The reality is that's a fundamental misunderstanding of what a tariff is.
There is a reason you will find tariffs drop off after the great depression. They make everything more expensive for businesses and in turn, the end consumer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_tariffs_in_the_Unit...
"Fighting" China with tariffs is like fighting your neighbor who's dog keeps peeing in your yard by lighting your own couch on fire.
These tariffs have a huge red flag because there's no objective. Onshoring? No, wait, we got a new deal the tariffs are removed. New trade deals? No, wait, somebody wrote a mean Tweet about Donald so the tariffs are back and the deal is off.
These tariffs are arbitrary and capricious and no business would rationally respond to them with any kind of long term investment. People just want to weather the storm of the mad king and international partners are developing alternative relationships to seek more stability.
Tariffs do produce immediate market effects - inflation and shortages, which we do observe.
In order to produce positive market effects tariffs must be gradual, differentiated, measured, negotiated and communicated well in advance.
And if the cost if lives or dollars or reputation is enormous, he'll still sleep like a baby.
In the current political climate nothing is certain - but this will likely come to a resolution in the near term.
It doesn’t really make sense, for example, that we slapped tariffs on Madagascar, when the primary reason we run a trade deficit with them is that they grow vanilla which cannot be grown in the US.
Vanilla will happily grow in parts of Florida and the USVI as well.
Onshore vanilla production, now cheaper than Madagascar given the 47% tariff? No wait; the tariff was reduced to 10%, maybe 15? Something.
The burden of ALL taxes falls on both sides of the transaction. The proportion of the burden varies with market conditions, the most important being elasticity.
That's why studies like the OP are necessary, to determine how much the proportions are. Honestly I am not surprised with the result, tariffs are objectively bad. Curbing trade is bad by default.
That's not what we have here, and that's not what the Trump tarrifs are perceived as internationally.
It could've passed on the tax to the consumer, but it didn't. It has ceased making its iconic beverage and now only sells a variant that tastes crap. No amount of money can bring the good stuff back. The sugar tax killed it. The world is now a slightly worse place, thanks to government interference.
(I'm sure there's a way to extrapolate this anecdote back to tariffs)
It's always kind of enlightening to see exactly what things businesses choose to explicitly pass on to the customer, and what things they just eat as a cost of doing business. It's often very political and performative.
Some restaurants in California have taken to adding a "Living Wage Fee" to restaurant bills as a way to protest having to pay their employees proper wages. They could have just eaten the cost and raised their food prices slightly, but instead they chose the passive-aggressive route, complaining about it via the bill, which the customer sees. Presumably to try to convince the customer that "Living Wage" politics are bad and that they visibly raise the price the customer pays.
But, when the county raises their property taxes, the same restaurants just eat the cost. They don't add an "Unfair Property Taxes" line item to their diners' bills.
Businesses like to say that, to get consumers to back them politically, but it's not at all true:
When input costs increase, a seller must decide whether to take the extra expense out of their profit or to increase the price (or some mix of the two).
Taking the extra cost out of their profit obviously decreases profit.
Raising the price decreases sales (consumers won't buy as much at a higher price), which decreases profit. The change is not linear (look up demand curves). The seller, if they are smart, already found the price that maximizes revenue. Therefore changing the price will reduce revenue.
In reality, it's not such a science and there are other factors. Another fundamental factor is price elasticity of demand, which is how much a change in price affects demand. For sugary drinks, quite a bit - people can forgo them. For lifesaving healthcare, elasticity is less, for obvious reasons.
Yet that's not what the administration says about the subject. They're either confused or they're lying (and the people who support them and regurgitate their talking points are confused).
The belief that they are confused is a generosity that we should really be disabused of at this point.
Like, even the propaganda by fascists claiming fascism makes for good policies is bad. Germany under the Reich, completely setting aside the human atrocities, was a fucking SHIT SHOW of a nation state.
Everyone? No, only the willfully ignorant.
This would seem to be an admission that the domestic product is inferior, otherwise why would it be necessary to burden the import with tariffs?
In any case, if that's the intent, it's not working out for fairly predictable reasons. Lots of imported goods have no domestic equivalent. The factories required to make them require years of investment, which is not forthcoming, because the longevity of these tariffs is highly dubious and the government is doing nothing to encourage business development. And even if there were new factories, they would have to import machines and raw materials, which are of course tariffed, driving up the cost of domestic goods, and defeating the alleged purpose of the tariffs.
There's no just explanation that can make the tariffs look useful to anyone. Like everything from this administration, it's about the appearance of action.
They’re just an easy cudgel to use against an entire country at whim, at least until the rest of the government delegitimizes the “emergency” excuse being used to impose them.
Essentially the President regards everything as either a zero-sum no-holds-barred negotiation with him as the primary beneficiary, or as some kind of real-estate deal (see his Davos speech about how we’re “leasing” Greenland). Tariffs are just a great general-purpose stick he found a way to wield.
There are valid reason and particular instances for when tariffs are good/useful:
* https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/when-are-tariffs-good
It's just that the those instances are not applicable for what Trump is currently doing.
Actually people are being murdered for real, lots of other real stuff as well
They are. My point is not that the administration isn't having a real impact, but rather that they the administration doesn't care about the real impact, positive or negative. They care only that they get the headline.
And at least 60 other countries
"The intent is to make that stuff more expensive so we can compete."
Who is the 'we' in that sentence? If it's US citizens, then how is making US citizens pay more money helping US citizens compete?
What’s worse, this often raises domestic prices: unless we have robust competition, taxing imports just raises the ceiling for what an existing manufacturer can charge while the uncertainty discourages investment in new capacity: moving entire supply chains takes years and the tariffs changing frequently means that anyone financing it has to price in their competitive edge disappearing if the right cryptocurrency purchase gets the tariff rescinded.
And Afghanistan, Botswana, Cameroon, Fiji, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nauru, Serbia, …
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariffs_in_the_second_Trump_ad...
Also, let's not forget about 'penguin island':
Will this bring manufacturing back? It seems to be working to some extent, but its a risk to manufacturers because the whole thing could get reversed after an election.
Not to mention the incoherence that one day its a tool to bring jobs back, the next day its just a negotiation tactic so they get reduced/dropped on a country by country basis over and over.
I thought it was retaliation for Canada not doing enough to stop their 20-odd kilogram contribution to the 4 tons of fentanyl smuggled in every year? [0]
(Which is to say I agree with you. Just trying to support your point that the reasoning has been so completely all over the map that anybody trying to assign any real meaning seems delusional. At this point I think most people have entirely forgotten half the reasons that have been made up along the way.)
[0] https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/07/fact-sheet-pr...
The "smart MAGA" guys always crack me up because by the time they craft an intellectual justification for his previous moves, he has pivoted/reversed and pantsed them once again.
Frequently we get the "he's been poor advised" fallback as well.. Good Czar, Bad Boyars.
[1] https://www.koco.com/article/manufacturing-jobs-us-tariffs/7...
The trade deficit is shrinking, and which necessarily means there is more domestic flow as foreign hoards of dollars are liquidated. That flow has to go somewhere.
Could be straight to the tax cuts of course.
You are correct. Of course, if new output is automated, then the purported goal of the tariffs (more manufacturing jobs!) is defeated.
The fact that any new manufacturing will of course be automated shows how little thought went into designing these tariffs and how transparently false the administration's promises are.
> The trade deficit is shrinking
This is totally irrelevant. The size of the trade deficit does is a red herring.
Because factory machines and raw materials are being tariffed. Also because a source of cheap labor (immigrants) is being excised.
> Actually increasing manufacturing capacity first requires construction and capital expenditure.
It certainly does. And companies are rightfully hesitant to invest, because the legally dubious basis for the tariffs may not survive this month, much less into the next administration.
Yet history teaches us that the sort of people this administration consists of never relinquish power without a fight.
1. It isn't now, nor has it ever been, the role of the federal government to dictate what types of jobs exist in the private sector. 2. Even if this was the end goal, making it easier and more affordable to manufacture in the US would be far better for all parties involved rather than brute forcing it through arbitrary taxes.
To what specific extent is it working? Not that I don't believe you, just curious how much it's changed already and in what way.
We just bought a million sq ft building (that was an old RCA plant) and millions in new machinery to keep up.
We are only a regional player, too.
Perhaps some of that has been replaced by "Made in USA".
(Day-to-day, I generally don't buy things not made in the EU — packaging, for example, will typically be from Sweden, France or Poland.)
This is the other side of tariffs that few discuss. It may put import prices up, but it also increases the domestic flow of income.
Which means that those who rely solely on imports pay the cost and those who make the domestic supply get an increase in income as an offset.
Our prices are primarily pegged to what brown paper is (used to make corrugated) which ebbs and flows. Our prices were affected a little because a lot of pulp and raw material comes from Canada (they sell soft wood incredibly cheap... it's actually been a point of contention in our treaty for decades) but the cost change has been fairly slight (close to inflation).
Labor prices have gone up a decent amount and so has health care. We've found savings in increased efficiency due to scaling up production (there are some big fixed costs wrt machinery that becomes a smaller piece of the pie with increased production).
Nobody imports boxes... cost of transport is more than the product which is why almost all box makers have regional plants.
And you think this is due to tariffs? If so, please provide some details.
1. The tariffs are too broad, they don't target a single or a few industries.
2. Trump has gone back and forth many times on them, using them as negotiating leverage, not as long term incentives.
3. They are on very shaky legal grounds and will likely end up getting reversed by either the Supreme Court or the next president.
If you want to use tariffs to encourage on-shoring you make them targeted and pass them with bipartisan support through congress. Companies need stability and long term guarantees for the kind of capital expenditure that is needed. Even better if you use a mix of carrot and stick, rather than all stick
And with China a key target in the Trump Tariff debacle, China is punching holes in these punitive tariffs. Besides shipping goods to intermediary countries that are not as heavily tariffed then exporting to the U.S., China is taking ownership stakes in American businesses, thus circumventing the whole tariff thing. And the beauty of this is, they can take advantage of U.S. taxpayer benefits, such as an R&D tax credit, to sweeten the deal.
Nikon (for one) had to raise US prices on their digital cameras to handle tariffs:
* https://www.dpreview.com/news/7688376775/tariff-watch-nikon-...
Is the US administration hoping to increase (digital) camera production in the US? Camera lenses? Is there a moribund American camera industry that could thrive if given a chance?
During Trump 1.0 he raised tariffs on steel and got 1k job in steel manufacturing… but lost 75k jobs in manufacturing that used steel as an input:
* https://www.investopedia.com/metal-tariffs-cost-at-least-75-...
> It seems to be working to some extent […]
US manufacturing job numbers are down:
* https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-factory-headcount-fallin...
* https://www.wsj.com/economy/u-s-manufacturing-is-in-retreat-...
If China and the US were producing the same things but the US version was just a bit more expensive, then sure, consumers might switch yo the US version if the Chinese version overnight became the more expensive one.
But that isn't what's happening generally. China is producing stuff that the US simply doesn't produce, and so consumers just need to pay the increase out of their own pockets for the same Chinese product. It takes multiple years lead time to set up a manufacturing operation for anything of note, and I doubt many people are convinced of the stability of the tariffs to make that leap.
> its a risk to manufacturers because the whole thing could get reversed after an election.
It's a risk to manufacturers when Trump might wildly change tariffs for a country / set of goods / whatever, up or down, at any time, because someone said something he didn't like somewhere, or some other non-economic rationalization.
The instability and lack of cohesive direction mean it's impossible for manufacturers to respond to tariffs with investment even within Trump's term.
US Tariffs only hurt US citizens. Anything else is simply the stuttering of a simpleton.
And if the tariffs are ruled invalid you're free to speculate whether target is going to send you a check for what you effectively paid or just pocket the difference.
Maybe it’s because of propaganda, mis information, social media, education or because they’re too busy and tired trying to make ends meet so they don’t have time to research issues for themselves.
It feels like it will be very difficult to course correct when so much money and power wants it this way.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tylerroush/2025/08/31/trump-say...
But, that's (corporate) socialism, and that group of people (mostly) claim to hate socialism.
There's a time and place for tariffs. Protecting "all" domestic industries via global trade war is (IMO) not it. Nor is wielding tariffs as a punishment simply because a foreign leader wasn't docile and subservient enough for Trump.
If the tariffs were "an attempt to get domestic US industries to produce items now being imported," they wouldn't be levied on manufacturing inputs.
Then their understanding is incorrect because that isn't even the INTENTION.
That's how the US won the first trade war under trump 1 (and continued by Biden). Now Trump 2 tried to ramp it up and this time its backfired because other countries have refused to go along. Many have even been pushed to collaborate more closely with China. China's exports have only grown to record highs
Trump failed to convince other countries to continue going along because he's a simplistic zero-sum bully who barks orders, expects others to fall in line, and then throws a tantrum when they don't - rather than a tactful leader capable of maintaining the trust of a voluntary positive-sum coalition. That he's also been overtly attacking allies at the same time doesn't help convince anyone either - the new regime was attacking Canada straight out of the gate, and it's hard to explain attacking Greenland any other way than a Putin-favored plan to drive a wedge between us and our traditional allies.
I suspect very few believes the claims other countries are paying the tariffs anymore. People are just saying that's true to stick to the party line.
Unfortunately, saying plainly untrue things has become a major part of US politics.
Let me propose a game. You name a bald-face lie told by the last administration. A bald-face lie is one where the person telling the lie knows its a lie, and knows that the people they saying the lie to knows that it is a lie. Got it? Bald face lies are generally only told by sociopaths. So, you do that, and I will give you 5 told by this admin. I will include at least one from the last month. We'll keep going back and forth and keep a tally. With you getting a 5x handicap.
Now, do you think you will win that game? Do you think it will even be close? Be honest with your answer.
Just like Mexico will pay for the wall?
> The reality is that's a fundamental misunderstanding of what a tariff is.
Nope! It's a politician talk! People fall for lies whenever they are sold wrapped in a label of "cheap prices".
There’s an argument that some sort of tariffs are actually necessary. The world is changing and the US has become reliant on countries who increasingly have divergent interests from the US. Additionally, some countries have aging populations that will make them more and more unreliable places to manufacture stuff in the next couple decades. It’s entirely reasonable to believe that it’s pretty critical for the US to begin the process of re-industrializing as soon as possible and tariffs are a crucial lever to make that happen.
But…how you do that matters. Re-industrialization is a process that will take decades and the businesses doing that need to be fairly sure of the government’s policy for most of that period. If Trump had built a broad consensus with Democrats for the tariff policy so that businesses could have understood that a future Democratic president or congressional majority would continue the tariff policy, then businesses would be able to plan accordingly and begin the massive capital outlays that come with re-shoring manufacturing. And the tariffs would strategically exclude certain items like the steel that would be necessary to build factories. And, lastly, you wouldn’t pick now to go on a deportation spree when a sizable chunk of the nations construction workers are undocumented immigrants, since all those factories will need to be built by someone and there aren’t enough Americans to do it.
But instead of the sane and well-reasoned way to do it, we’ve got Trump’s shoot-from-the-hip chaos version. The tariff policy changes weekly, so businesses can’t predict it, let alone rely on it in the way they would need to to spend the collective trillions of dollars on manufacturing infrastructure that need to be spent. And he’s antagonizing Democrats to such and extent that any future Democratic administration will drop the tariffs on day one. The result of which is that businesses, understandably, are hunkering down until he’s out of office. Instead of spurring the massive investment we need, his policies have chilled spending on manufacturing. The only thing we’re really building at the moment are data centers.
So there’s this narrative that tariffs are awful now that’s really the result of someone incompetently deploying them. Some sort of tariff policy would actually be a necessary medicine for the country to help heal the damage from an over reliance on a globalized system that is going to crumble in the coming decades. It won’t be easy, but the earlier the country starts to address it, the better the outcome will be. But it needs to be done intentionally, in a bi-partisan way and through acts of Congress, not in a scattershot fashion where Congress is a bystander and a single deranged lunatic pulls tariff percentages out of ass whenever the mood strikes him.
See also his brief hesitation only when his farming and hospitality CEO buddies ask him to leave some illegals for their business needs.
The reason is, the whole world's manufacturing base had been destroyed in the War and the USA was the only man left standing!
We didnt need tarriffs because we were already winning the trade balance. Tarriffs made it harder to repatriate overseas gains.
https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2019/may/historica...
> is like fighting your neighbor who's dog keeps peeing in your yard by lighting your own couch on fire.
it's more like buying your own dog to pee in your yard, and keep out the neighbor's
What is missing from the convo is where the tarriffs go - they go to fund the federal gov't, which spends on Goods and Services for the American People (you hope).
What you would want to see is a reduction on income taxes concomitant with the increased tarriff revenue. US Gov gets the same amount of money, US consumers pay the same in taxes + tarriffs, but American industries get protection from overseas competition, strengthening key sectors of the US economy.
I guess you could argue that we’re so far behind in some sector like manufacturing that we need developing-nation-like trade barriers to nurture embryonic growth, but a look at real numbers would, I think, demonstrate that’s rubbish.
Yes, that's historically been the argument used to pry open foreign markets
Tariffs in the legal sense are technically paid by the importer who sells a product. It's their responsibility to pay it... always.
The importer could technically eat that cost, and the consumer wouldn't see a difference on their price tag.
But what happens in practice, the vast majority of the time, is the importer passes that extra cost on to the consumer by raising the price they're selling it for. This is technically a business decision made by every importer individually, it is not a requirement.
The people saying tariffs are paid by the importer, or tariffs are paid by the consumer, are both right, but within different perspectives and depending on how each importer chooses to handle their tariffs.
Once the tariffs dropped, their cost of goods more than doubled.
Their business in that capacity, was gone overnight.
It's easy to think in some vacuum businesses can just "absorb" costs, but as many businesses know, this is rarely the case.
No, it becomes a non-existent item.
> Seems like a win all around?
If you burn your neighbor's house down, it's possible that what will get built in its place will be nicer. That doesn't make it a "win all around".
Genius, though. Just have them pay more for their "luxury" items! Why didn't they think of that! They would be glad to know helping kids with special needs is a "luxury."
It's interesting to see how little of that is going on, empirically, by looking at these kinds of quantitative studies.
https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/global-reta...
What we mean when we ask who is paying the tariff is this: when we increase tariffs, who becomes poorer?
And the answer to that is obvious.
No "importer" is going to eat the cost of the tariffs, and it is ridiculous that anyone would think that.
Alternatively: You don't need tariffs when you're the only industrial nation not bombed into oblivion.
>They make everything more expensive for businesses and in turn, the end consumer.
Agreed
But no, some of us have had functional brains for a while. Thanks.
EDIT: to be fair, if you were even slighly more specific about the shit-eating morons that ate this illogical, stupid rhetoric, it would be too political and, at best, result in your comment getting clobbered so.... "everyone" it is. Can't make the dumb****s that led us here feel bad.
It might shock you to ask around your social circle and discover how many people would read a hypothetical headline like, "Tax Rate for Top Income Bracket Increases to 55%", and interpret it as, "Wow, so if my income was as high as that, more than half of what I made would go to the government. Crazy!"
But tariffs have been used in the car industry for decades. If you got rid of them completely within 5 years the American car companies would be closing plants.
The whole reason Japanese auto manufacturers build plants in the US was to avoid tariffs. Shipping costs are actually incredibly minimal for a vehicle.
So in my opinion, we've seen where they can work. If you value American jobs anyways. It does get hard to math out when you have to weigh the money the average consumer would save over the 10 million auto jobs in the US.
https://epa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=...
There is a LOT of other work we could be doing if we stopped trying to uphold existing uncompetitive industries
I’m with you though. If humans could just get along we could build an amazing world.
China only became an auto industry power house in the 00s.
Not that hard to math out, the deadweight loss of tariffs is always non-zero. IIRC there was a pretty good paper that mathed out the impact of Obamas tire tariffs and concluded that it cost the economy significantly more jobs than it saved.
The thousand of hours labor, the material to source the widget, the real estate for the factory, the transportation now all occurs overseas.
At the very least, you can't spew something like that then not even bother to link a source.
Ratio of 3 jobs lost per tire job saved.
> The thousand of hours labor, the material to source the widget, the real estate for the factory, the transportation now all occurs overseas.
This frees up massive amounts of capital that is more effectively spent playing to Americas strengths, this isn’t a zero sum game.
I'm not super educated on all the happenings in the car industry globally, but I've seen a few videos of Chinese EVs that put anything Ford, GM or other US brands have put out to absolute shame.
You start off with
> I think blanket tariffs are dumb don't get me wrong.
Then add a conjunction and use a single example to just make a point opposite to what you started with.
> So in my opinion, we've seen where they can work.
I can't help but think that you don't believe blanket tariffs are dumb because it worked for one industry and helps American jobs. Just start with that please.
I disagree with this both-sideism. Democrats are much more in following with norms, where MAGA-era FKA-republicans will through anything aside for their benefit (e.g. Merrick Garland).
If the Dems pick up on some of the issues the Republicans are neglecting, while maintaining principles* about healthcare access and reproductive rights I expect they'd be the dominant political force in America for some time...if they just had somebody who could man the helm.
* Hah. What principles?
The regional/small business owners are always threatened by competition from larger international firms and benefit less from international trade. They believe in the nationalist rhetoric and are opposed to free trade because it undercuts their businesses with cheaper products. They think the U.S. can remain the world's superpower without running a trade deficit and doesn't need to build alliances to maintain its power. This is Trump's base, and their misunderstanding of U.S. power is why they love the idea of tariffs. (good for local producers!) They want to get all the benefits of being a superpower without any of the costs.
The original income tax was sold as 1% on mid income and 2% on high income. At the time more than half the country was not going to pay any tax.
Southern states supported an income tax because they believed it would make it possible to collect revenue for indigent people. Exactly opposite of "taxes the rich".
...for the wealthy. Tariffs are use taxes and overwhelmingly affect the 99%.
What domestic behavior specifically?
If they're supposed to encourage industrial development at home, they've failed on that front. Building new factories requires years of commitment and billions of dollars, but the current administration has shown no interest in actually investing in that development. Meanwhile, the raw materials that would be necessary for a factory are more expensive precisely because of the tariffs, making new industry even less likely. Finally, the very dubious legal ground on which the tariffs are based means that no one is sure they'll be around to the end of this administration, much less into the next, so there's little interest in adapting long-term plans to a temporary state of affairs.
If they're supposed to encourage consumers to buy domestic, they've failed on that count too. Many goods simply are not available manufactured in the US (see above). If the tariffs were applied gradually and incrementally, maybe people would adapt, but from the consumer's mount of view, everything just gets more expensive, so what are they supposed to do? Again, applying tariffs to raw materials means that it's impossible for American businesses to undercut foreign imports even if they wanted to.
Like everything from this administration, the tariff are an impulsive decision based on poor economic understanding and incompetent execution.
In other words, they are a regressive tax --- pure and simple.
If tariffs are held strong, there will be two possible outcomes:
1) Domestic production will be increased (via American businesses as well as onshoring foreign businesses), providing jobs and ultimately lower-cost products
2) International tariffs will be decreased across the board - resulting in a more level field for American businesses to compete in foreign nations
Few realize American goods have been tariffed internationally for decades, resulting in a difficult-or-impossible business climate for American businesses.
The situation is akin to Wall Street's infamous short-term outcome favorability. Tariffs are a long-term game, and people have to be willing to trade some short-term outcomes for the long-term economic health of America and it's businesses (and jobs, wages, etc).
When has reduced competition ever resulted in lower-cost products?
Even for goods we already mass produce, companies respond to tariffs of their competitor's goods by hiking their own prices up.
That works when those countries are selectively tariffed while others are let off. Blindly applying tariffs to whatever satisfies the mood is not the way.
> or alternatively to apply pressure to a sector to bring it on shore.
For this to work, the cost of onshore production must be lower than the tariffed price. The inputs must be made cheaper and not tariffed. Again the US administration is not doing any of these strategically.
> The inputs must be made cheaper and not tariffed.
Not necessarily. It's presumably not as efficient, but you'd still expect the entire chain to head in the desired direction eventually.
I have talked to some purchasing people at my company and it seems it's going exactly the other way. The company is moving as much production as possible away from the US to serve the international market without paying for tariffs.
The purpose of a thing is what is does. If a tariff can be used to stop a war, then tariffs are meant as a strategic bargaining chips.
This is what a tariff is.
This is why the ”overregulated” EU got hit with a 30% tariff?
1. 90% instead of 100% is pretty good 2. kind of irrelevant, a better question is how much more money went to domestic companies rather than foreign?
Tariff can hardly to connected to tax
In Chinese , tariff = 关 税 = port tax
That is to say there is no 200% tariff on cups.
[1] - https://www.fedex.com/en-us/ancillary-clearance-service.html
So in this case an American is still paying for the misguided close-the-barn-door-after-the-horse-ran-out policy, just with most going directly to the corporate interests that helped install this corrupt administration.
(but the joke is on them - Aliexpress Choice doesn't charge brokerage fees)
Tariffs are designed to change consumer spending habits, and force international businesses to create on-shore operations. To that end, they are effective - but it takes longer than 365 days for those patterns to shift.
> misguided close-the-barn-door-after-the-horse-ran-out policy
> helped install this corrupt administration
I dare say your opinion, here, has nothing to do with the efficacy of tariffs. Tariffs have long been studied, and both major political parties have called for tariffs like we're seeing right now at various points in recent history. The only difference is nobody desired to rock the status quo, so the lopsided economic policies of the past persisted.
Nearly every other nation tariffs American goods in some way. American businesses attempting to sell products into Brazil, the UK, Germany and more are - and have been - at a significant disadvantage for decades due to high import taxes and duties. For the first time those international businesses are feeling the same consequences as their own nation's weaponized economic policies. Perhaps that will put pressure on their governments, achieving the ultimate goal of the USA's policy - reduce and/or remove tariffs across the board. ie. Fair Trade vs. Free Trade.
I didn't say they aren't, rather I focused on the higher-level context which seems more relevant.
> the efficacy of tariffs
I'm not arguing against tariffs in general. I'm taking issue with applying them twenty years too late (after entire industries have wholesale moved away), in an arbitrary, capricious, and illegal manner (dubious for encouraging long-term investment), while expecting them to create well-paying domestic jobs - the only ways to compete with Chinese labor prices are creating domestic "lights out" factories (which given the regime's continued rolling out the red carpet for cross-border capital, likely won't even be American owned), or devaluing our currency to turn our country into an impoverished manual-labor work camp of the type that China worked desperately to move beyond.
As I alluded to with my last parenthetical, I expect the main outcome to be further erosion of what domestic industry we have left (eg Amazon [0] is less competitive, but also any last-step value-add manufacturing / productization) in favor of an international just in time supply chain where this new national sales tax is only paid after a consumer has bought the product.
[0] I could see Amazon just moving most operations to customs-bonded warehouses though.
The best time to take action was yesterday. The second best time is today.
Tariffs are a long-term economic policy. It will take longer than 365 days to change consumer spending habits and onshore foreign businesses/production and rebuild domestic businesses/production.
Most countries have tariffed US goods for decades. The US tariffs on foreign goods will, over the long term, convince foreign nations to reduce or eliminate their tariffs on US goods (creating a more fair business climate for US businesses), and/or increase domestic production (creating jobs, salaries, taxes, etc).
We can't act like it's just too late to do anything about the lop-sided economic policies of decades-past, and we can't act like changing those policies today is nothing but doom. There will be a restructuring - a period of time to adjust - and then things will be fine over the long term. It just takes time and the political will-power to do so.
The best time to close the barn door was before the horses ran off. The second best time is today.
Does this make sense? Especially as a plan for getting the horses back?
Markets are not computationally smooth, rather they have structure. China recognized this, which is why they've been using government policy to keep their prices low to make industries get over the activation energy of moving there. Now that those industries are there, the structure then gives China leverage which "we" (ie our leadership class) are only now waking up to. Adding some tariff friction that would have kept industry here is nowhere near the level of incentive required to bring industry back.
> We can't act like it's just too late to do anything about the lop-sided economic policies of decades-past
I'm not. There is another comment of mine in this thread pointing out how Americans have been getting fleeced for decades by not spending the proceeds of having the world reserve currency on mitigating the problems of having the world reserve currency. What I am saying is that tariffs, especially as being championed right now, are more like hopium rather than actually confronting the problem.
> we can't act like changing those policies today is nothing but
The doom part comes from having an incompetent dictator-wannabe President who is at best applying a cookie-cutter approach that is decades out of date, but more seemingly just using these levers as threats to personally enrich himself as our country burns. Which is why he is also using tariffs against longstanding allies, thus prompting them to revisit why they are harming their own economies by tariffing China.
> the political will-power to do so.
What I see is the political willpower on this topic (and other longstanding problems) being abused to not actually address those problems, but rather just to facilitate the next con job on the American people.
A factor in this that is not mentioned is that companies selling goods to the US may have made an effort to lower prices, altering production to lessen tariffs or in other way tried to offset the extra amount US consumers have to pay.
An estimate of that would be quite interesting.
Isn't that the 10% in the article? That's the mechanism by which "China pays the tariffs".
So this 10% might also simply represent de facto theft from foreign business.
Typical. 1) No, tariffs are not always paid by the end consumer, producer margins collapse also. 2) If the end consumer can pay increased prices then the previous price wasn't properly efficient. 3) Short term vs Long term matters most in the actual outcome of prices as domestic competition takes time to build. 4) Interest rates are being kept high to produce a reportable outcome.
End the Fed, then lets see where we are. Otherwise, stop trusting banks because you hate the used car salesman.
In most free trade agreements many products are without tariffs, some have quotas and others yet have tariff. For example, under CUSMA Canada have no tariffs on US made apparel and footwear, diary is under quota and steel has 25-50% tariffs. But then if you hear someone who lies a lot and has an agenda they will only tell you about steel tariffs and make you think that all US made products are under tariff.
That's an easy question. The answer is "they don't."
USMCA/NAFTA guaranteed free trade with Mexico and Canada.
Pre-2025, there was no blanket tariff on US goods in Europe. They tariffed some agricultural goods at 11%. Industrial goods were in single digits.
The tariff numbers that Trump purports (e.g. blanket 30% tariffs on Switzerland) are in no way proportional to their tariffs on US goods. It's just false.
The lie that other countries had massive blanket tariffs on all US goods is being sold to the American public to justify massive so-called "reciprocal" tariffs that (a) violate existing trade agreements, (b) make things expense for the American consumer, (c) don't necessary encourage new businesses in the US.
Trump also either purposely or stupidly considers the VAT a tariff instead of a sales tax.
I just want to point out that this "reciprocal" nonsense was in no way calculated or strategic. The chart/table they showed was literally LLM-generated and no one could explain how they got those numbers. It's a complete circus and we're sitting here refuting bullshit everyday.
Even if there were massive tariffs towards the US, these are clearly politically motivated economic attacks, not motivated by economics. And that's not a thing an ally would do, regardless.
All Trump's policies assume he's playing a single-move game where his is the only move. It turns out it's an infinite game and the other side actually has free will and competent decision makers. He can't just wish people into the cornfield as he promised.
American importers and consumers bear the cost of 2025 tariffs: analysis
See FedEx for instance:
14.6 Regardless of any payment instructions to the contrary, the Sender is ultimately responsible for payment of duties and taxes and all fees and surcharges related to FedEx’s disbursement of duties and taxes if payment is not received. If a Recipient or a third party from which reimbursement confirmation is required refuses to pay the duties and taxes upon request, FedEx may contact the Sender, for the same. If the Sender refuses to make satisfactory arrangements to reimburse FedEx, the Shipment may be returned to the Sender (in which case, Sender will be responsible both for original and return charges) or placed into a temporary storage, general order warehouse or a customs-bonded warehouse or considered undeliverable. If Transportation Charges for a Shipment are billed to a credit card, FedEx reserves the right to also settle uncollected duties and taxes charges associated with that Shipment to the credit card account.
It sure sounds like they aren't going to charge the shipper. And I can't blame them for not wanting to be left empty-handed.
In short, they now often release shipments without attempting to collect payment from the recipient and charge the shipper.
> Duties and taxes may generally be billed to the sender, the recipient or a third party. If the sender fails to designate a payer on the air waybill, duties and taxes will automatically be billed to the recipient where allowed. Bill Sender Duties and Taxes and Bill Third Party Duties and Taxes are options available only for deliveries to specified locations. REGARDLESS OF ANY PAYMENT INSTRUCTIONS TO THE CONTRARY, THE SENDER IS ULTIMATELY RESPONSIBLE FOR PAYMENT OF DUTIES AND TAXES IF PAYMENT IS NOT RECEIVED. If transportation charges for a shipment are billed to a credit card, FedEx reserves the right to also settle uncollected duties and taxes charges associated with that shipment to the credit card account.
The runaway deficit is a massive problem now given the age of 0 interest rates is over.
So what's astonishing is, whether you like him or not, the Orange man actually got the American public to accept what is defacto the largest tax increase in decades.
Unfortunately, they immediately spent that money too on the promise of persistently high growth in the world's richest economy. I find that unlikely over time, but time will tell.
Seems every large Western country is currently hell bent on finding out what level of deficit spending results in societal collapse.
What does it mean "got the public to accept it?" The public had no say and these are probably illegal. On top of that, he probably literally does not know that these are effectively taxes on consumers (i.e. he believe his own bullshit).
No credit is due here whatsoever.
Yes, I'm sure he believes his own bullshit, but ironically, its bullshit that the US actually needed to pull (tax increases). Modern democracy has proven totally incapable of not stealing the future from its children.
But I also agree that getting an advanced electronic device landed to my door for $5 was an unnatural economic state and something should have been done. Not unilateral 100%+ tariffs, changing weekly, with bonus rampant insider trading. We elected the worst possible person for that important job.
Did you forget that the Big Beautiful Bill included a massive tax cut?
Netting it out, it’s a loss in revenue that disproportionately helps the richest and taxes the poor while making the government revenue decline. While also making the US dollar decline, multiplying the losses.
Stupid is as stupid does.
You may chose not to buy any products or goods that requires you to pay tariffs.
Which is the primarily goal to begin with. Influence consumer behaviour.
I realize that for some products and goods there may not be a an alternative choice of products or goods that do have tariffs.
In theory, over time, these will be increasingly replaced by products and services that have the competitive advantage of not having to tariffs applied to them.
Once tariffs are in place for a year or two it is possible that, domestic producers have expand capacity, have created jobs have caused supply chains shift and new production is based on the tariff based price structure
This however takes time. And to what extent it happens is not easy to predict.
Some may think that the next president will remove all tariffs the moment he or she takes office, so it is a short term problem. The problem with removing them all, is if the above has happened, and removing them will destroy American jobs.
The problem with broad tarrifs by executive order under emergency powers to address longstanding issues are numerous.
Longevity and stability of the tarrifs is questionable because a new executive is likely to cancel them, the executive that issued them is likely to cancel them, and they may also be cancelled by the courts because their basis isn't solid. For some goods where production is easy to shift, it still makes sense to move it ... but then it's easy to shift out again when the winds change; goods where setting up production is a many years thing aren't likely to move with the winds.
The broad tarrifs mean that for goods that are manufactured from components of many origins, it may not make sense to pay tarrifs on the components in order to reduce tariffs on the finished goods. Or that it makes more sense to move manufacturing from one foreign country to another than to move to the US. I get it if you want to move both manufacturing and resource extraction to the US; but it would make more sense to do it one step at a time... first develop demand for the resources in the US, then push to onshore the resource extraction... OTOH a lot of americans prefer resource extraction to be out of sight, and some resources are simply not abundant here.
The other factor is that many countries respond to our broad tarrifs on their exports with their own tarrifs on our exports. This can easily hurt US producers more than it helps them. US products become more expensive in those countries due to their import tarrifs as well as US import tarrifs on the inputs and often there are many non-US suppliers to choose from; possible increases in US domestic demand may not materialize because costs will go up for US consumers as well due to tarrifs on input and potentially loss of economies of scale if the reduction in exports is significant.
I may be a free trade maximalist, but IMHO, the current admin's tariff policy is a recipie for economic slowdown. Which does help their goal of reducing immigration: the best way to reduce economic immigration is to have a deeper recession or depression than the world at large; it also helps with traffic. Big inflation numbers also push stock indexes up and reduce the cost of servicing old debt, but increase the cost of revolving and issuing new debt.
Once tariffs are in place for a year or two it is possible that consumers will be paying higher prices for inferior goods from providers that can't compete elsewhere.
In other words, there are both positive and negative effects --- and no clear way to predict which will prevail.
It's 19 century economics applied in the 21st century --- it's direct government interference in the marketplace --- the opposite of what Republicans spent decades railing against.
That's how tariffs would work if wielded for the right reasons. But now domestic producers have to pay tariffs on the very machines and inputs needed to expand capacity.
I don’t support tariff but it being used as a negotiating technique is the only choice here to reduce trade deficit.
US can’t keep up the trade deficit it currently has. It requires endless fiscal deficit and sell paper money to others that sends their cheap stuff to US. With growing deficit, the interest payment now is soon to be higher than defence budget. Something has to give.
Because it seems more likely to me that we have a greedy moron in charge who doesn’t mind his “business” (aka our society) loses trillions as long as his family and friends make billions.
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