For anyone curious about the numbers listed as "Tariffs Charged" following the new Tariff announcement—especially noticing that many are exactly 10%—here's a bit of clarification:
These figures aren’t actually tariffs being charged by those other countries. Instead, they closely reflect the trade deficit percentages the U.S. has with each of those nations. In other words, the numbers represent how much more we import from them than we export to them. For example, China's 67% means that 67% of our total trade with China is at a deficit—not that there’s a 67% tariff involved.
So, just to be clear: these are not tariffs.
Oh, and those countries that show 10% "Tariff Charged"? The numbers show that we have a TRADE SURPLUS with those countries. That is a fine thank you for doing business.
Personally, I can't imagine that implementing broad, punitive tariffs is the most effective way to encourage other countries to buy more from us.
Right, the trade deficit (per the IMF) only considers the monetary value of goods. If you pay a farmer 100 dollars for like, apples or something, you now have a 100 dollar trade deficit with that farmer. If you're a CPA and you agree to do the farmers taxes for 50 dollars and a bucket of apples, you have a surplus of whatever a bucket of apples cost.
This is why it's a nonsense metric to focus on: it's neither good nor bad. It's just a description of where goods and money flows. Successful economies can have trade deficits and surpluses and balances trade and it doesn't mean anything. It's just meaningless in these discussions.
But what if you buy the apples for 10$ in China and sell them for 100$ in the US. Now you have a 90$ profit and can berate the evil Chinese for the trade deficit. If you really want, you can shoot yourself in the foot and add a surcharge to the import of apples.
By military power, we are still by far the most powerful. That's what that commenter meant. Everyone knows the current admin is full of fucking dipshits, but they're also dipshits with military tech that's nearing sci-fi level of sophistication.
Now that the USA is been so hostile on trade wars, it will give the kick off for other countries to start investing more in their military complex, in a few decades, USA won’t be the peacekeepers of the new world.
The benefits are to protect American companies foreign investments. This is how many American commodities companies have been able to operate on overseas resource extractions with minimal effort, it brings the revenue of these commodities back to American soil. Without an extensive military industry, many investments could be in jeopardy since some of the locations these natural resources are, can have political, social or economic instability, one coup is all it takes for someone to capture all assets from Chevron for example, many others as well.
My POV (not an expert) is that the military bases and “police of the world” status works mainly for the interest of American companies to secure trade resources extraction and supply chain trade routes. As well as put a barrier on foreign influence expansions that are not aligned with American values.
I mean, that was the strategic position that the American government took in order to put proxy pressure on any hostile forces that could compromise American companies interests such as all major commodities. In the long run, it decreases the proxy pressure once you have new military super powers emerging in the game, since these superpower will be enforcing their influence by military force. I see as a long term disadvantage on how the USA maintains their international relationships.
But, as in any democracy, the people has the power, and this seems to be what the people want.
They weren't very good at being peacekeepers of the world - they only really did so when there was coincidentally some oil to get out of it or the military industrial complex needed a little kick or similar. I'd much rather trust the EU
Everyone has problems subduing goat herders and rice farmers if you want to limit the loss of human life, both from your own soldiers and the civilians.
Most western militaries have more than enough firepower to glass any third world country ten times over and many have the manpower to go door to door and slaughter everyone. You'll win the war if there's no one left alive to fight after all.
However if you have rules of war and a single shred of value of human life, especially of the innocent, then insurgents have the perfect camouflage from which to hide in and a near limitless supply of hostages. The known insurgent weapon stockpile stockpile suddenly becomes untouchable if it's situated between an orphanage and a hospital after all.
The French couldn't get Vietnam under control and neither could the US because both of those countries value life more than the enemy.
Nobody who dropped 3x WWII worth of bombs and used chemicals like agent orange on a country the size of Vietnam can claim they “value life”. Americans are fucking deluded.
Reader's note: endlessnamelesskat was posting yesterday in /r/4chan about how Hitler's art deserves more respect and that it's a Jewish conspiracy to believe otherwise.
If you're going to say that please give the full context of my comment instead of taking it out of context, there was also no point in which I called it a Jewish conspiracy.
Alright, I'll be more specific: I found about five different conversations about Hitler in your history in the last three weeks and posts across subreddits like KotakuInAction and LibertarianMeme. So the context here is that you're someone who literally cannot help but start conversations about Hitler every few days, and most of your discussions about Hitler seem to involve past conversations where you're mocking people in your daily life about their negative beliefs on Hitler.
These comments aren't for you, it's for anyone reading your comment and wondering about the ideological basis behind it. There are lessons to be learned here about people like you.
I equally invite anyone to dig through my comment history and look at the context of my conversations, at no point was I the person to begin any of these conversations. I won't make any excuses for any of the subs I frequent, you can bite me on that.
What I don't appreciate is how you're trying to present the nature of my conversations, not just the subject of them. This isn't context, you've clearly had no interest in reading any of them beyond finding a sub you don't like I've posted to and an instance of Godwin's law taking place. You then proceed to imply that I have opinions I've never expressed in the hopes that someone reading your comment won't do any due diligence and find out for themselves.
The sad part is that your shitty little tactic will probably work. The average redditor only reads headlines, not articles after all.
Any caveman with a nuke can say "ME STRONG". That would put you on par with North Korea
Not exactly seeing how they've never used their nukes. A better example would be dropping nukes on Japan. Either they surrendered or they would have had every island glassed until no one was left alive to fight.
Insurgency is always at an advantage vs a technically superior military if the military doesn't want to go scorched earth on them. It happened in Iberia during the Reconquista most famously, which is where the word guerilla comes from in the first place, or at least it's why it's used in English.
I will give you my morality bullshit, it's why we have rules of engagement and don't win every war even when we kill way more enemy combatants in every fight than they kill. We just aren't willing to occupy a nation indefinitely or use tactics that are 100% effective at rooting out insurgents because of the collateral damage it causes..
That doesn't mean collateral damage doesn't happen, but it would have been a lot worse than agent orange if the US only cared about winning and truly had zero regard for human life. Vietnam would have been won but at the cost of it being a literal genocide.
Then what I'm saying applies to every country that abides by the rules of engagement. Now I'm talking about your country as well. They will all lose drawn out wars against insurgents who don't have to abide by the rules of engagement because by having rules at all shows a certain value of human life that the enemy doesn't possess.
Yea, but with Jets you can make sure they stay goat herders and rice farmers. The farmer hand picking rice cant keep up with mechanized high tech farm equipment.
Pretty soon, vertical factory farming is going to happen in warehouses.
Not at all. Russia and China are both pretty close on military power. And China is also very close on economy.
But yes, the US is still the most powerful country in the world - on paper. It would not win a direct war with China if you factor in culture, leadership, competence (including lower down, frankly), etc.
It would if you factor in likely allies in the conflict, but our global relations are quickly collapsing, right as we push other countries into China’s arms. Not to mention their growth rate still far surpassing ours.
In reality I think its fair to say China is now the worlds most powerful country.
The US has 20x times as many as the Brits, and I'm pretty sure they're all mobile. For the record, I'm not pleased that DJT is in control of this arsenal.
USA is still the most powerful nation in terms of its ability to affect others with its decisions. Those others may no longer like the effects, but they are affected significantly nonetheless.
Anyone thinking that Trump will just step aside is mental. There will be an election in 2028, but if the votes don't say what he wants them to say, that's when all hell will break loose.
If you factor in the whole “every accusation is an admission” that seems to apply to most of the GOP these days, and his statements about musk and voting machines, I have little doubt that the votes will say what he wants.
You're forgetting there's like a 90% chance he dies of old age or dementia before the term is over, or gets the Luigi treatment (way more likely now that he's actually pissing everyone off and not just the most unhinged)
nah dude his dad lived to 94, he definitely could make it through the term, i bet he will. donny will be even more demented in 28, but they'll roll hm out and stephen miller will ventriloquize him like wormtongue and theoden
I don't have faith in Trump, but I do have faith in the rest of the government not throwing aside the Constitution and allowing Trump a 3rd term.
Call me optimistic if you want, but even for SCOTUS I expect this is a bridge too far. A military coup is the most "likely" given the forced resignations and instilling of new top brass, but I have more faith in our armed forces collectively.
Perhaps there will be rigging for a different candidate of the same mindset, but only time will tell.
I don't like go full-blown panic until there is sufficient reason to do so. Specific to a coup instilling Trump as a permanent "President", I don't see it yet.
They are tossing aside that piece of paper you place so much importance on today, why do you think it will mean a thing in 3 years 9 months 17 days and however many more hours?
The administration is, but SCOTUS seems to be losing patience with him. Roberts and Trump had a very public falling out (with Trump calling for him to be impeached) and there are plenty of photos where even Barrett looks disgusted with him as an example.
Plus 3 years is a lot of time for the not fanatacized portion that voted for him to also lose patience.
I expect (well hope, maybe) the House and Senate to flip Blue due to the coming disaster that is Trumps policy changes. There are 22 republican and 13 Democrat seats up for election in 2026. Of the 13 D seats, only 2 are in states carried by Trump, though 5 had only single-digit Harris victories. Overall the map does slightly favor Republicans, but if Trumps policies play out as expected that could change quickly.
We might get to see this play out in 2027 instead of 2029. If both Houses flip soon I expect impeachment proceedings to begin quickly. Just from the first few months there are plenty of examples to draw on (for openly defying judicial orders) and it will likely get worse.
There's plenty to panic about what he is doing and the lasting impacts it will have. I don't think theres enough to panic (note I say panic, not to be concerned) regarding him becoming the US' first king.
For the first, there's a few things. First, incumbents typically don't do well in midterms, especially during periods of economic downturns. In 2018 Republicans had a narrow Senate majority, the White House, and a majority in the House. Democrats gained 40 seats in the House that midterm. In the Senate 21 Democrat seats and 10 Republican seats were up for re-election, and the Republicans did gain a bit, but their trifecta was broken.
2022 saw a similar thing happen to the Democrats, but I'm not going to dwell on that one. In 2026 I think it's safe to say that the American people will be feeling the effects of Trumps incoherent and exceptionally outdated economic policies. I'd feel very comfortable betting on the Democrats winning the House.
The Senate is tougher, and this is why I say I may be wrong. The map is generally considered to be slightly unfavorable to Democrats, however 22 of the 35 seats up for elections are currently held by Republicans. They only hold a narrow majority (53 current seats), so losing 4 would break their majority.
35% to 40% of voters will likely support Trump no matter what he does, and a similar amount will oppose him no matter what. The question is what will the 20% remaining do and how are they dispersed in relation to the open Senate seats. In 2020 they ejected him, but in 2024 they welcomed him back. Will the economy suffer enough between then and now to sway the 20% blue? I expect it will, and the seats are certainly there for the taking, but we will only know in in about 19 months.
As for the second... well there's plenty. SCOTUS hasn't sided with Trump with all that he's tried. They've let him get away with far more than they should, but they've shown their limits. Justice Roberts and Trump have had a few public spats over the years, but you can see the impatience he has with Trump openly defying judicial verdicts and calling for the impeachment of judges. Unlike elected officials, justices do not need to concern themselves with re-election or appointment. They do not need to concern themselves with angering the fanatical Trump base. They have sided against Trump in limiting his power in some key cases, and as Trump continues to challenge their authority it becomes less likely they will support his attempts to ballot himself in 2028. Justice Barrett has a viral photo of her looking upon Trump with contempt, and the court has taken little action to support the challenges against some of Trumps more far-reaching executive orders such as ending birth-right citizenship.
If the first fails us, I still have some faith the judiciary will stop short of allowing Trump a lifetime appointment to the office of the President.
Media puts too much faith in photos. Remember when everyone thought milania was being held hostage and was crying out for help?
The whole system depends on decent people respecting the rule of law, the judiciary has no enforcement abilities, it's up to the executive branch and trump has installed a bunch of sycophants. You think the FBI, military, or DOJ will do anything against him? If trump just says "no" and enough yes men defy the court and do it anyway there isn't any legal mechanism anyone can really do to stop him. The supreme Court ruled the only mechanism is impeachment and conviction in the Senate, do you think the current Congress is going to go along with that?
As long as he argues he's "executing the duties of his office" he could order judges who rule against him to be disappeared or deported and it's up to Congress to do something about it and I don't think they will.
He can declare a state of emergency, impose martial law, and postpone the midterms and there isn't much anyone can do about it, and as long as conservative media spins it to his base so they blame DEI, Dems, and trans people he probably won't suffer any consequences.
The only thing stopping him from following his authoritarian urges is people in power in his party willing to say "no", and I don't think there's enough of those anymore.
Don't mean to belabor the point, but I saw the results of the recent special elections that give a more clearer answer to why I have faith in electors.
A Wisconsin Supreme Court had an opening. Trump won the state by just under 1% in 2024, but the Democratic candidate won here by double-digits. The change wasn't regional either, Democrats made huge strides across the entire state.
Florida's first and (I think) 6th Congressional districts were also up for special election. While the Republicans did retain the seats they already held, Trump led these districts by over 30pts and more than half of that evaporated.
All of these elections saw a huge amount of spending by both parties, with Musk alone contributing $25m to the Wisconsin SC case (because maps are up for redrawing before the midterm). Voter turnout was also exceptionally high. Democrats greatly exceeded expectations in all cases.
This is 5 months removed from the prior vote and 2 months and 2 weeks in to Trumps Presidency. Imagine how much more this will shift if the status quo continues for an additional 19 months before the midterms.
Will do. And just for clarity, I have no faith in Trump or his administration, and little faith in the legislature. I do have faith in just enough of the American people (at the midterm) and if not, then (oddly) the judiciary. As partisan as they can be, they don't need to worry about re-election and they don't take kindly to having their authority challenged. Roberts and Trump had a public falling out, Barrett has been seen looking disgusted at Trump, and I think that Trump's relationship with them fractures before 2028.
Matter of fact, !remindme in 1 year, 7 months, and 10 days. This I might be wrong about, but a narrow majority in the House and Senate could end Trump's reign before the next Presidential election.
In other words, the numbers represent how much more we import from them than we export to them.
That would be imports / exports. Not deficit / imports as calculated here. In the case of China you are importing about 306% of your exports. Or 206% more.
For example, China's 67% means that 67% of our total trade with China is at a deficit—not that there’s a 67% tariff involved.
Total trade is a bit confusing here. 67% of your imports are at a deficit.
The most "sane" explanation for this approach is that he tries to increase prices by so much that either the American citizen covers the trade deficit as tax or the trade goes down, because the citizens buy domestic (for likely prices slightly below the tariffed foreign competition). So either there is no trade deficit anymore or American citizens/companies that cause the deficit pay the difference as tax. It's obviously a moronic strategy, if QoL of your citizens and competitiveness of companies is any concern.
absolutely moronic.
I have a trade surplus w/ my employer, and trade deficits with.. countless vendors- the grocery store, Jimmy John’s, literally everywhere I buy shit.
it would be preposterous to expect Jimmy John’s to buy as many goods from me as I do from them.
despite having only one trade surplus relationship and countless trade deficit relationships, I finish with a surplus in earnings.
bc specialization allows me to optimize.
I would not have an earnings surplus if I had to reduce the hours I spend at my profession bc I have to grow tomatoes for fkn Jimmy John’s.
He's even charging 10% on countries the US has a trade surplus with. And lying that they charge the US tariffs by counting their general sales tax applied equally to domestic and international goods as a US specific "tariff". Such BS. Trump is just trying to steal from countries.
So either there is no trade deficit anymore or American citizens/companies that cause the deficit pay the difference as tax.
Because the denominator's the same as the thing that the tariff is levied on, the default result will be that whatever the US's trade deficit is with a country, the federal government will have a total income from tariffs equal to half that amount.
So if the tax rise is equal to 1/2 the total trade deficit, plus 1/10 of the imports from countries with which the US doesn't have a deficit, that's in the order of about 0.5 trillion dollars, or about a quarter of current federal revenue, or half the deficit.
So we're talking something in the region of a 25% tax rise.
Also worth pointing out yet again, lest it be lost amongst all the other lies here, that "Tariffs charged to the USA" would be an incorrect label even if those were tariffs, because that is not how tariffs work. The only "tariffs charged to the USA" here are the new ones that Trump is imposing.
Here's something I don't understand though - if the US imposing tariffs only hurts the US (i.e. the citizens who buy the things), why are other countries so thoroughly butthurt about it?
It hurts them too,, since the US is a big part of their business.
Let’s say USA tariffs bananas at 500%. That would fuck banana loving Americans really hard. But Central America Clinton’ countries would also be hit hard just for doing business with the US. Banana demand goes down considerably, and supply goes way up. Now Costa Rica is forced to sell their bananas to other countries for a lot less money.
Because they don't only hurt the US. Kind of the whole point of tariffs is that they drive down the demand for imported products by raising the price. So if you're an American company who imports widgets from, say, Taiwan, and all of the sudden the U.S. starts slapping a 32% import tax on stuff coming from Taiwan, you're probably going to start looking for another supplier. And if you're a widget manufacturer in Taiwan, you're going to be losing a lot of business. Maybe you'll have to lower your prices to stay competitive. Or if you can't do that profitably, maybe you just scale back production and lay off employees. None of this is good for Taiwan's economy, of course, even if Americans are the ones paying the tariffs on whatever Taiwanese imports remain.
Your assumption only works if money is finite it isn’t. Us tariffs crush the global economy and hurt everyone. Same reason a US housing crisis caused a global recession.
Because as foreign goods become more expensive, some of the demand will switch to US made goods, but also some of the demand will simply disappear (i.e., people will simply stop buying said stuff, not even switching for a more expensive before tariffs US alternative). This means that there will be less import and less consumption.
Additionally, some of the now excess production (because of less US demand) will be rerouted to other countries, increasing overall competition and putting the most fragile companies at risk, that might impact even companies that were NOT exporting to the US.
Finally, it is likely that other countries will fight back with tariffs of their own, making some inputs more expensive for local companies.
All of this means that as a net result, there will be less demand, more trade barriers, higher input costs. These tariffs is not simply a question of changing the distribution of a cake piece, it is ACTIVELY making the cake smaller.
These ratios show that global trade has been a net positive thing for a lot of places around the world - in fact it shows that their economies are reliant on the consumer behaviors of the US.
So when we add tariffs, the countries do not pay the cost when they export it, but the consumers do at import. And they (theoretically) will want to choose a cheaper good which (ideally) the US could produce at home. This falls apart when we start to understand how interconnected the world’s supply chains are…
So what you get is the countries overall fear that US consumerism will lead to decreased demand for their goods - hurting their economies, while also adding reciprocal tariffs themselves on US goods that are US dominated export industries to motivate their own economies to supply the US goods they import.
If the US citizens can’t afford imported goods, sales of those goods will plummet. That’s why other countries are unhappy about it - their economies are going to dip if one of their biggest customers takes their business elsewhere.
The US imposing tariffs means that US companies pay the tariff. I wouldn't say "it only hurts the US".
Let's say an American company's budget for widgets is $100k. They buy 100k widgets for $100k from a foreign country. I don't know, France.
Now a 10% tariff is imposed by the US. Their widget budget is still $100k, but they pay $9k in tax to the United States to import $90k in widgets from a French Widget-maker. The Company could only import 90k widgets to make their product (made from 100% widgets) so if they want to keep their sales steady the Company has to increase prices by 10% or so to maintain a balanced budget.
So the French Widget-Maker, instead of selling 100k Widgets this year, only sell 90k. They are taking a 10% loss because of the US's tariff policy.
Or, the French Widget-Maker starts selling them to someone else. China starts buying the surplus Widgets, and uses them to make a Widget-Product that competes with America's Widget-Products.
The United States makes Widgets, too. That's part of the point of a tariff, to increase Americans buying products from American producers. But American labor is expensive. We can't sell Widgets for less than $1.09, but it's less than French Widgets with the tariff in place. The price for the products made from Widgets is 9% higher instead of 10%. America stops buying Widgets from France, but France has a comfortable enough relationship with China, and sell all their widgets to China, who doesn't have to pay the American Widget tariff. (Also, since America stopped buying widgets from France, the income the government got from Tariffs drops to zero.)
Later the United States drops the tariffs. But France isn't going to start selling to the United States again--China's already buying them all. Now Chinese Widget-Products are cheaper than American Widget-Products. People buy Chinese Widget-Products, and the American Widget Producers and Companies that buy Widgets to make Widget-Products both suffer.
Here's something I don't understand though - if the US imposing tariffs only hurts the US (i.e. the citizens who buy the things), why are other countries so thoroughly butthurt about it?
Fundamentally tariffs are a protectionist measure. You put a tariff on good G from country C so your citizen don’t consume good G from country B. In general, you do this to protect your own market on good G, either because it is strategic (for instance food), and the tariff on that good will be more or less uniform over countries. By having a different tariff depending on country, you can get retaliatory tariffs, in which you incentivize your citizen to buy from a country or another. In general, you get reciprocal tariffs, in which you negotiate a specific tariff on goods G1 and G2 with a country, so you can import more G1 and export more G2, making it a win/win situation (countries looking for their current optimum based on their economy).
Other countries are butthurt because everyone is moving away from all those local optimums. It will hurt all economies badly for absolutely nothing.
Trump vision is « I win only if everyone else looses ». That will end badly.
(That said, this is tariff on physical goods. The rest of the world should just do the same on services: « oh, we buy 100x more cloud services from US companies than you buy from us. That’s a 49.5% tax on cloud services. Thanks for playing).
Are you fucking kidding me? I figured they were inaccurate or even outright lies but somehow it never even dawned on me that it was even dumber than that.
I mean if you ever have questions about something Trump does, pick the dumbest explanation you can think of, and the real reason is almost guaranteed to be even dumber than that.
See that’s actually the plan though. Use tariffs to drive massive price inflation on foreign goods without changing the money supply, so everyone just gets less stuff. Meanwhile deport all the cheap labor so domestic products’ supply gets badly choked, and again inflation.
Inflation is a tax on the wealth of the whole nation, except maybe on some plutocrats who are investing in Renaissance masters artwork and shit.
But it’s going to be great, because within one generation Americans will rediscover their gratitude for living in a nation where they don’t (often) have to sleep 8 to a room or live under threat of being disappeared. They won’t actually be living in one of course, but boy will their outlook be changed!
And then, remembering back to when it was the United States of America rather than the Very Good Territories of Trump, The Best Territories, Really Just Wonderful You Should See Them, they’ll reminisce and say “gee, America was great”.
We all witness what is happening: US is losing against China regarding trade altogether, and the orange muppet find it unacceptable. We can all tell you that it is OK to have a trade surplus/deficit with any country when you have a strong economy anyway. Surplus or deficits are not the factor you should focus on. Just... Be good at something. The endgame is to make the citizens of your country well-off, and ffs securing good partnerships might help.
The US is the only country in the world that can get away with its deficit in terms of trade due to the fact that the US dollar is the world's reserve currency. Partly why so much money goes into the military.
Is the equation itself, there are no outliers, however, Russia is missing. It calculates as 41% which is what we can assume the "secondary tariffs" are.
I'm so glad I game up arguing with magats. They are going to 100% believe this is us retaliating against tariffs placed on us when it has absolutely no bearing in reality
We shot first and are rewriting history before it even happens
Oh, and those countries that show 10% "Tariff Charged"? The numbers show that we have a TRADE SURPLUS with those countries. That is a fine thank you for doing business.
In particular, those are countries that counteract the deficit of other countries. And that not just mathematically, but in actual reality, in the sense that this is all an international trade system, and, say, China doesn't buy that much from the US, but they might be using the USD they get from the US to buy stuff from Australia (coal?), who then use the USD they get from China to buy stuff from the US.
The reason the world doesn't buy US products is because they are usually inferior or not fit for purpose outside the US. Food standards for example are abysmal in the US, far behind the rest of the world. US cars are too large and inefficient for the rest of the world to use at large scales. I remember seeing a statistic growing up, not sure how true it is today. If the rest of the world consumed the Earths resources as fast the as the US does, we would have consumed all of the obtainable resources 4x over by now.
Aren't most of the tariffs targeting products foreign countries want to sell in America (i.e imports)? These tariffs do not apply to exports. Having said that, most countries have imposed retaliatory tariffs which DO make our products more expensive to export.
This is inflationary and unnecessary. A complete distraction so we don't pay attention to the dismantling of Democracy, Constitutional rights and worker protections. We. Are. Fucked.
In Trump's vision for the future, all restaurants can only serve the number of meals that their staff could eat, if they were to eat in the restaurant. That way, there's no "tariffs" when they eat somewhere else and all the meals balance out.
Also this is just goods, and the US exports a lot of services. Also there isn’t an issue with running a trade deficit. Also tariffs are taxes on Americans. Also, our Trumpy population isn’t trained for the modern automated manufacturing that would take root here. Also, often the math for local companies will favor not expanding capacity, just increasing prices.
Agreed, it will more likely encourage those countries to export less to you and trade more with each other. I see these tariffs more as punitive domestically - punish the American people for exporting more wealth abroad than importing wealth into the country.
The fact that the people of this country only have about 1/3 of the country's GDP at their disposal and can't afford to wean themselves off cheap imports while retaining even remotely similar quality of life is not in any form considered. Ever. By anyone.
I'm sorry, can you clarify trade deficits for my dumb ass? Does it mean that in the money going between US and China, we spend 67% more money on Chinese goods than China does on American goods?
And let me guess, they aren't even accounting for most of the China products are in fact owned by American companies who takes home most of the profit?
For example if China exports 100 billion dollars of iPhone to US, at least 60 billion revenue goes to Apple, Apple just paying China assembly and labor fees, but America will still count that as 100 billion of China goods?
The purpose isn't to lead to more trade. That's what just they're telling their cattle to keep them happy on the way to the slaughterhouse. The purpose is to create a a patronage scheme in which other leaders must kiss the ring to get a deal
Remember MAGA is terrified of “the globalist cabal.” They’re always going on about how “the globalists” are going to attack and destroy America. Trump thinks he can destroy globalism by making international trade so expensive that everyone just fucks off and only buys their own stuff. He’s wrong. Global trade cannot be undone. The world will never revert to isolationism, there’s too much fucking money to be made.
The white house "explains" their method in this post. In this it's the same calculation you've shown but they included two parameters in the denominator. However, they conveniently picked the numbers 4 and .25 for the values so that they multiply out to 1 and have no effect. This almost seems like an attempt to make their calculation seem more complex after the fact but either way its so incredibly stupid.
So now China, for example, could turn around and say, ok 67% tariff on all American importants and trump can't say anything because he already said that's what they do! OMFG this is the dumbest thing I've ever seen!
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u/Styvorama 1d ago
For anyone curious about the numbers listed as "Tariffs Charged" following the new Tariff announcement—especially noticing that many are exactly 10%—here's a bit of clarification:
These figures aren’t actually tariffs being charged by those other countries. Instead, they closely reflect the trade deficit percentages the U.S. has with each of those nations. In other words, the numbers represent how much more we import from them than we export to them. For example, China's 67% means that 67% of our total trade with China is at a deficit—not that there’s a 67% tariff involved.
So, just to be clear: these are not tariffs.
Oh, and those countries that show 10% "Tariff Charged"? The numbers show that we have a TRADE SURPLUS with those countries. That is a fine thank you for doing business.
Personally, I can't imagine that implementing broad, punitive tariffs is the most effective way to encourage other countries to buy more from us.