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-24 points
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That’s how import taxes work. Now you may have incentive to spend your money at the local manufacturer, instead of chinese one, and he may have more money to buy whatever services you provide.

There is enough of dumb shit you can attack trump for, no need to attack him for the one that actually makes sense.

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14 points

Tariffs tend to make all sides poorer. We benefit from cheap imports, because those imports serve as inputs to our companies. Additionally, tariffs on our side tend to be matched by tariffs on the other sides which will hurt exports. There’s no realistic scenario where a broad tariff benefits the local economy.

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-3 points

We benefit from cheap imports

in a similar way you benefit from first few cheap heroin doses. so, not really.

my country officials were bowing and saluting to china cargo planes carrying masks and syringes during covid and there were real fear they if they did not, the plane might not have landed. we had indeed no capability to produce syringes and masks at home.

being dependent on china, which is euro-atlantic civilization’s geopolitical enemy number one, is not smart long term strategy.

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3 points

Tariffs, especially irresponsible ones like those of Trump, are just price increases for consumers in both countries and subsidies for domestic companies making an inferior and/or expensive product.

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14 points
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Say you are right, and magically stuff is made in the US. What would stop the US mega corps from just raising their prices 19pct? Still cheaper and free profit.

Why would large manufacturers move to a US with all its pesky eco rules and labor protections if you can just stay in your current country where you invested in your factories and just have the US consumer eat the price hike?

Investing in a country due to tarrifs is risky, cause if the tarrifs ever go away you invested in an uncompetitive manufacturing plant.

Tarrifs will be met with counter tarrifs causing other sectors to implode. The last round of trump tarrifs on china needed to be spent on farmers in the US almost completely because china tariffed their products and their main customer base in china dissapeared over night.

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-2 points
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What would stop the US mega corps from just raising their prices 19pct? Still cheaper and free profit.

i honestly don’t understand the question. why should they do that? what’s stopping them now? what’s your point?

Why would large manufacturers move to a US with all its pesky eco rules and labor protections if you can just stay in your current country where you invested in your factories and just have the US consumer eat the price hike?

because you can now produce at home at a competitive price?

Investing in a country due to tarrifs is risky, cause if the tarrifs ever go away you invested in an uncompetitive manufacturing plant.

indeed, longterm stability and predictability is important. there are unpredictable factors in 3rd world countries the west civilization currently exploits as well, so the goal is to be more stable and predictable at home. i am not saying it is easy.

Tarrifs will be met with counter tarrifs causing other sectors to implode. The last round of trump tarrifs on china needed to be spent on farmers in the US almost completely because china tariffed their products and their main customer base in china dissapeared over night.

so… it worked?

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3 points

You are either being silly or intentionally taking weird positions.

  • the current prices are set by the market. If an artificial influence like a tarrifs overnight makes part of the products a certain percentage more expensive, the market will readjust to this new reality. Since companies love profits, it will adjust upwards to get as close to the increased conpetitors price while keeping your advantage.
  • “at home” for a lot of companies is not the US. Your reasoning is poor here, companies are driven by profit not feelings.
  • No it’s not easy indeed, see previous point. And the competitive edge the companies have by staying in cheaper countries helps them be competitive in the rest of the world.
  • it worked? The Trump tarrifs stayed under biden… cause flip flopping policy is sometimes worse, and removing the tarrifs without china removing theirs will just make things worse. Did your stuff get cheaper? Or is that Bidens fault?
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1 point
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Why would large manufacturers move to a US with all its pesky eco rules and labor protections

Bwahhahahahah… You’re funny.

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9 points

I get what you are saying, but compared to where these companies are now…

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17 points

But this is a very stupid one that he doesn’t seem to understand how to work it. Let me give you one example that hit last time this asshole was in office.

My spouse works for one such import company. While it is US based it gets its metals and product from China and a few other Asian markets.

I wont get into the details as to what all they make but they provide a lot of various hardware items that you find in the large retail hardware outlets.

When Orange Man did this last time, guess what happened? They simply increased the prices to compensate and pushed all that down the line to consumers. When the bottom dollar got bad enough they laid off employees. Same thing happened at some of the other companies she worked with.

Thing is the US hardly manufacture anything, anymore. In fact a lot of the metals and other stuff we no longer mine. It’s easy to say ‘This makes sense’ well no, it doesn’t - he is running his mouth again to get votes without considering the long term effects of how it will damage the economy even worse.

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5 points

Thing is the US hardly manufacture anything, anymore.

tbf, we manufacture a lot still. It’s just typically things that require skilled workers and advanced machinery, not common consumer goods. The only consumer goods we produce in large values anymore are cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and handheld electronics.

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-6 points

You’re only looking at and mentioning the short term effect, not any long term effects, and then criticizing others for the same thing. The long term effect is inefficient businesses like your spouses company shuts down, and local production increases at all levels.

Global ecomonies are incompatible with life on Earth, as we have learned.

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7 points
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The long term effect is inefficient businesses like your spouses company shuts down, and local production increases at all levels.

That’s a wild claim. Can you back that up with any data that shows tariffs always increase local jobs and income?

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49 points

Tariffs only make sense when you can outcompete or at least get parity with your opposition. We can’t do that immediately and Trump is like a child who never had to wait for anything because he’s quite literally a child who’s never had to wait for anything.

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-15 points

We can’t do that immediately

You can use the money from the tariff to help local bussines to strive towards that goal.

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13 points

No, people just won’t buy that shit, necessities are by in large owned by huge multi national corporations who won’t end up paying that tariff they’ll just wrap it into the price and pass out to the consumer.

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13 points

Nope. Tariffs are price increases. They don’t directly generate revenue.

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8 points

Striving toward a goal is not immediately. Immediately people will see higher prices on a lot of familiar brands.

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24 points
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So how does that make products cheaper in the short term that he says it will, I.e the 4 years of a presidency?

With his proposed tariffs of 100%, washing machines used to cost $500, they are now $1000. Same machine, same features. Washing machine factory dont exist locally, and may not even exist because the margins may still not work out. Even if they intend to build one, how does that help me even long term? Washing machine prices are now anchored at $1000 instead of the $500 because their only competition has their price controlled at that rate.

How is me losing $500 dollars from now on for the same product saving me money? How does this repeating for hundreds or thousands of products help me save money while losing more money on each of them?

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16 points

So that means we’ll get cheap EVs and solar panels, right?

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-2 points

Cheap and not exploiting people and environment unfortunately don’t go hand to hand. You have to choose your priority.

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2 points

How do you think your food gets to your table?

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2 points
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“Cheap” is relative, stop being deliberately obtuse.

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6 points

They actually do go hand in hand. Just not under the american economic system. China has cheap evs higher average wages when factoring in ppp, and a better environmental track record and future than the US.

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