The calculations that decided the 27% rate

India charges a tariff of 52% on US products, Donald Trump claimed while slapping an incremental tariff of 26% (27% according to the annexure of the US statement) on India as part of his reciprocal tariff announcements.

- Roshan Kishore

NEW DELHI: Where does this 52% number come from? Some experts have suggested that Trump's calculations of tariffs imposed by a specific country could have nothing to do with tariffs at all. Instead, they seem to be a mark-up of US's merchandise trade deficit with a given country.

A post (one among the many which pointed this out) on microblogging site X (formerly Twitter) by Justin Wolfers, professor of economics at University of Michigan flagged this. "The White House "reciprocal" tariff bears no relation to actual tariff barriers. It's equal to half of the trade deficit (as a share of imports). This is indescribably crazy," Wolfers posted.