The U.S.-Canada Trade War: Media Bias, Tariffs, and What the Data Can Tell Us

Hello everyone!

Last summer, one of the first topics I wrote about on this blog was tariffs and their impact on small businesses in Brookline. I collected data from local businesses to better understand how rising costs and supply issues were actually affecting them.

Now, tariffs have become part of a much larger conflict between the United States and Canada.

The U.S. has imposed 50% tariffs on some Canadian products after trade talks between the two countries broke down, and Canada has announced retaliatory tariffs of its own. Beyond the economic effects, I found it interesting to look at how different news sources described the exact same conflict.

So, I looked at three articles covering the issue: one center source, one left-leaning source, and one right-leaning source.

The Economist: The Pressure on Canada

Article: The Costs of Defying Donald Trump Are Mounting for Canada

This article mainly focuses on Canadian issues that impacted the trade talks between the United States and Canada, ultimately leading to the imposition of 50% tariffs on some Canadian products and Canada's retaliation, which will be imposed on September 8th.

The abandonment of the trade talks by Canada's Prime Minister Carney, as the article suggests, requires walking a fine line to balance economic and domestic needs.

Specifically, the article describes the short-term but impactful economic issues arising from the 50% tariffs, namely projected inflation rising to 4%, unemployment rising to 7%, and the concern that the tariffs could exacerbate the already prominent cost-of-living issue.

On the other hand, the article also directs worry to Carney’s need to satisfy the domestic needs of Canada's provincial premiers. Weaponization of Canada's energy in the province of Alberta to retaliate against the U.S. could strengthen separatist sentiment in Alberta, while acceptance of U.S. demands could inflame separatism in Quebec.

The article ultimately highlights the pressure Carney faces to address his country's many concerns in the hope of achieving stability at the expense of short-term turmoil.

The Indian Express: Carney Stands Up to Trump

Article: Carney Stands Up to Trump: Likely Fallout of US-Canada Trade War

This article describes the ongoing conflict between the Trump administration and the Canadian Carney administration.

Trade talks between the two nations ultimately failed to reach an agreement, resulting in the imposition of 50% tariffs on approximately 5% of Canada's exports to the United States under the nearly 100-year-old Section 338 of the 1930 Tariff Act, a provision never used to impose tariffs before.

The article spotlights the differing views in trade talks between the two governments: Trump believes that Canada wants the perks of being a U.S. state without being one, and Carney believes that U.S. demands “went too far” and were written “in pencil.”

The article highlights Carney’s retaliation to these tariffs, where he imposed Canada's own tariffs on the United States, taking effect on September 8th. The article connects this dispute to Carney’s broader belief that middle powers should stand up to larger powers when necessary.

It also notes that Carney currently has “closed ranks behind him” in his effort to stand up to President Trump.

Fox Business: The Trump Administration's Perspective

Article: Trump Fires Back at Canada After Carney Suspends Trade Talks, Accuses US of Last-Minute 'Power Play'

This short article outlines the timeline of events since trade talks between Canada and the United States broke down.

The article highlights both perspectives: Trump's, that Canada wants the perks of being a U.S. state without being one, and Carney's, that the U.S. is making a last-minute “power play” that would restrict Canadian sovereignty by limiting trade with other nations while also offering too little in return.

The article highlights the Trump administration's interpretation of events, with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer saying the Canadians had “the best deal, and they still would have an even better deal,” and that the countries were in agreement before Canada walked out of it.

What I Noticed

Most of the articles share similar information. None of the articles display a strong sense of bias that completely overwhelms the possibility of seeing both sides.

For example, the right-leaning Fox source, although it focuses more on the Trump administration and ends the article with it, still highlights the Canadian perspective on the events. It displays the information largely as is, and any wording bias is negligible. Maybe this could also be due to the article's shorter length.

What surprised me was that the central source, The Economist, used much more biased phrasing than either of the leaning sources.

For example, describing Trump as an “unreliable man who uses trade barriers as a weapon” and Canada leaving the trade talks as “Canada’s prime minister abandoned the talks.” I thought the strong language of “unreliable” and “abandoned” was quite strong for a supposed center source, and I thought it was much stronger language than either of the leaning sources.

However, that doesn’t mean some differences in the articles were not visible.

The left-leaning source, The Indian Express, was the only article to mention exactly how the 50% tariffs would be imposed, emphasizing that Section 338 of the 1930 Tariff Act is being used, a provision never before used to impose tariffs.

I found this interesting because, after the Supreme Court ruled in February that the IEEPA does not authorize the president to impose these tariffs, I expected all of the articles to explain exactly how tariffs on Canada would be imposed.

One possible explanation is that placing more emphasis on Section 338 would also draw attention to the Supreme Court's rejection of Trump’s earlier use of IEEPA, which would be less consistent with Fox Business’s greater emphasis on the Trump administration's perspective.

What I Think

The trade issue between the U.S. and Canada is self-constructed. The Trump administration's use of tariffs has been the catalyst for this issue and for similar policies being imposed by other countries.

In my eyes, the government should stop trying to use tariffs to impose its will not only on Canada but on the entire world.

Economists widely argue that tariffs do not provide a net benefit to the American economy, and that increased trade between the United States and the world through globalization has not been unfair, as the Trump administration suggests, but has actually produced much of the country's economic growth.

As a result, the Trump administration's desire to impose tariffs comes down to protecting American industry and bringing manufacturing back to the U.S.

However, the benefit is concentrated mainly in this sector, so I interpret their repeated use of tariffs in negotiations as also serving a geopolitical purpose: as leverage to secure access to the American market and pressure other governments into accepting U.S. demands.

I believe that this geopolitical purpose has become the main goal of tariffs, and I don't believe that reason is valid for imposing 50% tariffs on some Canadian industries.

If I were in the role of an authority figure, whether a senator, governor, or representative, I would argue that the reasoning behind tariffs is fundamentally flawed. There is no great benefit to Americans, other than to certain manufacturing industries, in imposing such tariffs. Instead, the goal becomes spreading American will around the world, punishing those who do not obey and rewarding those who will.

I would argue that it is the government's job to begin dismantling the use of American global power as a tool for controlling international policy and return to a globalized world where all can benefit from trade.

Where Does Data Come In?

One thing I realized while reading these articles is that there is another perspective that doesn't necessarily come from the political left, right, or center: the data.

Both governments can make claims about who benefits from tariffs, who is being treated unfairly, or whether tariffs will strengthen their economies. As the trade war continues, however, those claims can actually be tested.

We could track inflation before and after the tariffs, unemployment, manufacturing employment, the prices of products affected by tariffs, imports from Canada, U.S. exports to Canada, and how businesses change their suppliers. We could also compare industries directly affected by tariffs with industries that aren't.

This is similar to what I tried to do on a much smaller scale with my Brookline business research. Instead of only asking whether tariffs are good or bad, I wanted to see how businesses were actually responding to them.

With enough observations over time, statistical analysis could help separate some of the effects of the tariffs from other changes in the economy. Even visualization alone could make trends much easier to see. Are prices rising faster for tariffed goods? Is manufacturing employment actually increasing? Are American companies replacing Canadian imports with American products, or simply buying them from another country? Are retaliatory tariffs hurting American exporters?

Those are questions that political arguments alone cannot answer.

And I think that's one of the reasons data science is so useful in public policy. News sources can decide which facts deserve the most attention, politicians can present the interpretation that best supports their position, and people like me can have our own opinions. But data gives us another way to check whether the story being told actually matches what is happening.

As this trade conflict continues, I think looking at those numbers will ultimately be much more important than looking at who claims to have won the negotiation.