This book recommends excising daily. Chana Joffe-Walt
Jim Henderson and Bret Ewing are import specialists. That means they sit in an office near the Port of Seattle and monitor every kind of product that enters the country. They are supposed to make sure that importers have paid the appropriate customs duties.
Jim has an encyclopedic knowledge of the U.S. Tariff Schedule (he's also got that enormous book to help him). The tariffs are essentially in place to protect American industry. And lately Jim's been worried about pencils -- pencils from China, to be exact.
At some point, the domestic pencil industry charged that Chinese pencil manufacturers were flooding the U.S. market and selling their pencils for less than it costs to make them. The U.S. government agreed (still does) and said Chinese cased pencils are subject to antidumping (higher duties).
Jim's been seeing a lot of children's gift sets from China lately, with erasers, pens, markers and pencils in them. That raises a red flag, he says. It could be an importer trying to evade the antidumping fees by masking Chinese pencils in the set. He's been investigating. Meanwhile his colleague, Bret Ewing, has been focused on a Frontseating Service valve (apparently it goes in air conditioners), also from China, to see if it is subject to antidumping laws, too.
We've got more from these guys and their strange little spot in the global economy on today's podcast.
categories: Economic Scene
Comments
Please note that all comments must adhere to the NPR.org discussion rules and terms of use. See also the Community FAQ.
You must be logged in to leave a comment. Login | Register
More information needed to participate in the NPR online community.. Add this information