US-China relationship must improve: Trump
Congress likely to pull plug on medical device tax
DES MOINES, Iowa:
President-elect Donald Trump said on Thursday the United States needed to improve its relationship with China, which he criticized for its economic policies and failure to rein in North Korea. “One of the most important relationships we must improve, and we have to improve, is our relationship with China,” Trump told a rally in Iowa. The United States and China are the world’s two biggest economies.
“China is not a market economy,” he said. “They haven’t played by the rules, and I know it’s time that they’re going to start.” Trump criticized China repeatedly during his presidential campaign and drew a diplomatic protest from Beijing last week after speaking by phone with President Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan, which China considers a wayward province.
It was the first such top-level contact with Taiwan by a US president-elect or president since President Jimmy Carter adopted a “one-China” policy in 1979, recognizing only the Beijing government. Trump kept up his criticism of Beijing during the rally, which was part of a “thank you tour” to express gratitude to states that helped him win an upset victory over Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton last month. “You have the massive theft of intellectual property, putting unfair taxes on our companies, not helping with the menace of North Korea like they should, and the at-will and massive devaluation of their currency and product dumping,” Trump said of China. “Other than that, they’ve been wonderful, right?”
Trump repeated his campaign message that he planned to prioritize the United States and American workers over global interests. The Trump administration, which takes office on Jan 20, would focus on two rules: “Buy American and hire American,” he said, adding he would keep pressuring companies not to move jobs overseas.
Medical service tax
When Donald Trump takes over as president on Jan 20, one of the first business tax breaks he delivers is likely to go to the US medical device industry and companies like Mark Throdahl’s. The chief executive of OrthoPediatrics Corp, based in northern Indiana, said his company has been able to hire more workers since the temporary suspension effective last January of a federal tax on medical devices. —Agencies