If you're looking for malign influence on 4chan - look outside the US. Anyone on /pol/ and /k/ after Oct 7th understands clearly who has been influencing if not controlling the site.
>How are businesses supposed to plan anything in this environment?
They're not supposed to. The only people who are planning anything in this scenario are Whitehouse insiders coordinating stock frontrunning from Signal group chats.
It'll be "fun" to see all the "negotiations" that happen with other countries, where they offer a crazy array of bribes / emoluments to WH insiders.
Which is perfectly fine, now that we have Executive Order 63, Pausing Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Enforcement to Further American Economic and National Security. This is no longer something the DOJ looks for or tracks, with AG Pam Bondi having to sign off on any potential investigations after a 180-day pause.
Even better, I can tell you one I experienced literally today.
I was at a barbeque, and the people hosting put out one bowl of diced red onion, which despite the name was purple, as it tends to be, and a bowl of crispy fried onion, which was brown. I reached for the fried onion, and avoided the red(purple) onion, because I always hated red onion.
Now, if you want to be annoying, you could make all sorts of red(heh) herring arguments about the cause of me avoiding the red onions being their flavour and aroma in the past having caused me not to like onions, and that's all true. But effects can have multiple causes, and it's also true that the distribution of pigments in the onion leading to an emergent property we dub "purple" did in fact convey information to me that caused me to decide not to eat them. I didn't smell them or taste them. Information was transmitted from onion to mind, via the electromagnetic field. Clearly the emergent property of purple colour has a causal effect here.
As for other examples in the natural world of non-human plants an animals, I don't know, but feel free to use a search engine. But since the colour purple is found in all sorts of life forms(including humans, and all sorts of life forms(including) are able to perceive and discriminate it from other colours, it's fair to assume that the colour purple is out there having all sorts of causal effects.
The purple you saw in those onions is literally a neurological glitch. Your brain inventing a color that doesn’t exist in the spectrum. When red (long) and blue (short) wavelengths hit without green (mid), your visual cortex makes up purple as a placeholder. Your avoidance wasn’t caused by the color itself (a mental construct), but by the brain using this imaginary hue as a proxy for past onion trauma.
This mirrors how we treat UI error messages. A "404" doesn’t cause missing data, it’s just the system’s way of flagging underlying issues. The real causal chain was anthocyanins → wavelength reflection → neural pattern-matching → memory recall. Purple was the middleware, not the root process.
Fun twist. Those fried onions’ brown does have causal ties to flavor. Maillard reaction products directly interact with taste receptors. The universe trolls us with color semantics, but chemistry always wins.
It might not exist in the spectrum, does that mean it doesn't exist? You're arguing and conflating two different things here. On the one hand, you're implicitly arguing that a colour can't exist unless it corresponds to a singular frequency of light, which I've already argued against. This is no more meaningful than arguing that tables and chairs are mental constructs because it's all quarks and electrons at the end of the day. Emergent properties exist and can have causal effects, most philosophers and scientists are in agreement about this.
The other is that a qualia or the mental experience of seeing purple is the same thing as perceiving purple as distinct from other colours in a physical object. I'm not talking about the qualia. In fact, I hate the concept of qualia, because whenever it's introduced into philosophical discussions, the discussion devolves into epicycles of meaningsless discussion of definitions and nomenclature and ends up going nowhere.
No, the purple was there. You say all that was there was some chemicals that only reflects certain wavelengths. I say this is what defines the emergent physical property we call the colour purple. You say electrons and quarks, I say tables and chairs. Both are accurate, and certainly not in conflict.
You might say, so how is this distinct from qualia? Well, for the qualia of seeing purple, there is no way even in principle to decide whether my qualia is the same as your qualia. But I can still look at a red onion and tell you it's purple, and you likely would agree unless you're colour blind. So this property of purple is, unlike a qualia, objective, not subjective.
Your critique reveals a crucial conflation between structural emergence and perceptual categorization, a distinction that clarifies why "purple" (as a color category) lacks the causal efficacy you ascribe to it. If you gift me some of your valuable reading time, let's dissect this.
1. Two Types of Emergence
- Structural emergence (tables/chairs): Arises from physical interactions between components. A table's causal power (holding objects) derives from its atomic structure creating macroscopic rigidity. These properties are observer-independent. A laser would detect the table's structural integrity even with no humans present.
- Perceptual categorization (color): Emerges from evolved neurobiology + cultural reinforcement. The "purple" label applied to red onions is a compression algorithm for "reflects 400-450nm + 600-700nm with minimal 500-600nm". This categorization has no causal power beyond its role as an information tag.
2. The "Objective" Color Fallacy
Your intersubjective agreement about purple stems from:
- Shared cone cell biology: 94% of humans have L/M/S photopsins with peak sensitivities at ~560nm (red), ~530nm (green), ~420nm (blue)
- Cultural conditioning: Modern color lexicons standardized via Pantone systems and CIE charts
Yet this consensus doesn't make purple an emergent physical property.
Consider this.
The Himba tribe uses "zoozu" for dark colors (blue/purple/black) and doesn't distinguish purple as a category
Industrial paint manufacturers recognize 12,000+ color terms, far beyond basic spectral labels
Your "purple" onion would register as #6A1B9A in HEX, 17.3° hue in CIELAB, arbitrary numerical tags, not causal agents
Contains zero causal nodes requiring "purple" as an explanatory variable. Replace "purple" with "wavelength combo X" and the physics/neurology remains identical. Contrast with a table's causal power. Replace "table" with "carbon lattice configuration Y" and you lose the explanatory utility.
4. The Qualia Dodge
You're right to reject qualia-centric debates, but the alternative isn't reifying color categories. Instead, recognize that:
a) The onion's surface selectively reflects wavelengths
b) Your visual system detects this pattern
c) Your brain applies a culturally-learned label
d) The label activates memory associations
The causal oomph lives in the biochemical aversion pathways, not the color label. Change the label (call it "ploobalooba") while keeping wavelength data and aversion remains. Change the wavelengths while keeping the label, and behavior shifts.
5. The Real Emergent Culprit
What does have causal power here is pattern recognition heuristics. Your brain evolved to:
- Create color categories as survival shortcuts ("red" = blood/danger)
- Link these to outcomes via associative learning
These heuristics are genuine emergent properties with causal effects, but they're neural algorithms, not spectral properties. The purple label is their UI, not their codebase.
TL;DR
You're mistaking the map (color categories) for the territory (wavelength interactions). Tables derive causal power from structural emergence, "purple" derives consensus from neuro-cultural emergence. One explains why plates don't fall through surfaces, the other why we argue about onions at barbecues.
Someone figured out that the new tariffs are just our trade deficit with that country divided by the country's exports. I think more and more we see lots of evidence they don't know what they're doing.
> Someone figured out that the new tariffs are just our trade deficit with that country divided by the country's exports.
Note that the White House has both (1) officially denied this, (2) provided the formula they assert was used as support for that denial; but the formula is exactly what they are denying but with two additional globally-constant elasticity factors in the divisor, however, those elasticity factors are 4 and 0.25, so...
"To calculate reciprocal tariffs, import and export data from the U.S. Census Bureau for 2024. Parameter values for ε and φ were selected. The price elasticity of import demand, ε, was set at 4.
Recent evidence suggests the elasticity is near 2 in the long run (Boehm et al., 2023), but estimates of the elasticity vary. To be conservative, studies that find higher elasticities near 3-4 (e.g., Broda and Weinstein 2006; Simonovska and Waugh 2014; Soderbery 2018) were drawn on. The elasticity of import prices with respect to tariffs, φ, is 0.25."
In practice I believe at least 90% of Americans can’t figure out what that formula actually means; but if they drop the epsilon phi bullshit only 70% can’t figure it out. So it’s pretty effective obfuscation after all.
This is the same president that took a sharpie to a map, to show the incorrect path of a storm, because he could not admit being wrong or making a mistake.
These people are either malicious or incompetent. That's been the case for every single day of the decade-ish that Trump has been foisted upon us.
I've seen people use "sanewashing" to refer to the type of comment you're replying to, there's no sane explanation but people try to come up with one because the world doesn't make sense otherwise
I think often trump's policies are rooted in some sort of idea that is perhaps controversial but at least not totally insane, and then implemented in the most boneheaded way possible.
E.g. one explanation given for these trade policies is that trump sees a war with china down the line and is worried that china has tons of factories that could be converted to make ammunition while usa does not.
If so, there is at least some logic to the base idea, but the implementation is crazy, probably not going to work that effectively, and going to piss off all amrrica's allies which would be bad if WW3 is really on the horizon.
E.g. one explanation given for these trade policies is that trump sees a war with china down the line and is worried that china has tons of factories that could be converted to make ammunition while usa does not.
1. US will never outproduce China in ammunition
2. Alienating allies won't help the US produce ammunition
Trump has always liked tariffs [alas, I can't find the source for this pre-presidency, its been blown out by current events]. He thinks trade is a zero sum game, and thinks that someone else set up the petro-dollar system.
Trump has consistently and reiliably always cowered away from war. Using other means to stop it (see russia, NK, China, Iran). Yes I hear the "we're going to invade x, y and z" but they never acutally came to anything (is that because of his advisors?)
Trump doesn't think about future capacity, only future pride. Does this change "make american stronger, and other weaker" is pretty much the only calculus that he's doing.
Trump's thinking is roughly as following:
"Why do we have taxes when we can use tariffs to raise cash and bring power back?"
"Why don't they buy from us?"(china/rest of asia)
"why are we spending money on them, when we don't get any money back? They are weak."(NATO)
"Why are we punishing russia, they are offering deals" (Putin offering cash deals)
There is no 4d chess. Its just a man who's pretty far gone, shitting out edicts to idiots willing to implement them.
"The comment repeated past statements from "The Apprentice" star, who has said he wants to put a 25% tariff on all Chinese imports, to level trade imbalances in the global economy."
> [alas, I can't find the source for this pre-presidency, its been blown out by current events].
Doesn't help that Google's custom time range search is complete garbage. Searched for "trump tariffs" from 1/1/1980 to 1/1/2010 and almost every link is about the current tariffs but with timestamps between 1980 and 2010.
e.g. "20 Nov 1987 — President Donald Trump issued a slew of tariffs on Chinese goods", "30 Jun 1981 — Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced Monday a 25% increase on electricity exports to some American states as a result of President Donald Trump's tariffs", "31 Dec 1999 — IMF says too early for precise analysis on Trump tariff impact", "1 Feb 2001 — Trump's Global Tariff War Begins"
Did find a couple of links that were chronologically correct - a 1999 Guardian story about Trump wanting to tax the rich(!) and a 1987 NYT story about Reagan putting tariffs on Japan.
It is the logic of schoolchildren. It is the simplistic logic of a teenager discovering Ayn Rand's wikipedia entry. (Grover Norquits came up with his tax pledge while in highschool.) The world is more complicated than any econ 099 exam.
The US are never going into a direct war with China, and China is never going into a direct war with the US. This is M.A.D in action.
At most we might see a proxy war over Taiwan (i.e. the US supporting and arming Taiwan, with sanctions against the PRC). The risk would then be a widespread disruption of global trade, at which point the US would not want to be dependent on the Chinese economy or factories in any way.
There is no logic to these things. This is the emperors new clothes, over and over again.
The proximate cause for these tariffs is not some future event. This is post fact rationalization.
The proximate cause is still the ongoing “information” war which determines the perceived reality that is litigated in elections.
Earlier politicians played theater, acting as if the red meat being fed to voters was real on TV, but dealing with reality as need be when it came to decision making.
This was a betrayal of voters, who saw their election efforts result in legislators who didnt do what they said.
Trump does what he says. He believes WWE is real, and acts as if it is. His base believes it is real, and now reality is crashing with the fiction.
The fiction will prevail, because his party has also been working to build the power to enact their will.
Everyone sees logic here, the same way that everyone saw the emperors clothes. The alternative is illogical.
This is the reason potential reasons “we dont know” have to be postulated (war / China can make more ammunition)
Could be a thing? Perhaps people might start caring about product durability and stop buying cheap shit that goes in a landfill because the producers only care about shelf appeal.
This is my hope, too. But also I fear the transition is going to be ugly. Personally I feel lucky that I’m not just starting out my life — I already have high quality stuff.
I think there is a bit more nuance. US manufacturing jobs are never coming back. If you look at the stats, US manufacturing output continues to set records. Yes, the US is second to China (has been since ~2010), but that was bound to happen on population/demographics alone.
So is destroying diplomatic relations with all their allies and trying to force ceding of power in central Europe to a former enemy who is allied to China?
Go on with ya.
He's a prick saving himself from prison whilst being willingly used to establish an oligarchic fascist state from the former USA.
If you follow the logic of it, at least to the first order - fighting a two front war is bad, forcing europe to deal with russia frees up USA to focus on china. America's withdrawl from europe has made european states panic and re-arm, and you could argue that a well-armed europe that grudgingly helps america with a common enemy would be better than a poorly armed europe that uselessly helps willingly.
The second order effects of what he's doing are pretty obviously terrible for usa, but quite frankly i dont think trump is smart enough to see that.
[To be clear i think trump is stupid, but i don't think his actions are entirely random. There is a chain of reasoning here, it just misses the forest for the trees]
> America's withdrawl from europe has made european states panic and re-arm
Russia's invasion of Ukraine is more immediate concern there. Even if Europe still could count on the USA's NATO commitments 100% the war was a big wake-up call in terms of readiness.
If you look at what has happened i'm not sure. The ukraine invasion has been happening for a while now, and it has caused increase defense spending in europe somewhat, but it seems suddenly over the last three month the needle has been moving a lot faster than the last few years.
The problem with this line of reasoning is that Trump just pushed our allies in that part of the world closer to China. China stated the other day they are working on a joint response to tariffs with Japan and South Korea. Additionally, leaving power gaps around the world from the pullback of USAID gives China an in to be the 'good guy'. This is the exact opposite of planning for a conflict with China. In fact, it feels like ceding the fight before it even begins (much like what he did with Russia).
I entirely disagree with our current administration but your display is a bit comical. I don’t think there is much room to argue that the US has historically given the EU a huge margin of protection. I think about some of those comparisons where the US navy is great than the combined top n countries.
Now again it’s not a defense of the administration or to flex some sort of agenda but it’s hard to argue, the EU has underinvested in its military for decades.
Given Sir Kier Starmer regards himself as New Labour and it was Tony Blair that got us into the illegal wars of Iraq and Afghanistan to please the Republican Americans, then yes I expect he might get us into another illegal war (e.g. Iran) to please the Republicans.
Aren't we (UK) putting boots on the ground in support of Ukraine, directly opposing USA? We're going to fight on both sides - the side of expansionist oligarchs (Russia, USA) _and_ the side of democracy?
Wouldn't be surprised if the UK winds up trying to play the same 'both sides' game that Turkey generally tries to play. Ukraine is obviously much closer to home for the UK, but interests may align in other areas of the world.
>In a November paper, economist Stephen Miran, whom Trump has picked to chair his Council of Economic Advisors, raised the possibility that Trump could use the threat of tariffs and the lure of U.S. security support to persuade foreign governments to swap their Treasury holdings for lower-cost century bonds.
I wouldn't put 100% of the blame on the Democrats, here in Australia we are frequently voting for the least worst option not the best, and I'm not sure how the Democrats weren't the least worst option when compared to the other option
but for some reason a whole heap of people decided to stay home this time and this is the result, hope they still feel happy with their decision
I've heard that there's polling lately to indicate that's not true (unsure on source, it might have been an interview at Vox.com), and that higher turnout would have advantaged the Republicans further.
> You have a narcissistic asshole in the White House who got elected because the Democratic Party fumbled the ball.
It don't want to sound too persnickety, but there is always at least one losing side in an election. It doesn't have to mean they dropped the ball, it could just mean people preferred the other option. Hindsight bias is wonderful, but you have no idea what would have happened if they'd run with a different agenda, they may have had a worse result.
> but you have no idea what would have happened if they'd run with a different agenda, they may have had a worse result.
The 2024 election had historically-low support from normally stalwart Democrat demographics such as Latinos, the youth vote, and black males. That, IMO, supports the conclusion that the Democrats did something wrong this time. Also, not only did those groups abstain but Trump also picked up quite a few votes from them (especially working-age black males), suggesting that they are swing voters who probably could have been swayed to stay on the Dem plantation if exposed to more convincing messaging, or a more compelling Democrat candidate.
I'm not sure how you could look at 2024 and not see a historically terrible campaign by the Democrats. They had to force the presumptive nominee to drop out because his brain was dripping out his ears. That alone would do it!
I don't think half the population drafted this policy, so I could easily think the specific construction of the policy is insane without believing half the country is.
He's been articulating this policy for his entire campaign. Half the country voted for him. If you are saying that the details of its implementation are insane, then are you suggesting that Trump actually personally developed and scrutinized those details? Because I don't think any coherent theory of Trump would comport with that.
I do think a lot of the details are bad. But Trump is not exactly a details guy. And while I think they could have been better (by a lot, fairly easily), I do think they are an accurate, if crude, representation of the policy vision Trump has been consistently articulating for decades (he's been talking about tariffs and trade deficits like this since the 90s).
I do believe that half of the US voters do not understand the economic impacts and workings of imposing indiscriminate, massive tariffs on trade partners. The evidence that the majority of Trump's voters have no clue what they've been voting for is quite overwhelming. I would even call it crazy to believe the opposite, to be honest.
There's been some reporting that even die hard Trump supporters don't believe a lot of what he says. This gives them the ability to pick and choose what they believe and allowed him to appeal to a larger group.
How someone would vote for someone they know is lying is beyond my comprehension, but here we are.
Because Trump won the vote, you believe that half the population understands and supports his every action. That doesn't follow. His shit still stinks. Pretty sure The Right now have to say how sweet it smells.
This has been a cornerstone of his campaigns since the beginning. I don't necessarily believe they understand the details, but I do believe they understood he would impose high tariffs, and still voted for him anyway. Tariffs weren't a throwaway line, or something. He repeated it everywhere he could.
I think it is true that most people don't understand the economic principles of tariffs, including most economists. But I do think the plan he's implemented largely comports with what he's consistently said he would do.
Sometimes something does not make sense because we don't see or understand the big picture and what people are trying to achieve, and thus it literally does not "make sense".
Trump is neither stupid nor insane and he will have access to many very smart people, too. Based on that the reasonable assumption is that they are trying to achieve a well-defined objective and have set a plan in motion to do so.
The "game" is thus to figure it out. @ggm's comment above is one possibility.
1. It is authoritarian. Democratically elected leader's duty is to present the policies he plans to implement so that voters can decide if they want them implemented.
2. It is based on the "4D chess" myth - that the leader is way smarter than the rest and is capable of outsmarting other countries. The history shows that it is never true. The leaders are normal people. And the institutions are as good as the founding principles that are honored by them.
(1) is you not liking it, not that it isn't the case. Whether it is authoritarian or not is besides the point. (2) I am not claiming that they can "outsmart" anyone, just that the objective and plan may not be publicly or explicitly stated, or even that what is publicly stated is not the real objective (this is not "4D chess" this is actually how things tend to be in practice from politics to business).
(1) Bypassing the judicative branch is authoritarian.
(2) You just claimed trump has access to smart advisors and some hidden masterplan but you ignore all counter indication. He ousts critical journalists, nominates incompetent staff, invasion-mongers, tweets and plays golf alot.
If i can see any common factor in his insanity, its the need to have an enemy to pose as the strong man against, which indicates that trump does not have a constructive vision for the US.
> Democratically elected leader's duty is to present the policies he plans to implement so that voters can decide if they want them implemented.
That's 100% not true. A candidate leader might tell you what they're going to do, and then you elect the leader, and then they do them, but they don't propose plans once in power to see if the electorate like them.
As much as I'm not a Trump fan, I really don't like that people use a separate yardstick to measure him vs people they like.
Possibly, but the thing I have repeatedly heard is "Trump is doing this because he promised it on the campaign trail". The things might be bad (e.g. some pardon didn't sound great) but I wouldn't describe him as not fulfilling anything. He seems to have made some very specific promises, and has kept at least some of them.
Maybe there's a website that keeps track somewhere.
1) heads of state can in fact be incredibly incompetent
2) the goal could entirely be 'stay in power' (which can also be implemented incompetently!)
The UK for a good few years had a government which had both these attributes. They were only interested in policies which would appeal to their base, but eventually even those soured on them because the policies were implemented so badly.
The simplest solution is the right one. You are projecting intelligence, because you are used to.
This is AFTER the US government has roundly fired thousands of their experts and workforce, AND has just told everyone of its intelligence and army rank and file that there are no repercussions for a massive dereliction of duty.
On the contrary, in context I believe my comment is actually the simplest explanation. Claiming that the US government is insane while we, as random members of the public know better, is certainly not the simplest explanation...
It does not imply that what they are doing is a good idea or will work (whatever the objective is), just that there is more rational thought in what they are doing than what people might assume because the public does not have the information and seeing through what is going on requires insights that most people don't have, either.
Again, check @ggm comment above. I am not saying that this is what is going on but it is a possibility, and an average member of the public would never think of that scenario and thus wouldn't see the order in the apparent chaos.
> Claiming that the US government is insane while we, as random members of the public know better
Not insane, incompetent.
The problem with primarily hiring sycophants from his favorite cable news channel is that he's not getting the best, even from the GOP. This also makes him even more susceptible to people with their own agendas like Musk since no one is willing to pushback.
You don't need much background in Economics to understand that blanket tariffs hurt companies that rely on imports and exports and lead to higher prices. They used an LLM to come up with a formula that's just the trade deficit when you simplify it and called it "tariffs charged to the USA".
It also proves (1), since it is a response (QRT, rather than a comment) to a tweet describing the trade deficit/exports approach, and starts with "No we literally calculated tariff and non tariff barriers.", and then presents the formula proving (2).
That formula just simplifies to trade_deficit/2*total_imports per country. It doesn't disprove anything it just looks fancier but the two extra terms are constants that simplify to 2. If you do the math it lines up for every country that didn't get the default 10% rate.
To give further evidence that they don't know what they're doing, it's easy to generate this tariff plan using a fairly simple LLM prompt that gives back that same ratio:
If anyone needed any more evidence that they don't know what they're doing, what I find interesting is that the various French overseas territories that are part of the EU are tariffed at different rates than the rest of the EU (treating those as separate countries is traditional for any US company, which is sometimes a headache when you want to order something).
Réunion is at 37%, which isn't a problem because any company in Reunion could just use an address on mainland France, but there's more: Guadeloupe, Martinique and French Guiana are tariffed at 10%.
Does that make an easy loophole for any EU company wishing to export things to the US at a 10% tariff?
If these published rates actually going to be enforced this way, it seems like the whole EU has a very easy way to use the 10% rate.
Are those part of the EU? The whole membership of EU (or more precisely European institutions) is a mess and I really only know EEA, Schengen and Eurozone by heart. But there definitely are territories which are part of e.g. France, but not part of the EU
They are part of the EU and are part of the EU customs area, there is no practical difference with other EU territories regarding trade.
They are not part of Schengen (but EU citizens don't need any visa, it's mostly intended to curb illegal immigration from South America via Guiana) and have the ability to use different VAT rates from mainland France, but that's all.
I found it interesting that when the UK was part of the EU, the Isle of Man was not, but because they held British Passports, the people of the Isle of Man were EU citizens.
Not quite, at least not by default. The pre-Brexit Manx passport did confusingly include the text "European Union" on its cover, but holders of Manx nationality were only citizens of the EU if they had lived for at least 5 consecutive years in the UK or if they descended from a UK parent or grandparent.
It's the same for all the non-EU French territories. EU citizenship is not territorial, it's directly linked to the person's nationality so you wouldn't remove EU citizenship from a French citizen just because he happens to live in New Caledonia. French or British citizens living in Canada also are EU citizens after all.
The state of British citizenship is a bit more complicated though I think. A bit like US citizenship which kinda depends on which US territory one lives, as far as I understand.
Right, but citizens of British overseas territories, crown dependencies and whatever other statuses exist are not necessarily British citizens. Same as with the various US territories.
This is what I meant when I said these citizenships work in more complicated ways than the French one.
I think all French territories are part of the EU, but some other countries work differently. The prime example is St. Martin, where the French part is in the EU, but the Dutch isn't (yes that technically puts a EU border through the middle of the island, although there were no pass controls when I was last there.).
Sure they are, 2 seconds of googling compared to a minute writing your post:
> The European Union (EU) has nine 'outermost regions' (ORs): Guadeloupe, French Guiana, Martinique, Mayotte, Réunion and Saint Martin (France), the Canary Islands (Spain) and the Azores and Madeira (Portugal). The ORs are an integral part of the EU and must apply its laws and obligations.
LLMs are basically just good at sourcing ideas from the internet. Me thinks this just means that this tariff idea exists on the internet, especially since grok, chatgpt, etc all come up with the same idea. We used to not have income taxes and funded the govt with tariffs so this probably isn't a new concept despite media outlets pretending like it is.
I watched the man with my own eyes as he seriously floated the idea of injecting disinfectants to treat Covid-19. That was five years ago. His mental faculties have not improved since then.
The site was of course trash, but from what I remember he was asking if people gave themselves sunburn would it kill covid.
His words to me felt they were those of a typical 5 year old, or an 80 year old with dementia, asking questions about subjects he doesn't understand but desperately trying to fit in.
But no, he did then ask about injecting a disinfectant.
Now it's quite possible Trump doesn't know the meaning of the word "disinfectant".
In the same press conference he also asked if "heat and light" will get rid of covid.
(Although of course he says this as "suggestions" and the "I'm just asking questions" tactic)
The author presents arguments, with the evidence. If you're able to understand the argument, you can decide for yourself. Nothing else matters. As to why there are so many debunks, you'd have to ask the mainstream media why they've done this so much.
The strange thing here is that you've chosen to defend the indefensible on the grounds of trying to "both sides" something that really is only from one side.
Watch the whole thing for yourself https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zicGxU5MfwE He talks about light for the first two things (cover the body and put it under the skin) and then switches to disinfectant. Was clearly talking about some kind of chemical to "clean the lungs" like you would clean you bathtub.
Yes. These are College Freshman Essay economics, where you know just enough to declare it's time to go bold and are still stupid enough to believe it will work.
It's not that there's no strategy, it's that it was designed by reckless amateurs who haven't done the reading, haven't consulted with anyone that understands all the trade-offs, and have an uncapped appetite for risk.
The TV version works out perfectly, since the writers control the ending.
It's not: in the formula they posted, phi is the "passthrough from tariffs to import prices". That's where the country's own tariffs are factored in. Or am I reading this wrong?
Have you considered the possibility that they know perfectly well what they're doing and they're just lying about it? Lutnick, the commerce secretary, has been CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald for over 2 decades. The treasury secretary has a similarly stellar resume. There is no way these people don't understand the difference between expressing a trade deficit as a ratio and actual tariffs laid by other countries.
Trump personally may or may not understand it (I think he does) but his political superpower is his willingness to stand up in public and say complete bullshit knowing that it's bullshit, knowing that some people are fools who will uncritically believe the bullshit, and other people are cynics who who will nod along with the bullshit either to make money out of the rubes or because they think it serves a strategic purpose.
You can waste years wondering which side of Hanlon's razor someone is on, but it's important to remember that obsessing over such dilemmas can lead to paralysis. Just like there are a lot of street hustles and cons that depend on confusing/misleading the mark before tricking or mugging them out of their money, there are a lot of political gambits that depend on inducing analysis-paralysis in opponents. Manufacturing dilemmas is also a key element in military strategy.
My advice is to stop worrying about whether these people are such fools that you owe them some sort of empathy and an effort to save them from themselves, or you will end up like Charlie Brown having the football pulled way by Lucy yet again. It is OK to cut them off and treat them as bad actors, for the same reason you should often round off quantitative values instead of obsessing over precision.
Let’s not forget Congress could assert its authority over tariffs at any time. This isn’t just the executive branch unilaterally creating the biggest, most regressive tax hike in our lifetimes, it’s a coordinated GOP operation.
One thing they do is allow him to raise taxes on the middle class and poor, who will be paying those tarrifs, while lowering the taxes for the rich. Everyone's talking about some 3D chess when "more money for the rich" has always been the only consistent Republican policy.
> The Republican party passed the Civil Rights Act
Way more Democrats in both houses of Congress voted for it than Republicans (to be fair the Democrats held the Senate 67-33). A Democratic president signed it. His Democratic predecessor asked for it. How do you figure "the Republicans did it"?
My interpretation: "No one really knows what will happen but it could work to bring some production back to our country, let's give it a try, if it doesn't we try something else."
>Have you considered the possibility that they know perfectly well what they're doing and they're just lying about it?
Politicians are just pretending to be dumb? Why?
>There is no way these people don't understand the difference between expressing a trade deficit as a ratio and actual tariffs laid by other countries.
I don't think most people deny that these are capable individuals. The problem is - I think the people in Trump's inner circle now are sycophants first. They know what Trump is doing is destructive, but they are just choose to be yes men. Remember, this isn't Trump's first go-around, and the majority of people who stood up to Trump the first time (Pence, Barr, Perry, Price, Rex Tillerson) are gone.
Funny enough wikipedia has an article[1] about this that is so large that it has many sub articles. Ultimately, I can't trust that his appointments are exercising any sort of discernment because a large number of his 2016 appointees were fired for doing so.
In short, Fitzgerald could be a genius, but all signs point to him being a yes-man that would rather sink the ship than stand up to Trump.
> I think the people in Trump's inner circle now are sycophants first
If this is the case, we could at least likely put to rest most concerns that Trump will be implementing much of Project 2025.
I'd be very surprised if he had too much to do with that plan directly. Assuming that's true, and if he's only surrounded by yes men, no one is there to convince him to do anything other than exactly what he himself wants to do.
I told you: because it creates a strategic dilemma that paralyzes the opposition. The same reason a hustler pretends to be dumb to lure the mark, the same reason trolls use shitposting to bait people.
Yeah, and what if Lutnick doesn't care about making America better but just making money for himself? And his salary is not tied to his performance, but to his sycophancy?
It is not as if he is going to die of starvation because of tariffs. He has no skin in the game.
In my experience, people who operate that way often convince themselves that they can do both. They'll make themselves rich, that's the primary goal, but they contort reality enough to paint the picture of a win-win.
A great example is Rubio. People may disagree with his politics, but he has been a competent government person for a long time. Even had a legit shot at POTUS at one point. And now, he's trying to shrink away while Trump and Vance make a mockery of the Oval Office.
>Lutnick, the commerce secretary, has been CEO of Cantor Fitzgerald for over 2 decades.
Lutnick clearly has zero actual influence in this administration. He's a barking dog sent to do TV soundbites, and his explanations are often full-bore nonsensical or completely contradictory to his prior explanations. Foreign officials (such as Canada) have repeatedly come out of meetings with Lutnick almost...assuaged....as if Lutnick is saying "he isn't really going to do this...there's no way", because even Lutnick doesn't realize just how stubborn Trump is about his outrageously stupid ways. These guys keep trying to pretend this is all some masterful negotiating strategy by the Art of the Deal master.
And based upon 100% of Trump's history in government, it won't be long before Lutnick and Bessent are out of this admin, both will be "RINOs" attacked by the MAGA cult, and they'll both be telling the tale of how outrageously stupid Donald Trump is. Like closing on 100% of Trump's administration in the first term.
Just look at the lead up to these tariffs. The day before Trump was still "deciding". This is something that a team of expert economists should have worked on for months, probably to conclude that free and liberal trade is what made the US the richest large country on Earth, but instead it was something that everyone had to sit around and wait for Trump to pull something out of his ass.
Trump has openly and widely talked about tariffs replacing income tax for years. This administration is clearly one where no one ever can counter any harebrained idea from Trump -- and they're all incredibly stupid ideas from that incredibly stupid man -- so whatever nonsensical takes he has they have to all try to make talking points around and create some post facto rationalizations. It is the most dangerous administration in human history, and the American voter looked at this traitorous, constitution-shredding, law-breaking imbecile and said "more please!"
There is no 4D chess happening here[1]. There isn't even checkers happening. No masterful long term negotiating strategy. It's just a fumbling moron (rapist, charity-stealing imbecile) that is doing the most nonsensical way to deal with a deficit rather than, you know, raising taxes. And to be clear the US deficit is untenable and needs to be dealt with, and the head in the sand approach by successive governments is not reasonable, but combining DOGE's ham-fisted stupidity with Trump's economic destruction and the deficit is likely going to be much, much worse. The US is on the fast track to insolvency.
"But China....next war....China!"
Trump started this whole thing by attacking allies. By dissolving alliances and trying to economically harm its closest friends. Precisely the opposite of expectations if the US were seriously trying to counter China.
[1] Aside from corruption. Tariffs are the foundation of corruption because everyone has to come, hat in hand, begging for exemptions. There is going to be a line to the White House of manufacturers and importers, from Apple to military contractors, begging for special waivers. Which they'll get if they grease the right palms, as this is the most blatantly corrupt administration in US history. He's selling pardons in the open, and operating a literal protection racket, and this is just...an ordinary day now.
Why are you so certain that these tariff plans were still being decided by Trump the day before? He sure likes to put on that front publicly, but I'm less clear on how we'd know whether that's him playing games or an actual representation of the reality of how his cabinet is operating.
If one does want to impose a large block of tariffs, it does seem reasonable that you would want to keep details quiet until the entire package is announced. You wouldn't want other countries responding early
Quiet? Trump has been bellowing about his tariffs for months. China, South Korea and Japan -- long absolute adversaries -- even had a meeting about how to respond. The actual tariff plan is 0% based upon reciprocity, and instead is based upon "we're a rich country that buys lots of stuff, so let's punish the citizens who buy stuff" (as the largest tax hike in history). There are tariffs for unoccupied island chains.
And these apply immediately. This is an administrative impossibility. CBP is going to have a disastrous couple of weeks about this rag tag collection of barely defined nonsense.
Details of the tariffs weren't known at all until yesterday, they were quiet.
The comment I replied to was claiming that Trump himself was still deciding what the tariffs would be until this week. My question was how we could be so certain of that.
As far as reciprocity goes, how is this plan not based at least in part on reciprocity? They claim other countries have taken advantage of the US and we're on the losing end of trade deficits. The tariffs they announced seem to be based entirely on trade deficits/surpluses with each country.
I have no idea if this would work or what the administration's real motives are, but the on the surface it sure seems like they proposed tariffs that target the problem they claim - trade imbalances.
Specific rates weren't known because they were spitballed last minute, apparently based upon a ChatGPT conversation. That there were going to be significant tariffs has been openly gloated about by this admin and mouthpieces like Howard Nutlick for months. Do you think every other country needed a specific number to start their response plans?
And really that is a silly theory regardless. The US would achieve maximum effectiveness by doing a normal tariff legislative process and then soberly discussing with all parties. Instead it's constant on/off brinksmanship. Because Donald Trump is a profoundly stupid imbecile with a simpleton, child-like understanding of the world. There is going to be customs and business chaos as this is factored in.
>As far as reciprocity goes, how is this plan not based at least in part on reciprocity?
It has zero bearing on reciprocity. Reciprocity is matching the other party's tariffs.
If you're richer than the other party, or if they sell things that you want but you don't sell things that they want, that isn't reciprocity. It's like if I tariff my children when they buy from McDonalds -- I mean, McDonalds doesn't buy from me! - and claim it's reciprocity. That would be insanely stupid, right?
It's a massive tax hike on Americans -- a regressive tax that will hit the working and middle classes the hardest -- shrouded under some patriotic America thing. No way anyone falls for this...right?
All that is correct, but I think you missed the point the other poster was making. What if, instead of blundering about stupidly, the goal is to cause as much chaos as possible in order to consolidate political power?
Does the exact percentage of the tariffs matter? I suspect it doesn't - these look like approximate numbers to obtain concessions, and a complex formula doesn't really help anything.
Far as I can tell, the ideal would have been to simply double incoming tariffs, but that would be infeasibly large. This was a way to generate a plausible smaller number that can be increased later on an individual basis depending on how the country responds.
Now control the SEC so the privileged won't get investigated for insider trading.
That's how you devolve into a 3rd world country by the way. I've lived in 3rd world countries and seen this over and over again. That's why 3rd world country stock markets don't go up - because locals and international investors have a distrust in them. Locals know insider trading is rampant.
Once this kind of corruption is accepted in society, everyone will need corruption in order to stay ahead.
He doesn't care about Tesla anymore. He's making some fat money out of AI, SpaceX is a money printing machine now that he's got the ear of Trump and he's spending almost all his daytime (and nightime) hours shitposting and boosting racists on twitter.
Many people including doctors and health professionals apply restrictions to their diet including avoiding complex carbs or proteins, or reducing their salt or sugar intake while talking about balance diets. No complaints.
But when I decide to reduce all foods by at least 10%, lower my protein and carbs by 25%, pledge I'll remove at least 30% of metals from my diet and will be doing a 4 day fast twice a week in order to become an olympic level athlete by next year, people say I don't know what I'm doing!
How can people possibly be against nuanced thoughtful dieting yet be against my sudden do it all at once approach? It's totally inconsistent, what idiots everyone else is.
Here in the EU, you'd generally just pay VAT of imports. And to be clear, we pay the same VAT on internal goods.
To make it convenient for consumers, large foreign platforms would automatically handle VAT at point of sale, reducing friction and thereby pushing more import.
Some specific things had tariffs - e.g., nuclear reactors, and chinese electric cars - but it was by no means the norm, and I don't think citizens liked this. The Chinese car tariff in particular feels like German automotive lobbying, stifling competition. Tesla, pre-DOGE, also showed that we would have an unsatiable hunger for import of competitive cars, it's just that an F150 isn't a competitive car in EU.
Now, because if the trade war, we end up with blanket retaliatory tariffs and a strong push for buying local products, killing imports, that just wasn't there before. US and China was already in a trade war, so I guess that was the current state of affairs there.
> And to be clear, we pay the same VAT on internal goods
This isn't a fair comparison. Local produces also have VAT reduced by the value of goods they bought locally, so it is not such a burden for a local producer vs importer who doesn't benefit from such VAT reduction at all for his costs.
> Local produces also have VAT reduced by the value of goods they bought locally, so it is not such a burden for a local producer vs importer who doesn't benefit from such VAT reduction at all for his costs.
Huh? VAT is transparent to all involved companies regardless of import/export in such a way that the final transaction to a consumer cover the whole VAT of the value chain.
A quick VAT tutorial:
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The local producer buys seeds, and pays a price that includes VAT. They then sell crop for a price that includes VAT. The difference is settled with the government: The local producer gets back all the VAT they paid, and instead give the government all the VAT they collected.
A reseller buys local produce at a price that includes VAT, and sells it at a price that includes VAT. They then get back all the VAT they paid (which is exactly what the government got from the local producer from this exact transaction!), and in turn give the government VAT they collect from the final consumer.
In the end, the amount of VAT retained by the government is exactly the price paid by the last recipient of the goods. No company in the chain ended up paying VAT out of their own pocket, and no other government earned VAT.
---
Now try with imported goods: The foreign producer buys seeds at a price that includes their local VAT. They then sell crops for export at a price with no VAT. The producer gets back all the VAT they paid, and give nothing to their government as they collected none during export.
The reseller buys the foreign produce at a price without VAT and instead report and pay VAT themselves to initiate the VAT chain. They sell it at a price that includes VAT. They get all the VAT they paid back, and in turn give the government the VAT they collect form the final consumer.
In the end, the amount of VAT retained by the government is exactly the price paid by the last recipient of the goods. No company in the chain ended up paying VAT out of their own pocket, and no other government earned VAT.
Granted, the importer's country is the one stuffing their pillows with the VAT, which does not benefit the foreign producer. That's the difference.
Hey, thanks for the tutorial, I’ve been running my company and paying VAT for only 20 years, so finally I'll know how it works! But, kidding aside, your breakdown is fine in theory, but it misses the real world sting for a US exporter selling to Europe. US goods start outside the VAT system, no offsets, just raw costs. When they hit Europe, the importer slaps VAT on top, jacking up the price before it even gets moving. Local producers? They’re already in the game, balancing input VAT with what they collect. So from the US point of view it is virtually indistinguishable from tariff, making US stuff pricier than the local competition.
Take two producers - one US, one local - selling their identical products at $100. US costs are $80, all out of pocket, no VAT relief, US producer's profit is $20 after the importer adds 20% VAT ($20) to reach $120.
The local guy’s $80 includes 20% VAT on inputs ($13.33 reclaimable), dropping his real cost to $66.67. He sells for $100, collects $20 VAT (total $120), then pays the government $6.67 ($20 collected minus $13.33 reclaimed). His profit’s $26.67 - still 33% more than US's $20, thanks to VAT offsets.
You have to agree that this is a very tangible advantage for local companies, no?
The case for the local guy is not calculated correctly for EU VAT, leading to the misunderstanding. The cost of the input increases proportionate to VAT, with the VAT refund cancelling this out exactly.
Let's assume as you did that the actual input has the same real cost to manufacture (ignoring e.g. local labor cost differences, fuel cost differences, government incentives, etc.), and that your example therefore needs exactly 80 USD worth of real, untaxed input in both cases.
The US producer buys this for 80 USD out of pocket as there's no VAT to pay, adds 20 USD profit and sells it for 100 USD. An importer adds 20% VAT, making it 120 USD.
The local producer has to pay VAT so their price for the same thing is 96 USD out of pocket. They get 16 USD VAT back from the government next time they file VAT (irrespective of what they sell), i.e. the "relief" undoes the VAT entirely. They add 20 USD profit making the price 100 USD, add 20% VAT, and what do you know, same 120 USD price tag.
In both cases the final consumer price is 120 USD, and after VAT is cleared the input seller gets 80 USD, the producer itself gets 20 USD profit and the government at the point of consumer sale gets 20 USD VAT.
If the local guy exports the goods to the US the VAT is refunded, making both prices 100 USD. Input seller earns the same, profits remain 20 USD, but no VAT is earned.
This is also why all companies only discuss prices excluding VAT, as the VAT is purely symbolical if it's not a consumer sale.
Actually, EU countries have pretty high tariffs for some US exports, and other countries too, higher than US used to have until today.
That's how the common market remains competitive. We lower barriers for trade inside EU, while protecting our market from outside exports. Data is all available. Cars for example, US had tariff of 2.5%, EU 10%.
> Cars for example, US had tariff of 2.5%, EU 10%.
This is highly misleading:
Pickup trucks, which is a major share of the US car market, had an import tariff of 25% since 1964 (so it was pretty much the same average tariff level but with the EU doing less targetting).
The funny thing is that we actually have a quite big commercial market for such utility vehicles, currently met by dropside vans: vehicles built on a van frame with a flatbed or other custom equipment on the back.
This is not really that different from how the F-series works either, providing a frame where the rear can be built up dependent on needs.
It's just that the F-150 is a terrible fit. Our dropside vans are small with a very large footprint-to-bed ratio, is light and have low fuel consumption, is almost always custom, and has zero luxury or otherwise private appeal. There is no demand for e.g. engine performance, as the light vehicle class has load and towing limits that are easily met.
The F-150 is too bulky for casual city use and without a need to optimize have a low footprint-to-bed ratio, is heavy with and thirsty, is often just used "as is" with the stock bed, and is often used privately with a significant "muscle" appeal. In order to be driven with a regular license and not be affected by truck speed limits, tracking requirements and driving/rest time limits, it would still be registered as a light vehicle, making any additional load bearing/towing capacity unusuable.
There's nothing wrong with models being extremely optimized for specific markets and unfit for others. I imagine there aren't many EU-style dropside vans in the US, not to mention EU-style trucks. Japanese Kei cars are an even more extreme case of such market optimization.
I drive a Mercedes W447 in the US (though the "crew" version) and get no end of crap from people around me with F150's and the like (I live in an area that is borderline rural/urban and has a ton of farming). Meanwhile I have a larger hauling capacity, get vastly better mileage, have 8 seats when I want them, etc.
It's too bad no-one bought these and they went away.
Amusingly the Postal Service in our area drives them now.
Something like this or an electric van would be amazing. However, does everyone always want to borrow it? I don’t think I own anything that wouldn’t fit in a vehicle like that.
> The idea the pickup trucks are wanted in Europe is hilarious.
While demand is much lower than in the US, it's still not zero.
But I'm talking about US import tariffs, not EU.
"Light trucks" have like 80% market share in the US; if you have 25% tariffs on those (for over 60 years now, too) then there is no room to complain about 10% car tariffs in the EU, full stop.
You could make a strong argument that Fords dominance in the segment was significantly helped by protectionism (without those tariffs Ford etc. would face much stiffer foreign competition).
Well because they are applying them in a blanket fashion with no warning basically everywhere.
Tarrifs are a tool. They have both positive and negative consequences. It seems like the manner they are being applied are just random and will get most of the negative consequences with very little of the positive.
They don’t even necessarily have positive benefits for manufacturers unless they somehow have a supply chain that exists only in the US all the way down. The automakers are against tariffs, for example.
That's why you implement them reciprocally, to force anyone else implementing them to reduce theirs. Their problem is that the method they used to identify the tariff levels was, generously, crude. And also that it was implemented too sharply.
However, as a political tactic, the sharp implementation gives them breathing room to re-calibrate before the midterms. That comes at a real GDP cost, though.
Not retaliatory, reciprocal. Retaliatory tariffs are dumb. Reciprocal tariffs are the Nash equilibrium. Whether or not these particular tariffs are in fact reciprocal is something we could debate, though. At best they are a very crude approximation of reciprocal tariffs.
Since we are diving into language semantics, these are _arbitrary_ tariffs that have been shat out via a "formula" which is being fed "how much stuff they sell us" as its input.
trump said "punish everyone who we spend more money with, barring our favourites" and they gave him a set of options. He chose the one he liked the best. No he didn't read any impact assessments, if they were made. He went by gut instinct.
Its just a punt. There is no greater game plan. its just a man making policy by vibe.
What makes them arbitrary? there is no really plan to test if they are going to work, or at what point they need to be adjusted. He will keep them until he sees something on twitter/truth social that makes him reconsider.
Yes, they are badly implemented, I agree. He is calling them reciprocal tariffs though, which implies he will lower them as they lower theirs. I don't think he's chosen a good way of estimating theirs, and so I don't think it's a particularly good policy, but reciprocal tariffs in principle are a good idea.
Even though his first pass crude approximation is stupid, it's really how other countries react, and how he reacts to them that will determine whether they behave like reciprocal tariffs or not.
There is a baked-in plan to test if they're going to work: they are formulaic, based on the trade deficit. Supposing that deficit falls, they will automaticlaly readjust downwards. I don't think the trade deficit (particularly restricted to goods, as they did it) is a good proxy for that, but it's also not completely untethered from reality.
> There is a baked-in plan to test if they're going to work
I really dont think there is a plan. Trump says he wants tariffs, this is what he got. Why would he adjust them, unless there is an upside for him? is he going to remember to re-evaluate them? does the department that generates the stats even exist any more?
I find it interesting that you are downvoted and yet nobody have a reason why you're wrong. Even the answer you get seems to agree with you.
I feel like that's not true (really, zero positives? never? that would mean a whole lot of people is patently stupid), but I'd like to base my opinions on facts, not feelings.
Why? Because the US is smarter than the others. By having open trade, we've benefited greatly. Now you could argue that other countries have benefited more, and that made me true but the benefits of free trade are that the pie keeps growing. So other countries getting a bigger slice is not shrinking our slice.
For what it's worth, I bought a $2000 robotic hand from US a year ago, and paid about €400 in VAT and €32 (so like 2%) in import duties / tariffs.
Obviously VAT isn't a "trade barrier", if anything it's a "consumption barrier" and it's the same for every business that EU citizens give money to (i.e. if I bought a robot hand that cost $2000 to make from an EU company, I'd likewise be paying €400 VAT on top of that).
It would help if people answer than downvote. Both these kind of questions and economic answers are getting buried.
My understanding so far based on buried comments is: other countries have tariffs on individual products they're historically good at manufacturing and they want to retain it. e.g. Milk in the Nordics, Cars in Japan and EU, Bikes in India, etc.
keyword: "selective to retain"
US is applying it across the board blindly, not to retain something that's existing, but what appears to be a blind hope of starting everything from scratch.
Buried comments say "strategy" is lacking, because these tariffs also apply on the very raw materials needed to start from scratch. The policy does not intelligently select and separate items by their current or future use to the US industry.
There is a prediction that this blunt hammer will not yield to a more productive situation, in couple of years it would only have to be quietly rolled back and strategic thinking would have to be re-applied.
The counter-counter argument is, maybe a real strategy is being worked upon, and this blunt hammer is just a leverage tool. But so far there are no concrete signals of strategic thinking, so it's currently perceived as "let's keep turning one knob after another". The lack of accompanying software updates, calculations, projections, personnel planning, etc all contribute to the notion that there is no strategy.
And at this point, it devolves into emotion and personality, which is better to stay away from.
The United States maintains the world's most powerful corporations and attracts exceptional talent, yet appears to be hastening toward what some consider an inevitable conflict—one that exists largely in political rhetoric rather than reality. Setting an ambitious four-year timeline to rebuild manufacturing capabilities seems impractical. More concerning is how this approach risks dismantling the global governance system that took generations to establish, while alienating allies who could be valuable partners rather than burdens. The potential costs of such a strategy are immense, explaining why many observers question whether there's a coherent strategy behind these actions.
> What's amazing me is the lack of consistent thinking by the commenters here.
I feel your "consistency" is based on a facile model where big percentages correspond to badness and that's everything.
An analogy:
1. Roommate Trump who falsely claims you're in a common-law marriage: "You're running a trade-deficit with your grocery store, so every time you buy groceries from them I'm going to punish you by taking 25% of the cost. If you don't like it, you should work there part-time to reduce the deficit. You're about equal in paying friends for food versus them paying you for food, but they need you more than you need them, so to make you hustle I'm still taking 15% from any money that goes out. Finally, you have an extreme trade-surplus with your regular employer because they just send you checks, hurray!... That'll be 10%, because reasons."
2. Critics: "That idiot is insane. That's not how any of this works. Find a divorce lawyer ASAP."
3. You: "You guys aren't consistent thinkers! I mean, why aren't you complaining about how Mrs. Johnson adds a 100% cost onto Mr. Johnson's purchases of cigarettes, as a way to get him to quit? 100% is a much bigger number, so obviously Mrs. Johnson's the real villain here, and you don't seem to care!"
____________
If you're so certain Trump has a coherent and non-dumb strategy, please describe how it's supposed to work and why you expect the results to be good things.
Can you provide an example, especially for the EU?
From what I read, the average tariff applied by the EU is under 1%. Other comments say Trump has just divided imports by exports to calculate his tariff rates.
On a trade weighted basis it’s more like 3%-4%. The US is indeed lower on average, but marginally by like 1-2% on average.
But I think the concern is more key industries for the US like autos, tech (EU never ending fines are essentially tariffs), etc. where the disparity is more dramatic. But it’s still not a 20% difference.
Another concern is the devaluation of the Euro vs the dollar due to certain economic policies. Which again is a defacto tariff.
Anyways, my guess is this is a negotiating position since 20% seems excessive, but I could be wrong.
I don't get your irony. Yes EU companies are smaller, do the fines are proportionally smaller, but they are held up to the same standard and fined as well. It's not some hidden scheme to extract money from the US.
The limits are conveniently set so that the law doesn't apply to most EU companies. Only 4/25 included companies are EU (and 3/4 of those are porn, Booking.com isn't).
Edit: it's definitely worse if you go deeper into the rabbit hole. Sister legislature, Digital Markets Act:
Booking.com insisted on the fact that it is one of the only European companies that is a global success and that as they are not the most dominant actor in this sector, they should not be disincentivized while competing with bigger companies.
So yeah, "please only punish non-EU companies" definitely sounds like a trade barrier.
Treating fines on US companies as a tariff means we should also count Volkswagen $4.3 billion fine for Dieselgate as a hidden tariff. Do you agree with that?
But specifically when it comes to tech (which is overwhelmingly US companies), there is a massive imbalance. Tariffs are one mechanism by which that imbalance can be tilted.
"EU privacy regs are just laws you can choose to follow if you don't want to get fined!" Yes, and tariffs are laws you can choose to follow (by producing US market products in the US) if you don't want to get fined.
Again, US companies will also need to pay tariffs on imported goods, so it's not just targeted at EU companies. It's a tariff on geographic production.
I don't agree with much of this administrations policies, but to claim the EU hasn't created an imbalance in the way it extracts "fines" from US tech companies (and the incentives around that) doesn't reflect reality.
AGAIN, I don't agree that either the EU fines or US tariffs are a good idea. But the logic of using a tariff to correct this imbalance is sound.
Great example. Your government has decided they will levy additional fees for parking in geographic areas deemed undesirable. This is also what a tariff does for manufacturing (US firms also have to pay tariffs on imported goods).
Aligning incentives through financial penalties = forcing an entity to give you money until what you want happens. The key question here is intent - 1)which entity, 2)what's the scope of what you want to happen, 3)what happened before and 4)
can you do something about it if you're disadvantaged?
Tariffs and fines, for lack of better words, are both aligning incentives through financial penalties, but they are still different things.
The EU (governmental body) created laws to price in negative externalities and punish offenders until they correct their behavior. Fines will punish corps (private citizens) directly, with little collateral damage, until they stop being anti-competitive.
A fine forces a 1)small target to follow 2)a specific law and uses, like tariffs, financial penalties to achieve this. That law is a long term reflection of people's local culture and values, and it 4)can be appealed and judged. 3)A negative externality was priced in as a law and a fine.
--
Right now, you have the Trump admin (gov body) applying tariffs to other countries (gov body) because they want manufacturing (private citizens) back in US soil. There is clear widespread collateral damage.
A tariff shapes the economic behavior of a 1)big target and, like fines, also uses financial penalties to achieves this. The desired economic outcome is a 2)trading strategy of a temporary administration. There is collateral damage. 4)There is no court, judge or 3rd party to appeal to, you as a government can only try to negotiate with the other government. 3) Two governments that were having mutually beneficial and consensual trading are now no longer doing so, there was no negative externality here, and while Trump may claim so it does not make it true that other countries were taking advantage of America. See trade balances considering products and services, as one example of lies trying to make it look like US was getting short changed by the world, it was not.
If tariffs and fines still feel like the same thing, it's only because 1)corporations have become government-sized and have achieved government-like powers; and 4) that 3rd party of the judicial branch seems to be more and more taken over by just the government itself, who might actually be a gov-sized and gov-powered corporation.
I mean, you are not presenting any robust or even reasonable arguments for your view. What you seem to be completely missing is intent. The EU privacy laws were not put in place to tariff US tech companies. The fact that US tech runs routinely afoul EU privacy laws and actually mostly gets away with it is entirely their choice. They could always abide by the rules and then they wouldn't get fined.
Listen I get this is wildly counter-narrative on HN (all tech legislation = good and EU = default good on this forum) so I will never win this argument.
But I’ve dealt closely with EU compliance on these matters, and the fines are absolutely levied selectively and in bad faith on areas that are impossible to comply with on the timelines provided or ever. They have absolutely turned into strategically punitive taxes on an industry that the EU has no answer to, so in effect, yes, they are tariffs.
I have also dealt with EU compliance, and I have never seen the EU act quickly on anything concerning business. It's a slow, bureaucratic institution.
With all due respect, when you are given years to comply, the problem is not that the timeline is impossible, but that your organization chooses to ignore the regulation.
If the same laws had been passed in the US, the company would have complied already.
Yes, fines sometimes appear levied selectively. Where do you draw the line though? Would you consider the tens of billions Volkswagen had to spent in the US to settle their emissions scandal as "tariffs"?
> Yep, and if you respect the tariff, you don't get fined. How hard is it?
Exactly, so we agree fines are not tariffs then?
> Just as EU companies have to abide by EU privacy regs, US firms also have to abide by US tariff regs.
Yes, also by nature, only importers pay tariffs, so most tarrifs will be paid by US firms, just like most EU fines are paid by EU companies. I don't see a disagreement here.
> "THE LAW IS THE LAW" is not an logical argument
It's not mine. I'm saying that if you don't commit a crime or by negligence let a crime happen, you won't get fined. Some criminals are never caught, and we can talk about two-tiered justice system, but just, I don't know... Don't commit crime? The risk to be fined will be 0 then.
This whole "the EU fining us for breaking EU law is a tariff" narrative is such BS. The big tech companies just don't like the privacy & consumer protection laws in the EU so now they're getting the US government to help them bully the EU into submission.
In my country, any fine > 135€ have to be given by a judge. If you want to discriminate between 'crime' and 'offense', be my guest, breaking the law get you fined, respect it, you'll be fine.
>Many other countries, including EU members and China, already apply tariffs and non-tariff barriers far in excess of what the US is applying now.
This has been persistently claimed but I have yet to see evidence on this. In most cases it's including VAT which doesn't make sense since local manufacturers pay that as well.
It's not really inconsistent as as far as I'm aware the US is the only country in the world with a universal baseline tariff on all imports. Other countries have tariffs that seek to protect certain industries and balance this with trade agreements that cover other goods or certain countries.
For example Japan wants to protect its farmers so has tariffs on rice. But that is not a simple tariff on all rice imports. There are various rules and a tariff free allowance. The largest importer of tariff free rice to Japan is the US.
I think there's a few things wrong with Trump's go to of tariffs as weapons:
- America seems to want total freedom to trade on its terms, not as partners. E.g. expecting countries to import American goods that do no satisfy customer demand or local laws.
- Trump's unpredictability will mean that companies will be hesitant to make large investments if they think the policy will change on a whim. US policy is largely controlled by a single, unpredictable, vindictive and fragile ego. That's not a good environment to build a stable and healthy company.
- The hyperbole such as calling international trade raping & pillaging. This is voluntary trade we're talking about.
- The main issue is that it's not solving the real problems of the average American. Globalization has big issues, it's kept some countries in poverty and contributed to declining living standards especially in western manufacturing. However it is just one factor amongst many that are causing hardship for small town America. A reversing of globalisation does not solve massive wealth inequality, it does not intrinsically solve low wages or abandoned factory towns. At the same time that Trump installs tariffs he's making it easier for the wealthy to concentrate ownership of assets, increase inequality, reduce employment laws and erase social protections. 14 billionaires with elite projection are not working to benefit the average American, they're working to benefit their own average.
"Never underestimate the bandwidth of a station wagon full of tapes hurtling down the highway."
- Andrew S. Tanenbaum, Computer Networks, 3rd ed., p. 83. (paraphrasing Dr. Warren Jackson, Director, University of Toronto Computing Services (UTCS) circa 1985)
Not really. The TikTok ban was rooted in national security concerns. The coalition that brought it forward would not be useful for regulating social media as the drug analog it is.
I don't see a brilliant move in America. (There is an a brilliant opportunity in the EU, Canada and Mexico to recapitulate the TikTok bill's rhetoric and structure, aiming it at both China and America.)
> TikTok ban was motivated primarily by the Israel lobby wanting to crack down on pro-Palestinian content
It really wasn't. But I agree that this was a popular take. (Funnily enough, the rumor helped shore up the bill's polling among Republican-leaning voters. And once it was up, like, yes, rule number one of politics is you generally don't say no to votes.)
The EU going after Instagram and Twitter would find its own stable of bizarre conspiracy theories.
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