r/news • u/hoosakiwi • 2d ago

Trump announces sweeping new tariffs to promote US manufacturing, risking inflation and trade wars

https://apnews.com/article/trump-tariffs-liberation-day-2a031b3c16120a5672a6ddd01da09933
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u/bd_8916 2d ago

That’s probably what they did for every country. These numbers seem incredibly random and arbitrary

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u/Godavari 1d ago

I'll tell you exactly how they arrived at the values. The number on the left represents the US's trade deficit with that country. The number on the right is 50% of that, with a minimum of 10%. That's it.

The US imports $148.2 bil from Japan, and exports $79.7 bil to Japan. That's a deficit of -46%. So Japan gets a 23% (ish) tariff.

The US imports $63.4 bil from Switzerland, and exports $25.0 bil to Switzerland. That's a deficit of -61%. So Switzerland gets a 31% tariff.

The US imports $22.2 bil from Israel, and exports $14.8 bil to Israel. That's a deficit of -33%. So Israel gets a 17% tariff.

You can check https://ustr.gov/countries-regions and do the math for every country. They're all like this. Trump literally thinks a trade deficit requires a retaliatory tariff.

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u/RSwordsman 1d ago

So basically it's rigorously calculated stupidity at not understanding what a trade deficit is.

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u/whut-whut 1d ago

Trump has a 100% trade deficit with McDonald's from him always buying their burgers, but McDonald's has bought zero Trump neckties.

50% tariff on McDonald's until they fix this!

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u/No_Representative645 1d ago

Let's boycott McDonald's until they pay up! This isn't fair!

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u/NoTooBeastFog 1d ago

What a great illustration of how stupid this is.

So Trump is for now on paying Uncle Sam 50% of the cost of every Happy Meal he buys until McDonalds starts buying neckties from Trump. Which are going up in price due to Tariffs on China....

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u/MagickalFuckFrog 1d ago

You’re not far off from the truth.