<p>''China continues to deny that it has an unfair trade advantage and refuses to end the practice of currency manipulation,'' said Senator Debbie Stabenow, who has introduced the Currency Reform for Fair Trade Act in the Congress.<br /><br />Stabenow's legislation provides a clear definition and methodology for determining currency manipulation which will help prevent foreign countries from gaining an unfair competitive advantage at the cost of American jobs.<br /><br />The bipartisan legislation is also co-sponsored by Senators Sherrod Brown, Jim Bunning, Bob Casey, Russ Feingold, Carl Levin, Allen Spector and Olympia Snowe.<br /><br />"Yesterday, President (Barack) Obama stated that his administration is going to get much tougher on countries like China that manipulate their currency and put Americans out of work," said Stabenow, adding that as a long-time proponent of a level playing field for US manufacturers and businesses he could not agree more.<br /><br />"It is time to pass my legislation which will ensure that our laws provide mechanisms to punish countries for manipulating their currency, so US workers are not put at a competitive disadvantage," he said. <br /><br />"We have lost 2.3 million jobs from 2001 and 2007 as a result of the trade imbalance with China. China continues to violate international law with subsidies, dumping and currency manipulation; it's really a form of international banditry," said Senator Specter, who co-sponsored the legislation yesterday.<br /><br />The Currency Reform for Fair Trade Act directs the US Department of Commerce to treat currency undervaluation as a prohibited export-contingent subsidy.<br />It ensures that standard remedies are put in place to offset the subsidy effects when a government undervalues its currency.<br /><br />Currently, such US trade remedies have not yet been applied. The legislation provides an explicit definition of when currency misalignment occurs and directs the US Department of Commerce to measure whether a country's currency is fundamentally misaligned.<br /><br />"These calculations will be public and will use reliable data available from the IMF as well as the two primary methodologies and guidelines that the IMF follows in its computations of exchange-rate misalignment," the Senator said.</p>
<p>''China continues to deny that it has an unfair trade advantage and refuses to end the practice of currency manipulation,'' said Senator Debbie Stabenow, who has introduced the Currency Reform for Fair Trade Act in the Congress.<br /><br />Stabenow's legislation provides a clear definition and methodology for determining currency manipulation which will help prevent foreign countries from gaining an unfair competitive advantage at the cost of American jobs.<br /><br />The bipartisan legislation is also co-sponsored by Senators Sherrod Brown, Jim Bunning, Bob Casey, Russ Feingold, Carl Levin, Allen Spector and Olympia Snowe.<br /><br />"Yesterday, President (Barack) Obama stated that his administration is going to get much tougher on countries like China that manipulate their currency and put Americans out of work," said Stabenow, adding that as a long-time proponent of a level playing field for US manufacturers and businesses he could not agree more.<br /><br />"It is time to pass my legislation which will ensure that our laws provide mechanisms to punish countries for manipulating their currency, so US workers are not put at a competitive disadvantage," he said. <br /><br />"We have lost 2.3 million jobs from 2001 and 2007 as a result of the trade imbalance with China. China continues to violate international law with subsidies, dumping and currency manipulation; it's really a form of international banditry," said Senator Specter, who co-sponsored the legislation yesterday.<br /><br />The Currency Reform for Fair Trade Act directs the US Department of Commerce to treat currency undervaluation as a prohibited export-contingent subsidy.<br />It ensures that standard remedies are put in place to offset the subsidy effects when a government undervalues its currency.<br /><br />Currently, such US trade remedies have not yet been applied. The legislation provides an explicit definition of when currency misalignment occurs and directs the US Department of Commerce to measure whether a country's currency is fundamentally misaligned.<br /><br />"These calculations will be public and will use reliable data available from the IMF as well as the two primary methodologies and guidelines that the IMF follows in its computations of exchange-rate misalignment," the Senator said.</p>