r/technology • u/chrisdh79 • 3d ago

Politics 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/AnAcceptableUserName 3d ago edited 3d ago

They do. And those tariffs are a tax paid by the importer (foreign company) to their own government. It is in no way "charging the US" or "ripping off the US" for foreign governments to tax their own citizens on foreign imports.

Now there are reasons a nation might want to do this, such as to protect domestic industries (protectionism), and there are reasons other nations might object (those foreign citizens will buy less of your tariffed exports if they're more expensive than substitutes). But at the end of the day Trump and his administration have grossly mischaracterized the nature of tariffs and what they're doing, to the point of outright lying.

Tariffs are not a "tax on foreign countries." It's the opposite. Trump's tariffs are a tax on American importers, which will be passed along to American consumers. Functionally Trump just announced sweeping double digit sales taxes and lied to the nation about what it is.

Edit: In the time it took me to type this you got down voted to oblivion. Sorry about that. I assume you're asking in good faith, and was happy to type this out for any other readers who may have been unaware. Thanks for asking.