Trade Improvement Act

Trade Improvement Act - Declares the purposes of this Act to be: (1) to provide authority in the trade field supporting United States participation in an interrelated effort to develop an open, nondiscriminatory and fair world economic system through reform of international trade rules, formulation of international standards for investment and tax laws and policies, and improvement of the international monetary system; (2) to facilitate international cooperation in economic affairs for the purpose of providing a means of solving international economic problems, furthering peace and raising standards of living throughout the world, while maintaining and insuring the security of the United States; (3) to stimulate the noninflationary economic growth of the United States and enlarge foreign markets for the products of United States commerce (including manufacturing, agriculture, mining, and fishing) by furthering the expansion of world trade through the progressive reduction and elimination of barriers to trade on a basis of mutual benefit and equity; (4) to establish a program of temporary import relief to facilitate adjustment of sections of the domestic economy adversely affected by increased imports, consistent with anticipated multilateral safeguard rules being negotiated with other trading nations; (5) to provide trade adjustment assistance to workers adversely affected by increased imports; (6) improve the means of dealing with problems of unfair import competition and to provide authority to facilitate negotiations to obtain for American producers fair treatment and equitable access to foreign markets; (7) to promote trade for the benefit of the American consumer and to provide him with products of quality, purity, and product safety at competitive market prices; (8) to provide the President with authority to deal with matters affecting trade, including the full exercise of United States rights in the context of international agreements and the use of temporary measures to deal with balance of payments disequilibria and to restrain inflation through export controls or suspension of import barriers; (9) to enable the United States to take advantage, under certain conditions, of new trade opportunities with countries with which it has not had trade agreement relations in the recent past; and (10) to provide for United States participation in the common effort of developed countries to open their markets on a generalized preferential basis to the products of developing countries.

Title I: Authority for New Negotiations - Provides that whenever the President determines that any of the purposes of this Act will be promoted thereby, the President may: (1) after the date of the enactment of this Act, and before 5 years from that date, enter into trade agreements with foreign countries or instrumentalities thereof; and (2) provide for such modification or continuance of any existing duty, such continuance of existing duty-free or excise treatment, or such additional duties, as he determines to be required or appropriate to carry out any such trade agreement or to maintain the necessary industrial production essential for the security of the United States.

Urges the President to negotiate trade agreements with other countries and instrumentalities providing on a basis of mutuality for the reduction, elimination, or harmonization of barriers and other distortions of international trade.

Requires the Tariff Commission and specified departments of the Government to advise the President.

Allows the President to terminate at any time, in whole or in part, any actions he has taken to implement trade agreements under this title.

Title II: Relief From Disruption Caused By Fair Competition, Adverse Market Penetration, and Unfair Trade Practices - Provides that a petition for eligibility for import relief for the purpose of facilitating orderly adjustment to import competition may be filed with the Tariff Commission by an entity, including a trade association, firm, certified or recognized union, a group of workers, a State, political subdivision of a State, or any combination of these entities.

Outlines steps the President may take within sixty days after receiving a report from the Tariff Commission containing an affirmative finding that increased imports have been the primary cause of serious injury.

States that in order to provide for the security of the United States through a strong diversified and healthy industrial base and to control unreasonable foreign market penetration of major domestic and industrial and manufacturing categories, the President shall determine for each category of industrial goods the degree of current market penetration by imports and the level of domestic market penetration by imports which may be permitted conducive to the best interests of the American people, the balanced growth of the American economy, the preservation of full employment in the United States, and the maintenance of adequate supplies at fair and competitive market prices.

Sets forth responses to unfair foreign import restrictions and export subsidies.

Provides that whenever any country, depencency, colony, province, or other political subdivision of government, person, partnership, association, cartel, or corporation, shall pay or bestow, directly or indirectly, any bounty or grant, including, but not limited to, internal value-added taxes rebated on exported merchandise, upon the manufacture or production or export of any article or merchandise manufactured or produced in such country, dependency, colony, province, or other political subdivision of government, then upon the importation of such article or merchandise into the United States, whether the same shall be imported directly form the country of production or otherwise, and whether such article or merchandise is imported in the same condition as when such article or merchandise is imported in the same condition as when exported from the country of production or has been changed in condition by remanufacture or otherwise, there shall be levied and paid, in all such cases, in addition to any duties otherwise imposed, a duty equal to the net amount of such bounty or grant, however the same be paid or bestowed.

Title III: Trade Adjustment Assistance - Creates the Trade Adjustment Assistance Administration and the Interagency Committee on Trade Adjustment to assist the Secretary of Labor in determining eligibility for trade adjustment assistance.

Establishes eligibility requirements for trade adjustment assistance.

Authorizes to be appropriated to the Secretary of Commerce $35,000,000 to furnish trade adjustment assistance to firms.

Provides trade adjustment assistance to workers. Authorizes to be appropriated $245,000,000 to accomplish this purpose.

Provides trade adjustment assistance to communities.

Directs the Trade Adjustment Assistance Administration to undertake to develop an integrated system of foreign and domestic economic statistics, which would provide the data necessary to forecast problems of economic adjustment, and to shift industrial and manpower planning into priority economic areas.

Title IV: International Trade Policy Management - Directs the President to take specified actions whenever he determines that special import or export measures are required to deal with the United States balance-of-payments position in the presence of a serious balance-of-payments deficit or a persistent surplus, other than a situation caused by a fundamental and worldwide misalignment in the value of the United States dollar, or to cooperate in correcting an international balance-of-payments disequilibrium as reflected in other countries' balance-of-payments deficits or surpluses.

Provides that any duty or other import restriction or duty-free treatment applied in carrying out any action or any trade agreement under this Act, under title II of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, or under section 350 of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended, shall apply to products of all foreign countries, whether imported directly or indirectly.

Authorizes to be appropriated annually for each fiscal year during the period beginning July 1, 1973 and ending June 30, 1978 such sums as may be necessary for the payment by the United States of its share of the expenses of the Contracting Parties to the General Agreement on Tafiffs and Trade.

Title V: Trade Relations With Countries Not Enjoying Most-Favored-Nation Tariff Treatment - Provides that the President shall not conclude any commercial agreement with any nonmarket economy country if he determines that such country: (1) denies its citizens the right or opportunity to emigrate; (2) imposes more than a nominal tax on emigration or on the visas or other documents required for emigration, for any purpose or cause whatsover; or (3) imposes more than a nominal tax, levy, fine, fee, or other charge on any citizen as a consequence of the desire of such citizen to emigrate to the country of his choice.

Permits the President to extend most-favored-nation treatment to the products of a foreign country which (1) has entered into a bilateral commercial agreement, or (2) has become a party to an appropriate multilateral trade agreement to which the United States is also a party and the President has issued an order extending treatment.

Title VI: Generalized System of Preferences - Allows the President to designate any article as an eligible article, to provide preferential or duty-free treatment for any eligible article from any beneficiary developing country, and to modify or supplement any such action consistent with the provisions of this title.

Title VII: Authority to Suspend Import Barriers or Impose Export Controls to Restrain Inflation - Grants the President authority to suspend import barriers and/or impose import controls to restrain inflation.

Title VIII: Maintenance of Production and Reserves Essential for National Security - Provides that no action shall be taken pursuant to the provisions of this Act or any other Act to reduce or eliminate the duty or other import restriction on any article if the President determines that such reduction or elimination would threaten to impair the national security.

Requires the President to submit to the Congress a complete list of manufacturing and processing operations essential and necessary for the national security of the United States in the event of a major conventional armed conflict.

Requires the Department of the Interior, in order to assist in safe-guarding the national security, to establish and maintain national defense petroleum reserves on public lands of the United States which shall have a petroleum-producing capacity sufficient to protect the United States against a continuous 1-year interruption of importation of petroleum from all foreign countries (except those contiguous to the United States), which the Secretary of the Interior determines to be an insecure source of petroleum.

Title IX: Foreign Income Tax Reform - Makes changes in the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 with regard to foreign income tax to carry out the purposes and provisions of this Act.

Title X: General Provisions and Additional Amendments Directs the Office of Trade and International Monetary Policy to annually collect and compile data from all persons, including corporations, firms, partnerships, or foreign nations, engaged in imports or exports to and from the United States. Declares that such data shall include information on the volume of imports and exports by category, the value of such imports and exports, the country of origin of all such imports and the destination of all such exports made by each such person.

Creates a select committee on multinational corporations to conduct a full and complete investigation and study of the role played by multinational corporations with respect to the recent dollar crisis on international monetary markets.

Declares it to be the sense of Congress that it shall be the policy of the United States to require repayment of the longstanding debts of foreign nations which are delinquent in nature.