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1.) Tariffs are a tax on the consumer.
2.) Competition should be better than tariffs.
However, for the worker, people think that tariffs protect jobs. It's kind of like the automation and minimum wage argument. People argue that the $15/hr minimum wage hikes bring about the kiosks, but, while it may accelerate it, it's clear to me that even if it were $1.00/hr, that they'd put in kiosks for $0.00/hr if they could. Thus, people would argue that the undesirable (for workers) working conditions with little regulation in Mexico and China, that even if the corporate tax were much lower, the EPA significantly cut down or abolished, that the corporate heads would STILL send jobs to Mexico and China to save a buck. Since, when that happens, Americans lose jobs, and since Trump won Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin on the grounds of promising to protect and bring back manufacturing jobs, tariffs would seem to PROTECT manufacturing jobs, even if they do punish the consumer , the tariffs are a penalty on offshoring. Since Trump kinda needed those three swing states to beat Hillary, how is he supposed to go about it without the tariffs?
1.) Tariffs are a tax on the consumer.
2.) Competition should be better than tariffs.
However, for the worker, people think that tariffs protect jobs. It's kind of like the automation and minimum wage argument. People argue that the $15/hr minimum wage hikes bring about the kiosks, but, while it may accelerate it, it's clear to me that even if it were $1.00/hr, that they'd put in kiosks for $0.00/hr if they could. Thus, people would argue that the undesirable (for workers) working conditions with little regulation in Mexico and China, that even if the corporate tax were much lower, the EPA significantly cut down or abolished, that the corporate heads would STILL send jobs to Mexico and China to save a buck. Since, when that happens, Americans lose jobs, and since Trump won Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin on the grounds of promising to protect and bring back manufacturing jobs, tariffs would seem to PROTECT manufacturing jobs, even if they do punish the consumer , the tariffs are a penalty on offshoring. Since Trump kinda needed those three swing states to beat Hillary, how is he supposed to go about it without the tariffs?
Since the loss of jobs is distributed amongst any number of reasons, and as you've mentioned, only a few of which might be attributed to jobs going off shore; he would first have to fly in the face of all evidence to the contrary showing protectionism and tariffs to be job killers...
Each and every time tariffs and rampant nationalistic protectionism has been encouraged....it's ended up being a net loss across the whole economic spectrum.
What kind of idiot would loudly ascertain in the year 2018 that "a tariff war is easy to win" when it has been shown throughout history NO ONE HAS EVER WON a tariff war?
His constituents would know this if they'd just bother to educate themselves beyond their own backyards.
I guess my question was a rhetorical as he knows perfectly well the base to which he's pitching his slow balls aren't the brightest.
Tariffs seem to work well for other countries. Might be a good thing for the U.S. if applied judiciously and executed in good faith by a competent administration.
Penalizing the entire country (with higher prices) for the sake of a small segment of workers (who either don't want to or can't adapt to a changing economy) is poor policy.
Any money the government gets their hands on they throw away, tariffs are bad for business. If you want companies to stay in the US and be competitive you can't put a huge hurdle that will ruin their business in place.
1.) Tariffs are a tax on the consumer.
2.) Competition should be better than tariffs.
However, for the worker, people think that tariffs protect jobs. It's kind of like the automation and minimum wage argument. People argue that the $15/hr minimum wage hikes bring about the kiosks, but, while it may accelerate it, it's clear to me that even if it were $1.00/hr, that they'd put in kiosks for $0.00/hr if they could. Thus, people would argue that the undesirable (for workers) working conditions with little regulation in Mexico and China, that even if the corporate tax were much lower, the EPA significantly cut down or abolished, that the corporate heads would STILL send jobs to Mexico and China to save a buck. Since, when that happens, Americans lose jobs, and since Trump won Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin on the grounds of promising to protect and bring back manufacturing jobs, tariffs would seem to PROTECT manufacturing jobs, even if they do punish the consumer , the tariffs are a penalty on offshoring. Since Trump kinda needed those three swing states to beat Hillary, how is he supposed to go about it without the tariffs?
Manufacturing jobs don't need saving.
Workers need new skill sets. Manufacturing is alive and well. Just more machine/computer intensive.
American factories need a lot of investment. We've been on the short term planning thing for too long. Gotta have a great quarter.
I get that the problems might risk a recession, but there might be another reason to make more stuff here by discouraging going to China or Mexico.
China - They steal our tech and if we go to war with them and since they make most of our stuff, we'd be SCREWED. Hence encouraging companies to open here (they won't go to Europe as it costs so much!) instead of China is a good foreign policy!
Mexico - They are sending illegals over our border and creating this migration crisis. One of their candidates for President is basically urging people to invade us. If we end up sending too much manufacturing there, don't you think that Mexico could suddenly decide to tax exports to punish us to try and blackmail us out of the wall? So discouraging companies from going to Mexico is again good foreign policy and also good for the border issue.
As for costs to consumers, I agree, it WOULD cause prices to go up, but let's not pretend that there aren't positives to these tariffs too.
(BTW, I agree, though mad at Canada for what they did to that college, it does seem stupid to start a trade war (which nobody would win) over that and we should stop the mess we're in with Canada concerning tariffs.)
Explain how jobs would be LOST from these tariffs and how MORE would be lost than protected from these tariffs. Also, explain what we should do about companies going to China and Mexico, neither of which country is really our friends (especially China!).
We'd have LOST World War II if we were relying on Germany, Italy, or Japan to get most of our manufactured goods, so relying on hostile nations like China is a VERY bad move military too (especially when they steal your technology!!!)
Just look back at history. Tariffs have never accomplished that goal. Especially when a trade war is triggered and retaliatory tariffs come into place. You can't fight natural market forces, nor should you in a supposed capitalist free market society.
It's baffling that Trump has gotten so many supposed conservatives to support government intervention in the economy.
The logic against tariffs is simple: The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Or of the one.
There are more consumers of any given good, than there are producers of that good. That is, there are always more people consuming an item, than there are people employed in producing that item.
Using simple Vulcan logic, we conclude that whatever benefits the many consumers, is of greater importance than whatever may benefit the fewer producers. If abolition of tariffs means the many consumers save some money, that is of greater importance than saving the jobs of the fewer producers. The needs (and benefits) of the many consumers are greater. Thus, tariffs are illogical.
Concerning the one, needless to say, Donald Trump is only one person, so whatever benefit he may derive from imposing tariffs, is least important of all. Though, I don't expect Donald Trump to understand Vulcan logic.
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