US trade policy in numbers: how exposed is the EU?

Amid lingering uncertainty on future US trade policies towards the EU, this study provides an assessment of the implications of a change in US trade tariffs for the EU, with a focus on Italy. By examining trade flows and matching over 5.000 products to effective tariffs, the work quantifies, at the aggregate and sectoral level, actual bilateral average tariffs on trade in final goods and intermediates. Although US goods’ tariffs are generally lower than those imposed by partners, this asymmetry is not as marked for the EU. This study also evaluates the direct and indirect exposure of the EU’s and its major countries’ GDP to alternative scenarios of US tariff hikes. A change in US tariffs would affect around 2.8 per cent of total EU GDP. The EU GDP potentially affected by US tariffs only on automotive imports would be 0.4 per cent while the overall Italian exposure would be just below, 0.3 per cent, around 10 per cent in terms of the value-added produced in the motor vehicles sector.