A Boeing jet earmarked for China was returning to the United States on Friday, flight tracking data showed, as the planemaker's flagship delivery plant outside Shanghai was drawn into a deepening tariff war between Beijing and Washington.

China is facing a double whammy: corrosive deflation and tariffs that threaten to block trade. Chinese workers will be the biggest casualties.

Trump tariffs in 2016 sent a glut of cheap Chinese imports, originally intended for the US, into South East Asia, hurting many local manufacturers. But they also opened new doors for other businesses, often into global supply chains that wanted to cut their dependence on China.