with the hand on the steering wheel right now and moving away from inviting foreign investment.
But let me change gears. There's a giant problem in the world with the playing field not being level, and so this is going to be a fight that goes into future years, and it's both parties trying to figure out where the US wants to be in that fight. So I think there's got to be a lot of work done on what do we want in terms of foreign investment? Into the US and into certain sectors and industries, David.
When it comes to nip on steel, the Biden administration is taking this approach because they were pushed there, and they were pushed there by Trump, who in January of this year said I would block that deal. Then Biden Harris had to come out and basically get behind Trump because it's an election year. Don't you think that the former president is also an individual that, if given this choice, would block that decision.
He's got views and he's a leader, and so what you're basically saying is Biden is following the leader and Vice President Harris is following the leader. That's not a good position for the US to be in if it's trying to lead in the world. That's one of the problems going on in the world is the vacuum of leadership from the US and the world is really to look at that in each of the forum, what are we going to do when the US is not really showing where it's going to go.
I love to also get your thoughts on one policy proposal Trump continuously talks about, so Republicans, when Kamala Harris came out, was talking about price gouging across the board for groceries. Republicans were all saying, she's a communist. This is price controls. What's the difference between that and capping interest rates on credit cards, which was a Bernie Sanders policy proposal. Now Trump's saying they should do it too.
I'm not in favor of all of of those, but price controls, as described by VP Harris, we're sweeping, and that's just not a good answer to what you're going to do about inflation. You've got to have some answer that talks about more production, and that's what President Trump did. I think that's the better approach. If VP Harris is asked about inflation the next time, I hope she doesn't talk about the middle class, and maybe she can just say, look, I'm going to try to have our economy, the private
sector of the United States produce a lot more. That's the way to deal with inflation. And she's just not saying that. She's got the government pushed into the middle of every part of the US markets.
You said that the US needs leadership and clear leadership in terms of what his positions are in certain places. I'm just wondering, do you have a clear sense of how to weigh national security versus letting fare and free trade and business. What that looks like under Trump, I don't know.
Under Trump, I know that issue. So starting in the nineteen eighties, there was a big push in discussion of whether what was industrial policy, how far did you want to go? There was the beginnings of SCIFIUS, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. I was at the Treasury Department at the time and substantially involved in that, and there was lots of discussion of what is our national security and within the US government, how do we
balance the various interests. So the Treasury Department is the chair of the SCIPHIUS, and that keeps a balance between the Commerce Department, which wants to export and wants to not or tended to, and the Defense Department, which often wanted to block. And so that kind of debate has been with US for a long time. It needs to be really worked out among leaders within the US as
the decisions come down. In the nineteen eighties, it was Fairchild Semiconductor, it was France's investment in the US, in Japan's investment in the US that were really causing political tensions in the US. So it's not such a new thing now, it's just got to be discussed really from this standpoint of what's our national interest, there's.
Also a sense of knowing who our friends are. What does front shoring mean when we try to change up our supply chain. Donald Trump recently said that if Deer leaves the US and moves some of its production to Mexico. This he said, I'm just notifying John Dear right now. If you do that, we're putting a two hundred percent tariff on everything that you want to sell into the United States. Do you have a clear sense of who our friends are under Donald Trump versus under Kamala Harris.
Well, we know that to Trump, it's going to be American workers. So and he's going to use more tools and tools more strongly stated than what the Biden Harris administration has been doing. So that's the big challenge of how do you really enter a world negotiation where the trading system is broken, the foreign investment system is really broken because in part because China is not following the rules and is the intellectual property problem is still with us.
And so we see in each of these areas there's got to be a balancing. I'm back to the same thing. What's the nation interest and how do we do the best job for workers in the US.
Well, well LEASA is talking about is Mexico. So is Trump basically trying to ditch the USNCA that he negotiated under his first term.
I know what he negotiated was a very strong agreement. It's not being fully implemented and Mexico has walked away from some of the principles of that. So as you look at it, these are living, breathing documents. You get the best negotiation you can that was twenty eighteen, and then try, but you try to get Mexico to stay on course. But think how much has changed in Mexico in these last six years of a government that really
was anti business. Was the first act of AMLO, the current or just departed Mexican President Lopez Obrador, was to stop the airport that was being constructed. They needed that airport because of the expansion going on in Mexico, but he said, I don't like those contracts, and it just ended it. So we've got a partner to the south within the us MCA that's gotten major problems. So there has to be real discussion in the US of how do we interact with Mexico when they've been leaning towards China.
It's a big to do list, David Mauntpas, We've got a lot to talk about. Hopefully we talked before the election once again in the next month or so. Thanks you, so good to see everybody. Good to see you, Sir David mauntpass there. The former World Bank President