April 7, 2021:-Following four years of a decidedly protectionist agenda, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says in a speech that things are about to change in a significant way.

The Cabinet official in charge of President Joe Biden’s economic plan set forth a bold set of principles on Monday that differ from the previous administration’s priorities.

Donald Trump’s saber-rattling against China is a policy that “will be competitive where it should be, collaborative where it can be” but only “adversarial where it must be.”

Yellen said, in a speech to the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, that “the most important difference today is a fundamental recognition that our policies at home and abroad to be inclusive, deal with inequality, and respect our environment,” which shows the difference between the present and the past.

“Over the last four years, we have seen firsthand what happens when America doesn’t step forward to the global stage,” Yellen said.

“America first must never mean America alone. For in today’s world, no country alone can suitably provide a strong and sustainable economy for its people,” Yellen added.

Without taking Trump’s name, she criticized the slow response towards the coronavirus pandemic, adding that the White House “failed to engage in addressing the crisis beyond our borders,” which made the economy even worse, said Yellen.

Although before the pandemic, the economy was well enough under the former President Donald Trump, who often used the term “globalists” disparagingly in front of his administration officials.

Unemployment was at a 50-year low, inflation was in check, and the administration negotiated a new agreement of trade with Canada and Mexico and redrew arrangements.

This lead economic officials, including Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, have lamented that the wealth gap had been closing meaningfully before the pandemic and now has widened again, mainly due to economic restrictions put in place to combat the virus.