Economy Trump's April 2nd Tariffs

[Siver!]

The tariffs are designed to make China less competitive. The whole point of them is that we're not supposed to be buying their stuff. Thats why countries tariff the shit out of everything we export.

Thats why leaders are lining up to negotiate a new deal with the USA.

We prop up China. They need us, probably more than we need them.

People like you make us weak. I know you think you're some kind of internet based revolutionist but thats not really how it is. All you're doing is reinforcing our dependency on a country with horrible human workers rights, who steal from us and the rest of the world with impunity, borderline cheerleading for them. How has this even affected you?

Well if you're not supposed to buy their stuff...

... why not increase the tariffs much, much further?

Methinks you don't understand the game that's afoot, dude.

 

[Seano]

The thing is Seano, and I don't want to speak for anyone else, is I don't think your statement about them needing us more than we need them is true. If you had data to the contrary I would be more than open to seeing it but seeing as how we import far more from them than we export to them I have had hard time with that statement.

If America wants to make China less competitive why not do what Asian countries have done for years? Learn what they are doing with things like cars, A.I., schools and just tweak it for America, and not just for corporations like when Amazon takes competitors ideas and rips them off. For example, governments keep subsidizing Tesla when their cars have been known to be worse and more expensive than their Chinese competitor, BYD. How about stop doing that and actually start raising standards so these companies stop putting out lackluster products.

The way I look at it is it is not so much cheerleading China but more of the idea that America is not going to advance by cutting regulations and education. Instead of the Trump Administration investing less and relying on the "free market" the government needs to step in and invest more. If the Republican playbook is used America won't get better.

I mean, we imported half a trillion in goods from them, 4 times what we exported to them. in 2024, we increased imports form China while they decreased imports from us, which has been a trend. Much of what we buy from them is literally toys and plastic nonsense. We don't really need a lot of what we get from China. We prop them up and in return, they steal tech from the world, exploit us and flood our country with propaganda.

There are things we need from China, sure but they need us to buy their plastic garbage even more.

 

[mkess101]

The tariffs are designed to make China less competitive. The whole point of them is that we're not supposed to be buying their stuff. Thats why countries tariff the shit out of everything we export.

Thats why leaders are lining up to negotiate a new deal with the USA.

We prop up China. They need us, probably more than we need them.

People like you make us weak. I know you think you're some kind of internet based revolutionist but thats not really how it is. All you're doing is reinforcing our dependency on a country with horrible human workers rights, who steal from us and the rest of the world with impunity, borderline cheerleading for them. How has this even affected you?

There are a bunch of flaws with this thinking as it pertains to the specific situation with China playing out right now.

First, the rest of the world didn't previously view the US as "the good guys" when it came to global superpowers. That's fantasy. BUT, we were absolutely looked at as the "less shitty of the two" when it came to us and China (at least with the majority of developed nations--there are exceptions obviously). Trump's actions are putting MASSIVE stress on that dynamic.

Second, the way each country operates makes this game of chicken WAY easier for China to play. Nobody "wins" a trade war. But the Chinese that rule their country are far better equipped not to lose it. Guess what Xi doesn't have to deal with? Mid terms. Reelection. His people suffer from an economic downturn due to the trade wars? He shrugs and moves on. Americans do? Well, you'll see mutiny within the Republican party. Trump as a lame duck won't stop the tide of desperate R's trying not to get ousted because of the economic turmoil that's possible.

So even if we theoretically grant (and I'm not, because trade imbalances are inherent between nations of disproportionate wealth) that the intentions are noble--the route being taken to get there is a ridiculously foolish one.

 

[Seano]

Well if you're not supposed to buy their stuff...

... why not increase the tariffs much, much further?

Methinks you don't understand the game that's afoot, dude.

er.... Isn't that exactly what we've done and are discussing in this thread? Tariffs on China are currently at 145%.

Quick question- why do people buy crap from China? Not industrial materials but things like keychains? Why do we buy that shit?

Because most of it is cheap, impulse crap you only buy because it doesn't cost much. If the same thing is suddenly 5 times as expensive, you won't buy it, right? I bet a year ago, you were shitting an Americans for shopping at walmart, am I right?

 

[Darkavius]

I mean, we imported half a trillion in goods from them, 4 times what we exported to them. in 2024, we increased imports form China while they decreased imports from us, which has been a trend. Much of what we buy from them is literally toys and plastic nonsense. We don't really need a lot of what we get from China. We prop them up and in return, they steal tech from the world, exploit us and flood our country with propaganda.

There are things we need from China, sure but they need us to buy their plastic garbage even more.

Totally get your point but America is addicted to that plastic garbage and has been for over 50 years now. A lot of Conservatives/Republicans/Dems want to blame this or that country but it is not their fault. China decades ago was a very bad place to be and they built themselves up and so did places like India. They took American greed and used it to their advantage. If you're looking for someone to blame I would point at American corporate welfare as the criminal here. All the money America has gotten and the quality corps give us becomes worse and worse all the time.

I don't know how old you are Seano but remember when Pizza Hut actually had good pizza? What is stopping Ford or Chevy from making a car as reliable for decades as a Toyota Corolla or a Honda Civic? American car companies are so bad they allowed Hyundai and Kia to come in the American market easily when 20 years ago most people never owned them. Why is Linux (which is generally free to download and use) a more reliable operating system than Microsoft Windows (whose peak was arguably in the 2000's)?

Point is we are not propping China up. America has dumbed itself down because of corps who only want us to spend more money but never want to invest in American schools, education or to increase their standards. There is a reason a lot of software jobs go to India and it is not because we could not find the quality people to do the job in America.

 

[Seano]

Totally get your point but America is addicted to that plastic garbage and has been for over 50 years now. A lot of Conservatives/Republicans want to blame this or that country but it is not their fault. China decades ago was a very bad place to be and they built themselves up and so did places like India. They took American greed and used it to their advantage. If you're looking for someone to blame I would point at American corporate welfare as the criminal here. All the money America has gotten and the quality corps give us becomes worse and worse all the time.

I don't know how old you are Seano but remember when Pizza Hut actually had good pizza? What is stopping Ford or Chevy from making a car as reliable for decades as a Toyota Corolla or a Honda Civic? American car companies are so bad they allowed Hyundai and Kia to come in the American market easily when 20 years ago most people never owned them. Why is Linux (which is generally free to download and use) a more reliable operating system than Microsoft Windows (whose peak was arguably in the 2000's)?

Point is we are not propping China up. America has dumbed itself down because of corps who only want us to spend more money but never want to invest in American schools, education or to increase their standards. There is a reason a lot of software jobs go to India and it is not because we could not find the quality people to do the job in America.

I am 48 and I do remember when this was a country to be proud of. I'd like to see a return to that.

 

[Darkavius]

I am 48 and I do remember when this was a country to be proud of. I'd like to see a return to that.

If you don't mind elaborating what made this country so great to you?

 

[Seano]

If you don't mind elaborating what made this country so great to you?

I'm nto going to spend all morning getting into specifics. I think you know what we've lost.

We used to lead the world. We were innovators. We were creators. We produced things the world needs. We've watched our manufacturing dissipate while our dependence of adversaries has increased exponentially. There were more reasons to be proud of who we are. We sold ourselves out to other countries and the reasons why escape me.

Now we're the worlds Salvation Army, basically. We're like the giant bowl of candy other countries pass on their way to better themselves, while shitting on us if we try to compete. We have to take the shit end in trade with EVERYONE. Our products we do manage to trade are tariff'd to the point of non competition and when we do the EXACT same thing, we are accused of a literal apocalypse. Not only do we eat shit on trade, we spend more to defend the EU than most of the EU does combined AND have to spend billions more on foreign aid than anyone else on top of that. How is this acceptable to anyone?
The big problem with that is that now we've had an entire generation who have never seen us as anything else. They don't understand what its like to live in a country that they're proud of. I know, its sounds like romantic hyperbole, but its the truth. There is an entire generation who has never felt pride in who they are.

 

[Siver!]

er.... Isn't that exactly what we've done and are discussing in this thread? Tariffs on China are currently at 145%.

Quick question- why do people buy crap from China? Not industrial materials but things like keychains? Why do we buy that shit?

Because most of it is cheap, impulse crap you only buy because it doesn't cost much. If the same thing is suddenly 5 times as expensive, you won't buy it, right? I bet a year ago, you were shitting an Americans for shopping at walmart, am I right?

Trump literally said yesterday he didn't want to put tariffs on China up anymore and stated it was because "people won't buy".

He WANTS people to buy from China so he can collect the tariff tax.

I'm being serious.

Trump says he might not want to raise tariffs on China any higher: 'At a certain point, people aren't going to buy'

Trump said he may not raise tariffs more even if China goes beyond the 125% duty it currently has on US goods.

www.businessinsider.com

He's telling you straight. It's a tax, nothing more.

 

[curryjunkie]

The tariffs are designed to make China less competitive. The whole point of them is that we're not supposed to be buying their stuff. Thats why countries tariff the shit out of everything we export.

Thats why leaders are lining up to negotiate a new deal with the USA.

We prop up China. They need us, probably more than we need them.

People like you make us weak. I know you think you're some kind of internet based revolutionist but thats not really how it is. All you're doing is reinforcing our dependency on a country with horrible human workers rights, who steal from us and the rest of the world with impunity, borderline cheerleading for them. How has this even affected you?

 

[Seano]

Trump literally said yesterday he didn't want to put tariffs on China up anymore and stated it was because "people won't buy".

He WANTS people to buy from China so he can collect the tariff tax.

I'm being serious.

Trump says he might not want to raise tariffs on China any higher: 'At a certain point, people aren't going to buy'

Trump said he may not raise tariffs more even if China goes beyond the 125% duty it currently has on US goods.

www.businessinsider.com

He's telling you straight. It's a tax, nothing more.

Its still part of our overall deal with them, thats why. We still need people to buy things in this country. We still need people to spend money at walmart.

 

[Siver!]

Its still part of our overall deal with them, thats why. We still need people to buy things in this country. We still need people to spend money at walmart.

Okay, whatever, you said "we're not supposed to buy their stuff", which isn't true.

You need Chinese goods, Trump knows you need them, so he's taxing them.

Hrs just working out the limits of the Trump Tantrum Tax, that's all.

The TTT.

 

[Seano]

Okay, whatever, you said "we're not supposed to buy their stuff", which isn't true.

You need Chinese goods, Trump knows you need them, so he's taxing them.

Hrs just working out the limits of the Trump Tantrum Tax, that's all.

The TTT.

Thats what tariffs are for yes. You need to put all these pieces of the puzzle together. We still trade with China. Selling our own goods would be preferable. So ideally, we would create the illusion of being a good trade partner with China, while making it more difficult for people to buy their product. Best case scenario, we produce our own goods and Americans buy them over Chinese crap, as they don't have the advantage of being cheaper. This is what literally every country does to us. This is why countries like China are in fear of reciprocal tariffs. We'd fuck them like they fuck us.

Unfortunately, we can't produce anything anymore because of the awful trade agreements that have crippled us while enriching everyone else, so our only recourse is to try to do better with what we do have. Tariffs are basically our only weapon and they are powerful, as evidenced by countries negotiating new trade deals with us vs telling us to fuck off.

 

[Siver!]

Thats what tariffs are for yes. You need to put all these pieces of the puzzle together. We still trade with China. Selling our own goods would be preferable. So ideally, we would create the illusion of being a good trade partner with China, while making it more difficult for people to buy their product. Best case scenario, we produce our own goods and Americans buy them over Chinese crap, as they don't have the advantage of being cheaper. This is what literally every country does to us. This is why countries like China are in fear of reciprocal tariffs. We'd fuck them like they fuck us.

Unfortunately, we can't produce anything anymore because of the awful trade agreements that have crippled us while enriching everyone else, so our only recourse is to try to do better with what we do have. Tariffs are basically our only weapon and they are powerful, as evidenced by countries negotiating new trade deals with us vs telling us to fuck off.

I think you're established as a premium economy.

You can't afford to produce affordable goods.

 

[Seano]

I think you're established as a premium economy.

You can't afford to produce affordable goods.

Yes, thats what I'm saying. That means "free trade" or "fair trade" with such nations is an illusion. So we get fucked that way AND they tariff everything we send over there so no one will buy it.

 

[mkess101]

Thats what tariffs are for yes. You need to put all these pieces of the puzzle together. We still trade with China. Selling our own goods would be preferable. So ideally, we would create the illusion of being a good trade partner with China, while making it more difficult for people to buy their product. Best case scenario, we produce our own goods and Americans buy them over Chinese crap, as they don't have the advantage of being cheaper. This is what literally every country does to us. This is why countries like China are in fear of reciprocal tariffs. We'd fuck them like they fuck us.

Unfortunately, we can't produce anything anymore because of the awful trade agreements that have crippled us while enriching everyone else, so our only recourse is to try to do better with what we do have. Tariffs are basically our only weapon and they are powerful, as evidenced by countries negotiating new trade deals with us vs telling us to fuck off.

But if these awful trade deals have "crippled us while enriching everybody else", why do workers here get paid so much more than these other places? Tariffs aren't primarily what make our products too expensive to sell in other places, it's more the fact that someone there is paid $8/day for what someone here gets paid $22/hour to do. It's simply not realistic to think that person making a fraction of what an American worker makes is gonna buy the product imported from America.

We can bemoan the uneven playing field and obviously, it would be great to rid the world of what's essentially slave labor- but sovereign nations are sovereign nations. And it's a global marketplace, so China isn't limited to selling only to the US obviously.

If you're the wealthiest place, you're gonna spend more than you sell. There's no way to tariff your way out of that.

 

[Seano]

But if these awful trade deals have "crippled us while enriching everybody else", why do workers here get paid so much more than these other places? Tariffs aren't primarily what make our products too expensive to sell in other places, it's more the fact that someone there is paid $8/day for what someone here gets paid $22/hour to do. It's simply not realistic to think that person making a fraction of what an American worker makes is gonna buy the product imported from America.

We can bemoan the uneven playing field and obviously, it would be great to rid the world of what's essentially slave labor- but sovereign nations are sovereign nations. And it's a global marketplace, so China isn't limited to selling only to the US obviously.

If you're the wealthiest place, you're gonna spend more than you sell. There's no way to tariff your way out of that.

Because we can't exploit workers the same way China can. Thats another reason why our trade isn't fair.

 

[AWilder]

Please let this be true

We demand an end to all tariffs on eyeliner!

 

[idrankyourbeer]

Trump brags gas is down to $1.98 a gallon in some states. It isn’t — anywhere

President attacks ‘fake news’ when reporter questions him on rising prices

www.independent.co.uk

#TrumpDementia

he also said that eggs were down 92%. what i want to know is where outside of benedict donald's fantasy funhouse can you find these eggs for around 49 cents per dozen?

 

[Siver!]

Yes, thats what I'm saying. That means "free trade" or "fair trade" with such nations is an illusion. So we get fucked that way AND they tariff everything we send over there so no one will buy it.

How exactly are you getting screwed?

You're buying goods that are cheaper. That's a good thing for you. That's how you save money.

This isn't about other countries and their tariffs, the calculations are all based on trade deficits which makes absolutely no sense.

It feels like there are about 6 or 7 angles we can claim these tariffs address, but ultimately they don't really address any of them or have any serious sense of purpose.

You don't want to manufacture what China does. You don't want to produce those goods in the US economy. You don't want to not buy the products because you need them, and you want them to be affordable so you can't tariff them too high. What's the point of it all? A negotiating tactics? For what? You're literally already winning all ends up, while complaining about getting screwed on a transactional level.

But it's not transactional. It's macro Commerce.