By Andrea Shalal

WASHINGTON, (Reuters) – All options are available to combat rising inflation. This includes reducing tariffs on Chinese imports. However, U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai stressed Monday that policy changes must be kept in line with medium-term goals.

She noted that such goals included building a global economy that is more durable and resilient. This would also serve consumers as well as workers.

Tai spoke at the Milken Institute Los Angeles’ conference on Monetary and Tax Policy.

Yes, we could look at the tariffs. But I am giving you the… strategic lenses through which we must be seeing them. Now the question is, “What do we do about them?”

Industry has been critiquing the Biden administration for failing to cancel tariffs on Chinese imports worth hundreds of billions dollars that had been imposed by Donald Trump. This is especially in light of rising inflation rates which are at their highest point since 1980.

Recent remarks by Janet Yellen, Treasury Secretary and deputy national security advisor, about the inflationary effects of tariff cuts sparked speculation about whether the administration might be considering changing its course.

Tai, however, seemed to dismiss the prospect of a bigger-scale effort to lower tariffs. He also challenged a paper from the Peterson Institute for International Economics calling for the elimination of large swathes of tariffs that are necessary to counter inflation.

It was estimated that the U.S. Consumer Price Index inflation would drop by 1.3 points if China and the United States eliminated all tariffs. Washington removed tariffs on steel from all other countries and also softwood lumber imported from Canada.

Tai stated that he had to question the assumptions of the study. It’s either fiction, or an academic exercise.

Sources close to the thinking of the administration said that no major steps were expected in tariffs. However, Tai’s office continues to study limited exclusions from Trump’s tariffs on Chinese goods.