Well Harry C, if you’ve watched politics for decades like I have, and like many Racket readers, name me one politician that could accomplish what Trump is doing. Just one. Get rid of waste, fraud & abuse through DOGE? ✅ Fire crooked grifter bureaucrats and defund CIA fronts like USAID?✅ Deport gangsters running fentanyl into the country?…
Well Harry C, if you’ve watched politics for decades like I have, and like many Racket readers, name me one politician that could accomplish what Trump is doing. Just one. Get rid of waste, fraud & abuse through DOGE? ✅ Fire crooked grifter bureaucrats and defund CIA fronts like USAID?✅ Deport gangsters running fentanyl into the country?✅ stopping child trafficking from Mexico & South America?✅ Establishing tariffs to make other countries pay & saving US taxpayers billions?✅ Lots and lots more. Only Trump has even considered doing anything to help Main Street. And you think he’s an asshole?
Those are nice green checkmarks there. Too bad not a single one of them has any basis in reality.
But just like some people can say "fiery but mostly peaceful" with a straight face, others will look at empty shelves and tripled prices for whatever's left and claim that they are "winning bigly."
Eggs had a very Soviet-looking "no more than 3 cartons per customer" signs on them. Toilet paper could be next. (Hmmm, where does a lot of raw materials for it come from?...)
Don't you have a bidet at home? Water's still local.
Yes there was a planned egg shortage manufactured by the previous administration who culled the egg producing chickens because of a bird flu plandemic, lol.
One problem with your analysis: other countries do not pay tariffs, Americans who use imported goods pay them, if businesses pass them on as part of the cost of acquiring the goods to process or sell, or American businesses pay them if they absorb them as a cost, rather than pass them on to consumers, and some goods must be imported (e.g. tropical crops we cannot grow in adequate supply to meet demand, like coffee, cacao, bananas, or rubber).
Americans have been paying for foreign tariffs for 80 years, since WW2. If countries don’t want their market share to tank, they will absorb the cost of the tariffs. If they don’t, they won’t sell product. Many companies (like my MIL’s in Mexico) will absorb some of the hit and the retailers will absorb some & buyers the rest. It’s time for a reset. Europe et al have been coasting on our money for decades. No more.
I've often heard the argument that other countries don't pay tariffs; we do. At one level, I agree with that analysis, but on another I wonder why it should matter then to the countries being tariffed?
Just this morning I was on a UK substack and the Brits were surmising that Starmer would be subsidizing Jaguar so it would not lose money when Americans could no longer afford their cars. That is how the UK absorbs the tariffs charged on UK products coming to the US .
I should add, the article was written in support of Trump's tariffs and 90% of the commenters agreed. They want their government to man up and quit with the globalist agenda.
Buy British! Buy the best! Drive a mile, walk the rest!
(A little ditty I learned in the mid '80's from the other good Samaritan who joined me in pushing a stranded Triumph out of an intersection in Society Hill, Philadelphia.)
Why? Supply and demand: a tariff increases the price to the buyer (and without generating more revenue for the seller per unit sold), demand decreases with respect to the increased cost to the buyer. If the goods being hit with the tariff have highly elastic demand, the country exporting them will drastically loose revenue.
Right. Several movements may come into play here. 1. Consumers pay a higher price for the foreign product, or for a domestic replacement, or do without. 2. The foreign company loses market share, and hence revenue. 3. Domestic companies who can replace the product are shielded and gain some of that market share, which provides profit and jobs domestically. 4. The nation evolves to become more self-sufficient, united, and perhaps resilient to external hostilities or control.
The anti-tariff side would emphasize the first two factors; the pro-tariff side would be concerned with the latter two. I think it's worth keeping them all in mind when we argue the issue.
Pointing out that Jaguar had already devalued any sale of its cars to the US market through its WOKE commercials. Sure, Starmer can still say future losses in the US market came about because of a tariff . . .
Not really because again, you're acting like marketing is the same thing as trade protectionism. Leave your stupid brainwashed ideologies at the door, this is an economics question.
Right. Surprising to see the braindead parroting of that lie regarding *who* pays tariffs, even here, on Matt's substack. Tariffs are a consumption tax.
To your point about US consumers paying for tariffs. People like Bernie rail against tariffs and in the next breath demand corporations pay more income tax, he thinks we are stupid and don't realize that higher income taxes are passed on to the consumer as higher prices.
Well Harry C, if you’ve watched politics for decades like I have, and like many Racket readers, name me one politician that could accomplish what Trump is doing. Just one. Get rid of waste, fraud & abuse through DOGE? ✅ Fire crooked grifter bureaucrats and defund CIA fronts like USAID?✅ Deport gangsters running fentanyl into the country?✅ stopping child trafficking from Mexico & South America?✅ Establishing tariffs to make other countries pay & saving US taxpayers billions?✅ Lots and lots more. Only Trump has even considered doing anything to help Main Street. And you think he’s an asshole?
Those are nice green checkmarks there. Too bad not a single one of them has any basis in reality.
But just like some people can say "fiery but mostly peaceful" with a straight face, others will look at empty shelves and tripled prices for whatever's left and claim that they are "winning bigly."
Don’t be dumb in public Boris. It’s unseemly.
Yeah, I have no idea why you keep doing it.
Shit! Did another pandemic break out! Is all the fucking toilet paper gone from
Costco again?
Eggs had a very Soviet-looking "no more than 3 cartons per customer" signs on them. Toilet paper could be next. (Hmmm, where does a lot of raw materials for it come from?...)
Don't you have a bidet at home? Water's still local.
Yes there was a planned egg shortage manufactured by the previous administration who culled the egg producing chickens because of a bird flu plandemic, lol.
LOL, indeed.
One problem with your analysis: other countries do not pay tariffs, Americans who use imported goods pay them, if businesses pass them on as part of the cost of acquiring the goods to process or sell, or American businesses pay them if they absorb them as a cost, rather than pass them on to consumers, and some goods must be imported (e.g. tropical crops we cannot grow in adequate supply to meet demand, like coffee, cacao, bananas, or rubber).
Americans have been paying for foreign tariffs for 80 years, since WW2. If countries don’t want their market share to tank, they will absorb the cost of the tariffs. If they don’t, they won’t sell product. Many companies (like my MIL’s in Mexico) will absorb some of the hit and the retailers will absorb some & buyers the rest. It’s time for a reset. Europe et al have been coasting on our money for decades. No more.
I've often heard the argument that other countries don't pay tariffs; we do. At one level, I agree with that analysis, but on another I wonder why it should matter then to the countries being tariffed?
Just this morning I was on a UK substack and the Brits were surmising that Starmer would be subsidizing Jaguar so it would not lose money when Americans could no longer afford their cars. That is how the UK absorbs the tariffs charged on UK products coming to the US .
I should add, the article was written in support of Trump's tariffs and 90% of the commenters agreed. They want their government to man up and quit with the globalist agenda.
Jaguars and Range Rovers suck anyway.
Buy British! Buy the best! Drive a mile, walk the rest!
(A little ditty I learned in the mid '80's from the other good Samaritan who joined me in pushing a stranded Triumph out of an intersection in Society Hill, Philadelphia.)
Wow, we are in a sour mood this morning. 🤨
But I'm not wrong.
There was a comment about Range Rovers "I wonder if Americans know who owns the Range Rover company?'.
I have no idea and did not care to look it up.
McClaren is the best British made car, but the company is owned by Abu Dhabi.
Germans (BMW) own Cooper Motor Works.
India (TATA) owns Jaguar.
Canadian owns Aston Martin.
Shall we go on?
Germans own Bentley.
Rolls Royce is about all they've got owned by a UK firm.
Seen any Rolls Royce's rolling about your Costco parking lot lately?
The working class of the UK does...but not the Globalists who are currently in power.
Anyone who dares protest will be arrested and jailed..for daring to share their opinion that the Globalists are selling out the UK.
Why? Supply and demand: a tariff increases the price to the buyer (and without generating more revenue for the seller per unit sold), demand decreases with respect to the increased cost to the buyer. If the goods being hit with the tariff have highly elastic demand, the country exporting them will drastically loose revenue.
Right. Several movements may come into play here. 1. Consumers pay a higher price for the foreign product, or for a domestic replacement, or do without. 2. The foreign company loses market share, and hence revenue. 3. Domestic companies who can replace the product are shielded and gain some of that market share, which provides profit and jobs domestically. 4. The nation evolves to become more self-sufficient, united, and perhaps resilient to external hostilities or control.
The anti-tariff side would emphasize the first two factors; the pro-tariff side would be concerned with the latter two. I think it's worth keeping them all in mind when we argue the issue.
That's correct! My comment to the Brits was the Nov. 2024 video commercial Jaguar did had the internet in a buzz and it was not a good one.
What does that have to do with anything regarding trade policy.
Pointing out that Jaguar had already devalued any sale of its cars to the US market through its WOKE commercials. Sure, Starmer can still say future losses in the US market came about because of a tariff . . .
Was that helpful?
Not really because again, you're acting like marketing is the same thing as trade protectionism. Leave your stupid brainwashed ideologies at the door, this is an economics question.
Right. Surprising to see the braindead parroting of that lie regarding *who* pays tariffs, even here, on Matt's substack. Tariffs are a consumption tax.
To your point about US consumers paying for tariffs. People like Bernie rail against tariffs and in the next breath demand corporations pay more income tax, he thinks we are stupid and don't realize that higher income taxes are passed on to the consumer as higher prices.
Great comment.