The world reacts to Trump's sweeping tariffs: 'No basis in logic'
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Well just to be fair - and i know people like shitting on Trump but hear me out - the complaints from workers against out-shoring labor to other countries has been very loud for many years.
Everytime the newspaper reports "Company X has moved its factory to China" you can be sure that lots of people are gonna complain about it. But tariffs are the only thing that actually forces companies to put the factories back to the USA. Or do you have a better idea?
wrote 7 days ago last edited byU.S. factories in most cases cannot produce goods that are competitive in a global market. Our labor costs are too high.
This idea that we can revive American traditional manufacturing of basic goods is a complete fantasy. The factories in Vietnam aren't going anywhere, because they will still be selling to the other 95% of the globe outside the U.S. Even if factories are stood up in the U.S., they will be constrained to producing higher-priced goods exclusively for the domestic market, with all the attendant inflationary impacts from start-up costs and higher labor costs.
Meanwhile, retaliatory tariffs from other countries will cause the collapse of U.S. exports. We'll lose markets for the sectors where the U.S. is still competitive, like agriculture, advanced manufacturing, and even services.
Trump's approach is similar to the failed development strategy of import substitution industrialization, except in this case he thinks it will cause the U.S. to reindustrialize. In any case, it will fail for the same reasons ISI failed in Latin America.
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You have to remember the people doing this are fucking idiots who have convinced themselves they're smarter than everyone else.
wrote 7 days ago last edited byExactly.... Yesterday Trump's "liberation day" clearly proved this
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Summary
Global leaders criticized Trump’s new tariffs, which range from 10% to 49%, warning of trade wars and economic fallout.
The UK and Italy urged negotiation, while Brazil passed a reciprocity bill. China and South Korea vowed countermeasures.
Australia and New Zealand rejected Trump’s logic, citing existing trade deals and low tariffs. Norfolk Island was baffled by a 29% duty despite having no exports.
Financial markets dropped, oil and bitcoin sank, and leaders warned of inflation. Analysts say Trump risks fracturing global trade with little to gain economically.
wrote 7 days ago last edited bySo, now $1 per banana is now real, wow. A complete bunch on my country costs that... We are banana exporters we are the banana republic...
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I saw someone say it seems that the tariffs were calculated by dividing our trade deficit by their exports to us and cutting that number in half. Another person analyzed his charts and concluded they look a lot like they were generated by AI.
So, there is, literally no basis in logic. Either one of Trump's minions calculated what it would take to recoup the difference in the trade deficit and just wrote it down and he announced that as the new basis for international trade, which has never, ever been done, for the reason that it is fucking idiotic, or he asked Gemini how to execute his already objectively stupid policy and wrote an Executive Order making it the law.
And the fact that we are forced to accept people on the Internet's guesses about how he calculated these numbers may actually be worse than the fact that just about every product on the market more complex than a stapler just jumped about 30% in price.
wrote 7 days ago last edited byThey published their “methodology” today, and it’s as dumb as you’d imagine: https://ustr.gov/issue-areas/reciprocal-tariff-calculations
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Summary
Global leaders criticized Trump’s new tariffs, which range from 10% to 49%, warning of trade wars and economic fallout.
The UK and Italy urged negotiation, while Brazil passed a reciprocity bill. China and South Korea vowed countermeasures.
Australia and New Zealand rejected Trump’s logic, citing existing trade deals and low tariffs. Norfolk Island was baffled by a 29% duty despite having no exports.
Financial markets dropped, oil and bitcoin sank, and leaders warned of inflation. Analysts say Trump risks fracturing global trade with little to gain economically.
wrote 7 days ago last edited byNorfolk Island was baffled by a 29% duty despite having no exports.
Ahahaha. For a day, I want to be inside his head and see the world through his eyes. It would be the most valuable insight for humanity... If only to learn exactly what not to do.
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Not really.
Corporations aren't going to be making billions of dollars off of, say Photoshop, if copyright and patents laws didn't exist.
Same goes for hollywood movies.
You're peddling rhetoric that was put here by your oppressors so you will work against your own interests. Congratulations.
wrote 7 days ago last edited byThe entities with the established distribution networks will make the money, not the little guy who makes their own little story.
If I write a little seld published novel, under your system, Hollywood can just take that story and make a movie of it without my permission. How is that better? You think more people pirating will take down these mega corps? Your system is chaos that's even worse than the current model.
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wrote 6 days ago last edited by
I've been saying this for years - why does anyone listen to him? He has no credibility - his whole life bio shows this clear as day.
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I don't buy that Trump has anything to do with the logic behind this world-destabalizing shock and awe spectacle.
The conversation would be different if people stopped attributing authorship to him and acknowledged the massive decades-old machine using him as a mouthpiece.
But it sure makes people feel smart though. Gives them something to meme about while the people who planned this get the real dirt done. Maybe he'll misspell a country name next... Do another ad for Leon's dinkeys, Israeli beans or something. Stoopid Donald got poopy pance. lol.
wrote 6 days ago last edited byThe conversation would be different if people stopped attributing authorship to him
Is there a lemmy channel for those conversations?
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D-bag works well enough for my purposes
wrote 6 days ago last edited bySure, whatever works for you.
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So, now $1 per banana is now real, wow. A complete bunch on my country costs that... We are banana exporters we are the banana republic...
wrote 6 days ago last edited byIt's one banana, Michael. What could it cost? $10?
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Well just to be fair - and i know people like shitting on Trump but hear me out - the complaints from workers against out-shoring labor to other countries has been very loud for many years.
Everytime the newspaper reports "Company X has moved its factory to China" you can be sure that lots of people are gonna complain about it. But tariffs are the only thing that actually forces companies to put the factories back to the USA. Or do you have a better idea?
wrote 6 days ago last edited byBut tariffs are the only thing that actually forces companies to put the factories back to the USA. Or do you have a better idea?
I mean no... And, how about accepting that the US is no longer a manufacturer, and that's just fine in a global economy
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wrote 6 days ago last edited by
Just unfathomably stupid.
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Lmao wat.
I’d ask if you’re serious, but I’m also sure you are.
Honestly, I was expecting this administration to be mind-numbingly stupid, but somehow they keep finding ways to surpass my expectations on that front on a daily basis. I’d be impressed if it wasn’t so catastrophic.
wrote 6 days ago last edited byI saw someone here explain it well... That when you try to understand the depths of the idiocy, you get the same feeling you do when you try to comprehend the size of the universe
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Summary
Global leaders criticized Trump’s new tariffs, which range from 10% to 49%, warning of trade wars and economic fallout.
The UK and Italy urged negotiation, while Brazil passed a reciprocity bill. China and South Korea vowed countermeasures.
Australia and New Zealand rejected Trump’s logic, citing existing trade deals and low tariffs. Norfolk Island was baffled by a 29% duty despite having no exports.
Financial markets dropped, oil and bitcoin sank, and leaders warned of inflation. Analysts say Trump risks fracturing global trade with little to gain economically.
wrote 6 days ago last edited byYou know what's fun? Cancelling stuff and citing the reason as 'tariff-related inflation'. It's too new and there is no response script yet, so customer service doesn't really argue.
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wrote 6 days ago last edited by
Nope, not for every country. Russia is missing from the tariffs
Overview In January 2025, United States exported $34.9M and imported $196M from Russia, resulting in a negative trade balance of $161M.
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I think Trump doesn’t want to trade at all. He wants us to produce everything we need.
wrote 6 days ago last edited byI'm actually pretty down with that that. We should be able and ready to produce whatever we need in case another country does what trump is doing or something happens that would prevent trade. If China attacks Taiwan, we should be able to produce our own chips. We should be able to function with as little dependence on other countries as possible.
In no way do tariffs fix that. You invest in yourself, slapping your friends because they're better than you at something is really fucking stupid.
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The entities with the established distribution networks will make the money, not the little guy who makes their own little story.
If I write a little seld published novel, under your system, Hollywood can just take that story and make a movie of it without my permission. How is that better? You think more people pirating will take down these mega corps? Your system is chaos that's even worse than the current model.
wrote 6 days ago last edited byThey can do so currently by making a couple of minor changes and settling for a pittance because your lawsuit would bankrupt you.
"Chaos" is a better system than one benefitting corporations only.
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But tariffs are the only thing that actually forces companies to put the factories back to the USA. Or do you have a better idea?
I mean no... And, how about accepting that the US is no longer a manufacturer, and that's just fine in a global economy
wrote 6 days ago last edited bytell that to the workers
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tell that to the workers
wrote 6 days ago last edited byI mean we did like 40 years ago...
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the "logic" is pretty much as you described it. Only, after charging yourself with the extra tax on Walmart purchases, you obviously can't afford Walmart any longer, so you learn to make your own soap with ash and the fats of animals that you have started breeding in your own flat.
wrote 6 days ago last edited byOr your neighbour does all the work instead of you, so you decide to buy soap from them. They're next door, while Walmart is across the county line, so you decide you won't charge yourself the extra self-tax with your neighbour.
Walmart"s soap, which used to be $2, is now $3, while your neighbour's soap is $2.50.
A week later your neighbour sees that demand for their soap is huge because everyone is self-taxing. So they raise their price to $2.95 to make extra profit.
In case you think this is just a contrived fiction, this is exactly what happened to many goods, like solar panels, with Trump's first-term tarrifs. Americans paid over double the average world price for solar panels.
Worse still, Trump knows this happened, yet somehow this time will be completely different. <sigh>
