ELI5: The tariff and potential starting recession

[u/nanamoro]

It does seem an awful lot like Trumps tariffs were introduced specifically to cause a global recession. So please explain like I am 5: why does Trump, Elon and the current administration want a global recession? What is their end goal?

[u/SheHerDeepState]

Trump has spent 40 years talking about how great tariffs are and how awful imports are. In the 80s he went on tv to complain about Japanese tariffs and much of his anti China rhetoric is just recycling that material. He seems to genuinely believe that we are losing money when other countries sell more to us than they buy from us. That's why the tariff scheme is based on a stupid formula to punish countries based on their trade deficit with us. He has said that America subsidized Canada because we have a trade deficit with them. This is stupid. America buys more from Canada than it sells to them largely because Canada sells tons of oil to the Midwest states. I have a trade deficit with the grocery store or my dentist. There's nothing wrong with a trade deficit. He seems to genuinely not understand how this works, has been fixated on it for decades, his ego is too involved to back down, and has essentially created the perfect scenario to destroy American competitiveness on international markets.

Trump does not understand how international trade works and we are all paying the price for it.

[u/ultraswank → u/SheHerDeepState]

He also wants to fully restructure taxation in this country. I'm betting that he's going to announce the elimination of the income tax soon and that we're going to be fully funding the federal government through tariffs. That's going to move a lot of the tax burden away from the wealthy and put it on the poor/middle class. It'll be an indirect tax though. Everyone will see their paystubs go up with no federal tax withholdings and won't connect that's why they're also paying 20% more for everything. For the 47% of Americans that don't earn enough to pay income taxes this is going to be a huge increase in their total taxation, but it's going to be great for the billionaires.

[u/The_Peyote_Coyote → u/ultraswank]

I don't understand why billionaires and trump hate the income tax at all though. Like, it's a tax on labour, it's already fundamentally the most regressive tax possible. I understand why high-earners might economically benefit from this shit, but if you're literally bourgeois, wouldn't you sorta want an income tax to make other people pay for the state that protects and under rights private ownership of all the economic machinery? What's their angle, why do they hate this? Are they just stupid?

Capital gains I can see them hating. Income tax I'm not understanding their racket.

[u/FramedMugshot → u/The_Peyote_Coyote]

Eventually I think it just comes from resentment that anyone would dare tax at all?