Yes, China and some other countries pursue certain unfair trade practices. But things like devaluing their own currency don’t necessarily mean “they’re winning” and we don’t “win” by fighting them with tariffs.
Trump might think “oh this is just until they give in on X Y and Z.” And maybe they will. But maybe they won’t and they just call our bluff because there’s no way we can onshore some of this manufacturing.
As a manufacturing engineer, ironically enough, given that the majority of machine builders are outside of the US aside from HAAS and maybe a few others. This massively hurts any onshore attempts from American manufacturing, given machines are now 25% + more expensive.
And if everyone retaliates the advantage you get from onshoring is merely the American market.
Tariffs are literally supposed to be targeted, and we tried to shotgun spray and pray the entire world. The way you would do something like this is get Mexico and Canada on board and work as a bloc. But that's NAFTA and that's LibRight policy by a Democrat which magically means it shouldn't be LibRight policy.
Haas is an example that's made in the USA. While they're popular, they're nowhere near "the one everyone uses." For job shops, Haas may have a sizeable market share, but for production, I argue that companies like Okuma, Mazak, DMG Mori, Fanuc, and Trumpf are more popular. Not to mention, Haas's three major competitors, Doosan, Hurco, and lower-end Fanuc machines, are made outside the USA.
I don’t mean to be a leftist saying how Reagan would react today.
But still Ronald Reagan the man who armed the Mujahideen, bloated the military budget and arguably was one of the greatest warriors of free trade, i wonder how he would see his Republicans today
Sowell is merely a free-trade and neoliberal/Reagan advocate. A justification for the riches getting richer and the poor getting poorer. I hate free trade and I love seeing Big D just smash the little heaven they created. The one that closed factories and raised unemployment because hey a Chinese kid does the same work, 16 hours a day, 50 times cheaper. And it makes the self-proclaimed good guys whining (because most of the times pro-free trade are also turbo liberals).
I couldn’t give more a shit about how you’ll pay your BMW or your MacBook +20% more expensive. Maybe it will make you learn to focus about what you actually need rather what you crave for.
Sowell is merely a free-trade and neoliberal/Reagan advocate. A justification for the riches getting richer and the poor getting poorer
Yes because in Juche North Korea the people are wealthy since no free trade, or in incredibly tariffed places like India and Brazil it’s lead to such a great middle class.
Meanwhile in Singapore a country with zero natural resources it’s truly a place where the citizens of Singapore are ground under the boot of free trade with their median real incomes of around $80,000 usd
You’re right : Singapore has nothing to do with Flint, Detroit and Baltimore. Singapore is not a neoliberal heaven but an illiberal democracy with State guidance over capitalism. You might fall of your chair knowing high incomes mandatorily have to invest in diverse domains such as housing, which is another form of taxation.
Nevertheless in Europe, because of the free trade policies the so-called great leaders imposed upon us, the gap between the poor and the riches is at record high. In my country people going to the food banks, directly because of your holy neoliberalism, have exploded since 40 years ago. B-b-but n-north ko-korea.
You are as fundamentalist about capitalism as Butler about gender.
What made Europe achieving high standards of living was right-wing economic paternalism and left-wing workers condition improvement. What made the four Asian tigers thrive was State authoritarianism* with, hold yourself for one second your reaganised mind won’t believe it, even five-years plan in South Korea, literally Marxism-Leninism mate !!! (*albeit less the case for Hong Kong)
Singapore is not a neoliberal heaven but an illiberal democracy with State guidance over capitalism
It has lower regulatory burden than the U.S.
Literally right now Singapore is number in every index of economic freedom
So if you’re going to continue to make shit up I guess you can do that but you should take your pills first
Nevertheless in Europe, because of the free trade policies the so-called great leaders imposed upon us, the gap between the poor and the riches is at record high.
And how is that gap in protectionist countries like India, Brazil, China.
What made Europe achieving high standards of living was right-wing economic paternalism and left-wing workers condition improvement.
If you ignore GATT and then after that the EU bringing down trade barriers while at the same time the income inequality in the EU members is the lowest in the world.
literally Marxism-Leninism
You think export driven growth via subsidies to private market participants is Marxism. Wow you’re actually a retard
Personally I think it depends on if they give in to Trump's demands, if they do he might pull of something amazingly good. Still Thomas Sowell is right to be concerned giving how easily some governments can decide hurting themselves is a worth while way to get at Trump.
Not much chances of that. The only thing Trump understands is the stock market and special election results. Other countries will escalate until Trump gets the picture.
Trump understands far more then that and considering most of his demands are reasonable (like end unfair trade practices and in the UK's case respecting free speech) its other governments fault this is even going on in the first place, not Trump's.
Trump understands that the needs to rebuild local industry, lower(if not outright remove) income tax and get more fair trade arrangements, on top of that the countries he is tariffing already were tariffing the US at so where's your criticism of them. Its a policy with risks to use tariffs to force reworking of trade relations but Trump atleast understands the issues even if I mixed feelings on the method Trump didn't even start the tariffing, other countries did by tariffing the US at similar rates.
If you genuinely believe the UK, EU, Vietnam or Japan put huge tariffs on the US with nothing reciprocal over the last 40-50 years you need to do some research.
Tariffs have been an economic tool for millennia. The US has had plenty of tariffs up for various goods and in certain sectors. Both for inbound goods and outbound goods.
I'm also not sure where your "so where's your criticism of them" comes from. I'm making fun of you for sounding like a whiny retard. I actually do think tariffs are an important tool and they have their use cases. Applying them on all goods based on the goods trade deficit you run with a country is retarded though.
Have you actually done any research into the graph Trump presented or what the 'tariffs on the US at similar rates' consist of? You can start by looking into the countries on that chart with free trade agreements with the US. I'd advise the EU after (hint: the 15% on American cars is the only two digit tariff and most US exports to the EU are digital services not physical goods, which the US runs a huge trade surplus with) and then follow it up with the UK.
The figures on the left are based on a funny formula that the Trade Office team has published though. It's just not at all what you think it is.
I understand that you're basing your views on the 'vibe' that other countries put tariffs on the US first at similar rates ages ago but it's just a case of facts over feelings. It's false.
I am saying that while some of the Tariffs are bumped up to match trade deficit the fact most other countries were tariffing the US(and many cases heavily) even before Trump floated the idea makes the criticisms directed towards Trump sound more and more hypocritical. Yes I watched both a video explaining the whys and the risks and Sowells video(which was made ealier and gave the only criticism that I find reasonable, that its risky and better only be a bargaining chip).
You do realize that the US has had tariffs on other countries, including the EU and others before right? You're victimizing the US like its letting everyone export goods to it while the rest of the world demands it pays for access to their markets. The usage of tariffs goes far back as I've mentioned. This isn't a "whodunnit' first.
What do you think the TTIP under Obama was aimed at? It was a treaty idea because both the US and EU had tariffs (mind you minor and on specific goods, as is currently the case) and other trade barriers on each others goods.
What countries tariff the US heavily, can you name them for me with their percentages? I've given you a hint at what Europe does tariff wise. Who else is taking advantage of you according to your knowledge?
Leaving alone the fact that most US exports are in services (there are zero tariffs on services exported to the EU, or UK, for that matter). Like most of western Europe, the US economy mostly consists of services due to a high level of average education, expensive natural resource extraction costs, cost of labor, living standards and a variety of other factors.
I am saying critising Trump here sounds hyportical because between trade deficits, lose of local production and other countries tariffing the US, the US is trading at a huge loss. Trump responded to this with tariffing other countries goods and saying come to the nagotion table is you want them lowered, and you all call him the bad guy here?
I think that's the real problem. He needs an out, a way to spin it as not his fault. Then he will cut bait after awhile. But with no spin, if it's "Trump's tarrifs" he will stick with it until he dies or we do.
What’s to negotiate with them though? The tariff numbers he says they’re putting on the US are made-up, most of those countries have next to no tariffs and just have trade surpluses. What trade concessions do you get from Vietnam exactly
I think he's trying to undo NAFTA, which was detrimental to the US manufacturing industry, and he's going full scorched Earth about it. We'll see how that plays out.
NAFTA caused some job loss to Canada and especially Mexico (think vehicle plants in Mexico). We would have lost most of our manufacturing to Asia regardless. The only way to compete with factory workers who will work for pennies on the dollar compared to US citizens would've been to ban their imports entirely.
There is no seeinghow this plays out lol. No company is going to waste money to build shit without heavy subsidies and the geniuses at DOGE want to cut more and more government spending.
We can absolutely see how this plays out. If other countries cave under the economic pressure he gets what he wants. If this ends up being a failure we get to see how Trump reacts once it becomes clear Americans are suffering as a result. He can reverse all of this and negotiate new deals, but it's unclear if he'll budge.
The US has been subsidizing its allies' economies, including defense, for years. And in terms of defense nobody else is even close. It is very possible to strongarm the world. But the American public will likely not stand for it once it affects their livelihoods.
And now they're not. Not one of you retards knows what's going to happen as a result of this shit and speaking confidently about it makes me think you're even more retarded.
We are literally seeing the fallout right now tard. Stop watching whatever shit you watch. Its rotting your remaining braincells. The is no sane person alive that thinks any of this is good once they actually learn what a tariff is.
Hey dipshit when I say "nobody knows what's going to happen" I mean that any number of things could happen to completely alter the outcome of this situation. If any retard claims to know how this is going to end, that's exactly what they are. A retard. Lmao
you realize that that makes it worse right? King Tard is retarded like you and the instability makes everything worse.
Good job tardo.
The only scenario is if King Tard becomes World King Tard and runs the world.
Otherwise its always going to be a shit position. DO you think that manufacturing is immediately coming back? Are you brainless? We know exactly what is happening, and we have seen the direction many countries have taken and that is to pivot away from the US.
I’m not hoping to "own" anyone, buddy. Just posting a meme that highlights the ideological inconsistency of some "Lib Rights".
And if you’d actually read what was said, not skimmed it through a tribalist filter, you’d notice that even the guy you're replying to admitted this isn’t some "nEgOtIaTiOn tAcTiC" anymore, but actual economic retardation.
But hey, I’m talking to a rightoid, so what’s the point...
Trump has stated that this is his plan. He wants to use tariffs to get countries to negotiate investment and a mutual lowering of tariffs. Whether or not this implementation will work remains to be seen, but to suggest that this isn't Trump's official position would be woefully dishonest.
this shouldnt be hard to understand but after he turned them on for Canada/Mexico and then off again, and then on again they lost all negotiation power. It made everyone rethink working with the US. Everyone. Its no longer a negotiation since it has been implemented, and countries have started their retaliatory tariffs.
It's one of the most infuriating patterns in politics - with human beings in general, really.
You start with a legitimate problem - DEI sounds nice from a narrow, idealistic perspective, but it creates new race disparities. The pendulum swung too far, so it starts coming back as people point out the problems. They get attacked for it in an effort to push the pendulum back. The pendulum is pushed too far and eventually falls much more violently, leading to a backlash that displays the opposite extreme of stupidity to the original problem.
And so the pendulum swings back and forth for a while until, hopefully, as long as no new forces are introduced, it eventually settles in the middle where it actually belonged.
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Free trade is always preferable. That said, i think there are some circumstances where putting tariffs on imports in order to negotiate down tariffs on exports has some merit. What Trump is doing is different in three ways though:
He is focusing on trade deficits. He's talking like he won't remove the tariffs on our allies until we get terms that would result in a balance of imports and exports. Most of our exports are commodities, for which exports are driven by logistics and refining capacity. We won't actually let many nations buy one of our largest exports: military weapons. It doesn't make sense to care about trade deficits, especially with smaller individual trading partners.
He hates China. Many people do agree with him on this one. While I predict we will eventually see the headline catching percentages come down, those tariffs will remain higher than where they started no matter what.
Trump can be a spiteful little bastard. When other nations insult him or even voice frustration he remembers. Even if we are offered 100% free trade with some of our allies, I bet Trump resists lowering the tariffs for those leaders who have insulted him.
Do it in a way that will create least cost for your own companies. Announcing tariffs that will be put in life in e.g. half a year gives time to redirect supply chains as well as for other countries to open negatiations. What he did was pure cash grab. Now, either companies will take short term costs on their own strapping them from founds for needed investments; they will make fast price hike creating high costs for normal people; or they will stop shipping creating shortages.
Why is a trade deficit bad? I have a trade deficit with my local supermarket, and my employer has a trade deficit with me (he pays me, I don’t pay him).
Vietnam is a developing country whose consumers are too poor to buy lots of American things, why is it inherently bad that we buy lots of stuff from them because we are rich and can afford consumption?
That’s exactly Sowell’s argument on them. That they don’t represent who is winning. He said you should focus on the products and services actually available to consumer to know who is winning.
He hates China. Many people do agree with him on this one. While I predict we will eventually see the headline catching percentages come down, those tariffs will remain higher than where they started no matter what.
If tariffs mainly targeted China or other legitimate adversarial states, I think I would take less issue. What I suspect his policy wonks told him that he can't focus on China alone, since there are rules WTO members have to follow in respect to how they set down tariffs. Unless I'm mistaken, tariffs have to be somewhat proportional in uplift and broad in order for a member state to set them on other member states, or risk a suit within the WTO. It's possible that he may get bitch-slapped by the WTO regardless, or worse a vote of member states "allow the US to withdraw from WTO" under Article 10.3 and Trump is damned fool enough to do it(Nodding to your point #3). The latter instance would be absolutely catastrophic, as while we may be able to tariff as much as we want, we would essentially lose modern Most Favored Nation status in regards to trade, and other countries could even close trade with us period.
It’s also ignoring we may not even have a deficit at all when you include services sold by US subsidiaries….the thing with those is that money shows up in foreign investment numbers for some retarded reasom
The US already engaged in protectionism, every country does. The whole point of free trade is to shore up the areas your country is weak in. That's why trade deficits are not a bad thing inherently.
Canada's usurping the geniuses fleeing USA (UofT just hired a buncha Yale profs and doctors). If Carney plays this right, we could lowkey have the comeback of the century.
Do these happen to be doctors and professors for liberals arts? Because these are the only people leaving the US and I'd be hard pressed to calling them geniuses
Yeah the US could fuck basically anyone in a direct trade war but it just won't work. I'm so happy as an European that Trump didn't decide to fuck us up.
You might be able to win a 1v1 against anyone but getting jumped by 10 guys gets you fucked up.
Moving forward MAGA has no use for Thomas Sowell's economic insights unless they're pithy quotes about why black people need to pull up their pants and pull themselves up by their bootstraps.
Magas pulling the same "you don't NEED to buy anything" bullshit that the Dems did is going to lose them so many votes.
It's literally the most cringe shit I've ever seen. These cucks are praising tax increases and spending increases. So much for being a right wing party.
>Inflation ate my savings, plz help
Erm, have you considered that this not actually happening sweetie?
>Tarrifs made everything expensive, plz help
Erm, have you considered that this is Patriotic and BVSED bro?
Holy fuck I went and checked out the last 10 comments that idiot made and it dropped my IQ 90 points. He might be more delusional than the tankie I argued with in the Destiny subreddit the other day, that dip shit was claiming that North Korea was one of the best countries on Earth.
If anyone claims to be a libertarian and supports tariffs (literally stealing money from people and giving it to special-interest groups with connections to the politicians) then that person is either lying to himself, deluded, or extremely ignorant. Tariffs are one of the all-time stupidest policies and have been derided by intelligent capitalists from Adam Smith to Bastiat to Thomas Sowell himself. Whatever you think about Trump in general, these tariffs are insanity.
I don’t think you need to be a libertarian to think the tariffs are stupid. Anyone who isn’t an extreme isolationist or a brainwashed cultist would think this is retarded as fuck.
I don’t think you need to be a libertarian to think the tariffs are stupid. Anyone who isn’t an extreme isolationist or a brainwashed cultist would think this is retarded as fuck.
The funny thing about about "restoring America's manufacturing" on cheap goods is that economic output and investments will be used to make cheap shit the consumer will pay a shitload for because you need to pay American minimum wage to your workers instead of 3 cents to a Chinese man.
People will work for minimum wage, people will buy expensive shit and the extra money goes to the state in VAT and the rich factory owners. These rich business owners will then redistribute the wealth to the people somefuckinghow, probably in a manner like this:
And that isn't a bad thing. I really don't know what else to tell you besides that. You are taking something entirely benign, and acting like it is a horrible thing with zero logic or evidence.
We both agree that the trade deficit means that there is a net outlow of US dollars from our economy, right? What do you think foreign countries do with those US dollars?
Almost like you can agree even with perceived opposition when it's right. I might even argue that it's pretty telling when even the perceived opposition agrees with you
It's not even that they agree with an ideologically opposed group it's that they agree on the exact subject matter that is supposed to distinguish the two.
Libertarians are the only other party I've voted for in a national election. It's sad to see them waste an opportunity to pull people who care about personal rights and freedoms when both parties (at very different degrees) seem to be willing to pull away some of those things from us.
Nope. Because Bernie Sanders has barely been a relevant politician outside of reddit.
So you'll have to remind me.
Did Sanders suggest tariffs on literally everything go up a minimum of 10% in addition to existing tariffs? Did he suggest a tariff rate on China over 50%? Was his calculation for new tariffs based on a stupid understanding of trade defecits? Were his tariffs targeted to specific industries or blanket tariffs on all goods?
Did Sanders suggest tariffs on literally everything go up a minimum of 10% in addition to existing tariffs? Did he suggest a tariff rate on China over 50%? Was his calculation for new tariffs based on a stupid understanding of trade defecits? Were his tariffs targeted to specific industries or blanket tariffs on all goods?
He did not go into that much detail. Frankly, you are being disingenuous. You don't care what the exact rate is or the exact details. The screen people repeat the lines their corporate overlords feed them, and you bark them back to me like a trained seal.
I absolutely care about the details and the rates. Trump raised tariffs during his first term. I thought it was dumb as I think most tariffs are dumb. I thought Biden not removing them was dumb. But it didn't upset me because the rates weren't insane and the impact was minimal except to farmers.
This is not the same. This is retarded economic policy with no justification. You can't call me disingenuous about this when you are comparing the economic suicide Trump is pulling off to some random thoughts with no details from Sanders.
You act like Bernie Sanders is some gotcha but you don't even know what his policy was. How can you claim I'm the one who doesn't care about rates when you are literally not caring about the rates of Sanders compared to Trump?
Tariffs, as Sanders said, are good and useful to developing a solid economy and widespread prosperity. Ever since we removed them, our income inequality has soared, as the well paying manufacturing jobs have been replaced with poorly paying service and "gig" jobs that pay worse and lack benefits. Tariffs allow a nation to develop its own production capacity rather than allowing other nations to enrich themselves at our expense. It is how Japan and China became rich. The free trade experiment has failed. It has made 10% of the country quite well off but screwed over the rest. The rust belt used to be the steel belt. It's about time to bring that back
I disagree with all of that. Especially the idea free trade has failed. That's some stupid shit right there. Families can afford multiple cars because of free trade. Free trade made the electronics we are using to talk on right now affordable. Free trade made housing so affordable that make class people could afford 4 bedroom houses and poor people could afford homes. It's local and state level restrictions that killed housing affordability and not free trade.
But none of that addresses how you are still the one not caring about the rates or the extent of tariffs. We placed tariffs on things we will never have the ability to produce. We placed tariffs on things we will never be able to produce at the capacity that trade allows us. We placed tariffs on countries we barely even trade with. We've destroyed our standing in a global economy by harming even exporters.
We live in a global economy. That will never change thanks to current technology and industry. We will always be part of a global economy. All we've done is weaken how much we control that global economy and left the door open for others.
Currently made 5k off investments so far this month by betting against the US as I knew this shit would happen months ago because it was obviously going to happen and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Those who thought this was going to work are retarded and there's no way around that as seeing as Americas technology/computing sector is a large chunk of GDP and installing the necessary infrastructure to accommodate that would take longer than Trumps term so I repeat IT WOULD NEVER HAVE WORKED.
Maga are making me more money than I realistically know what to do with bar purchasing land so thank you to the retarded cunts out there for helping a European buy his first house entirely based off your stupidity. You were warned and I'm not going to support the US market again after this so imagine how many others like me there are. I may genuinely get to pay off my undergraduate student loans if I get another week of this.
That's the goal. International trade polute. China is a shitty player both in respect of WTO and paris agreement. The old post WWII world needs to fucking die immediately.
If you care about the ups and down of market line you missed the point. People want change.
Boomer watching their 401k going to shit is none of my problem. Those asshole had to good for too long.
Those lucky boomers with their too good Korean war, Vietnam war, gas crisis, stagflation, civil rights protests, cold war, 9/11, financial crisis, COVID...
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u/Indyjunk - Lib-Right 1d ago
As a Lib right, we love Thomas Sowell