IMF warns US-China trade war will ‘jeopardize’ 2019 global growth

WASHINGTON, May 23 .
The IMF warned Thursday that the escalating US-China trade war will “jeopardize” 2019 global growth, undermining confidence and raising prices for consumers.

“Consumers in the US and China are unequivocally the losers from trade tensions,” Gita Gopinath, the International Monetary Fund’s chief economist, said in a blog post, directly refuting US President Donald Trump’s claim that the tariffs are paid by China and provide a windfall for the US treasury.

She and her co-authors warned the economic damage will be even worse if Trump goes through with the threat to impose steep tariffs on all goods imported from China, as that “will subtract about one-third of a percentage point of global GDP in the short term.”