What a lame excuse thinking China won't target European luxury brands because there's a lot of business for it in China. The same can be said for how Chinese EVs are going to be dominating the European market that they want to stop. Another Chinese will start a revolution against Beijing if the West isn't a part of their lives...?
Do not have the time to read the Yahoo piece. But I actually think it is not a bad idea for China to spare the European luxury goods unless the trade tensions keep escalating.
The European luxury brands do not hire many in their home states [1]. Hitting them with higher tariffs won't produce enough impact economically and politically in EU. It can even backfire because many of these luxury brands have outsourced the production in China and other global south countries. Their outlets also hire many locals in China and other developing countries.
Making luxury goods does not require a lot of advanced technologies and manufacturing capability. Most profit comes from marketing, followed by the designs. If China has to balance the trade with the EU, I would rather China can choose luxury clothing, jewelry and hand bags than machining tools, jet liners and lithograph machines.
China has done it right by aiming at the alcohol, meat, dairy products first. These have most of the supply chains and processing within their home states. The impact will have the least risk of overspill.
Luxury goods are necessary evils. Until Chinese brands catch up, China will have to keep importing from EU or some other places to meet the demands. Raising the tariffs too high on the imported luxury goods will create a bigger black market for smuggling.
[1] According to Wikipedia, "As of 2009, the group employed more than 83,000 people,
30 percent of LVMH's staff worked in France". I would imagine that percentage is much less than 30% now that LVMH employees more 200000 worldwide.
