US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen delivers a speech during the AmCham China Fireside Chat at Baiyun International Conference Center, in southern Chinese city of Guangzhou on April 5, 2024. Photo:AFP

US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has once again associated China with alleged "overcapacity" and noted that the US wouldn't take "anything off the table," including additional tariffs on cheap goods from China. 

Chinese experts noted that although some Chinese companies were affected due to additional tariffs on multiple Chinese products, which were imposed during the Trump administration, US consumers have to bear more pressure from surging prices of daily necessities.

Yellen made the remark during a recent CNN program, according to a Bloomberg report. She stated that the response measures are to stem what she has described as a flood of cheap goods into the US market, while adding that she "really wants to responsibly manage the relationship."

It followed her visit to China earlier this month, during which she made the accusation that "China's overcapacity distorts global prices and production patterns, and hurts American firms and workers, as well as firms and workers around the world."

Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Monday that the groundless allegation of "overcapacity" repetitively mentioned by Yellen defied economic rules, and it was aimed at making a compromise with US companies with backward capacity, such as those making internal combustion engine cars.

"Taking electric cars as an example, the current global capacity cannot meet the surging demand of the global transformation for new energy, and there is about 70-80 percent room for growth in the sector," said Lü. 

In order to tackle China's manufacturing progress, Yellen also said that other regions and countries such as Europe, Japan, India, Mexico and Brazil, as well as some emerging markets, are also concerned about China's "overcapacity."

Lü stated that on the one hand, it is absurd for the US to bundle its backward manufacturing capacity with other countries. On the other hand, there are some countries that have conducted active cooperation with China's world-leading new-energy sector. 

For instance, observers said that German automakers will take advantage of the visit by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to deepen collaboration with their Chinese peers in green transformation, and thus further dispel global concerns about China's so-called "overcapacity."