Washington — The U.S. House Ways & Means Committee and the U.S. Senate Finance Committee are scheduled to hold hearings this week with U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai on the 2022 Biden Trade Agenda. CCIA looks forward to hearing how the Administration’s worker-centered trade agenda can help foster economic growth for all, including how trade policy can ensure deployment of digital services around the world to facilitate this growth.
This is critical at a time when some longtime trading partners are enacting new barriers to cross-border delivery of digital services and goods. CCIA supports efforts of U.S. trade officials in making open, rules-based digital trade a top global economic priority.
Since coming into office, the Biden Administration has announced a number of welcomed initiatives, including the U.S.-EU Tech & Trade Council and Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, that look to engage key allies on things like cooperation around next generation technology, digital trade, regulatory cooperation, and supply chain security.
The following can be attributed to CCIA Vice President Arthur Sidney :
“As the Biden Administration works to strengthen relations with traditional allies and build partnerships to address trade and security challenges of today, we encourage policymakers to recognize the importance of strong rules to promote digital trade and global commerce.
“As countries continue to craft new rules for the digital economy, they are targeting only a handful of U.S. firms, ignoring domestic competitors. It is discouraging to see trading partners commit to cooperation on one hand, then proceed to enact discriminatory regulaitons that aim only to disadvantage designated U.S. companies instead of addressing concerns across a digitliazed economy.”