Imagine being a nation that doesn’t produce anything, telling all the producers what to do.
Trump’s threat of 100% tariffs would backfire massive. What it means in practice is higher prices for consumers, massive inflation to keep purchasing power up, a further weakening currency, LESS foreign investment, not more - because they also have to rely on imports to produce in US…
The producer only needs to raise prices to make up the losses…
It's called protectionism
I think one might need to assess whats left to protect sometimes. At the same time, Americans are super industrious
Me thinks higher inflation is ahead
Quite possible if he goes through with his threats
tariffs are fundamentally stupid
There are many fools who equate their country with themselves and believe that protectionism, which strikes a blow to other nations, benefits them. Voluntary trade is mutually beneficial for both parties, and restricting it is essentially self-harm. When will they finally understand this?
Some nuance here.......
https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2024/10/trade-intervention-for-freer-trade?lang=en
I can't think of another approach to dismantling the income tax structure. Trump can't completely deprive the govt of revenue.
The US only needs Mexico and Canada. Inflation is coming anyway; they printed too much during the pandemic, and Trump is going to print even more lol.
Would be a great time for Americans to read Economics in One Lesson (chapter 11 in this edition) https://www.liberalstudies.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Economics-in-One-Lesson_2.pdf
But what if done in tandem with elimination of federal income tax?
You’d probably want less of both.
Income tax discourages productivity and tariffs are a hidden tax on all. They are both terrible. You’d want to gut govt. spending and implement consumption based taxation. This would ultimately lead to better productivity, wealth, investment and job creation + better wages.
It doesn't discourage productivity from the wealthy because the wealthy don't obtain and maintain their wealth through labor. It's inheritance, and investment, and finance games. It's the 90% of Americans of are being overly taxed. And it's them who are adversely impacted by excessive taxation. I think it's really important to seperate the wealthiest 5-10% of the nation from the lower 90-95% because it's really two completely different circumstances and dynamics that at play. Motivations are different, taxation impact is different, spending is different, etc. What's good for one isn't necessarily good for the other. And the best interests of country are poorly served by treating them as one for purposes of taxation.
Tariffs cannot replace income tax to fund the government. It's just not enough. Because the higher the tariffs, the higher consumer prices, and less the American people will purchase. Reduced purchasing will decrease the amount of income from tariffs the longer the tariffs remain in place.
You cannot tax the American people into prosperity, which is exactly what high tariffs seeks to accomplish. The same goes for excessive sales tax to compensate for low or no income tax. The burden falls predominantly on the poor and middle class while the wealthy proceed as usual. The result of this drastically reduced purchasing by the majority of Americans is fewer businesses able to remain in operation, and a self-reinforcing inflationary cycle.
High tariffs —> higher prices —> less purchasing —> fewer businesses —> less tariff revenue —> higher prices
This cycle will drive the United States into a depression, creating a multitude of social crisises similar to what we saw in the Great Depression. We could be looking at 20 or more years of abject poverty, and the destruction of the middle class as we dig ourselves deeper and deeper into economic dispair.
The real solution is to drastically cut spending.
I would argue that a combination of cutting wasteful spending, and an increase on income taxes for the wealthiest 3% and large corporations would be the best solution.
The super-rich are straight up not paying their fair share. And they are routinely the majority beneficiary of Republican tax cuts. They like to talk about cutting taxes, and regular people get the idea that they're going benefit. But I'm practice it's the wealthy and large corporations that receive 85%+ of the benefits while 90%+ of Americans are left with the scraps. It's this weird phenomenon of lower and middle class Americans identifying with the wealthy when it comes to their views on taxes. It's a self-sabotaging mindset that has greatly contributed to our current economic woes.
This isn't to give Democrats a pass because the Democratic establishment also plays these games with taxes for the benefit of the wealthy and the donors. But they're crimes in this area are slightly different than this frito-bandito the Republicans pull every time they're in power. We're basically being fucked from both sides, and the pro-sports-like tribalism has people more concerned with whose team is better than with the practical consequences of what both are doing.
Without careful planning of intra-trade of supply and demand, it will be a repeat of globalisation and deindustrialization in the 70s and 80s , which led to rust belt cities and growth of west coast and upper east side. It will exacerbate inequality by hurting lower-income groups especially labor-intensive industries, while benefiting capital-intensive sectors like high-tech.
Another scenario is cost-push inflation like Argentina where a sharp spike in the price of goods (due to the rise of intermediary cost) would again disproportionately hurt the low income groups the most. Naturally people would be driven to look for low-cost alternatives, often at the expense of lower quality, which will reduce the overall standard of living in the country. The quality of goods would further derail when the market no longer has competition like during the soviet cold war era.
Would be a whole lot easier if people would take 5 minutes and google “what is a tariff?” before voting
I think the tangerine turd learned an important lesson the other day. That lesson being, we are not the center of the universe and we rely on other countries for certain imports as well.
Of course there would be retaliation by whatever countries we imposed a tariff on, why dafuq do you think no one else uses them?
Fukn moron.🤦🏻‍♂️
Exactly. The bulk of our R&D hardware is assembled with Chinese parts. Trump thinks we’ll just use US suppliers - but they too import from China 🤦‍♂️
Now, if we actually invested in manufacturing of small components, then we could gradually reduce reliance on imports.
This is the idea behind the tariffs. At some point, it'll be advantageous profit wise to come and build your plant in the U.S. Your company will be free of overregulation and will pay a lower tax as well.
Once you come build a plant in US you STILL rely on imports. You don’t have the economies of scale to compete with an already established manufacturing base and people cheat by having their end product assembled in the states while the bulk of it is manufactured abroad. This is how companies get around tariffs.
Would definitely take a transitional period.
Problem is Trump sees tariffs as a stick to wave and threaten or use in negotiations. It can work - we see it with Mexico and Canada and I guess it takes a Trumpian character to pull it off (appears to be unhinged). But we need more of a carrot approach - long term investment in infrastructure , tax incentives, automation investment, logistics, education. Better partnerships with private sector and better treatment of talented people who come from abroad (automatic citizenship). Trump is short sighted and only thinks about his image during his term and could care less about long term effects - or he does but doesn’t realize how to get there (unlikely, since he has people whispering to him all the time).
My position is this. I don't trust any politcian, period. I don't agree with everything Trump"s done. But I am finding a definitive peace with the fire he has lit under the establishment. He's probably out for himself, IDK. But he is setting the establishment on fire at the moment.
This is very short sighted. Those countries need to sell their goods in America because they are too poor to buy what they produce in their own country.
Ah yes, the US is the ONLY trade partner for any single nation, sorry, I forgot.
Nah it’s ONLY trade partner that has money and works themselves to death to consume nonstop.
Subtle violence is still violence nostr:nprofile1qqsph3c2q9yt8uckmgelu0yf7glruudvfluesqn7cuftjpwdynm2gygpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfduq3qamnwvaz7tmwdaehgu3wwa5kuegpzpmhxue69uhkummnw3ezumrpdejqwk5cd9
