1. The cost of tariffs is not necessarily born by consumers. Blanket statements about who pays for this or that tariff are fine in school…not so much in this world. That depends on the producers margins and the presence, or lack thereof, of alternate acceptable options. Our trading “partners” may not like paying admission to the biggest market on the planet but they’ll deal with it unless and until the playing field is actually level, not pronounced so by unelected theorists.
2. Acceptance of other countries tariffs made excellent sense when our national interests were served by helping war torn “allies” rebuild. That process has been complete for some time and such justifications no longer apply.
3. Trumps tactics are consistent with anyone who has done commercial realty. Demand the ocean, settle for an adequate lake…which your partners/opponents would never have ended on if that was your opening. If the politicians in every country agreed to drop all their cute little trade restrictions we wouldn’t be having this debate…and they’d all be out of work.
4. Trump isn’t a “one world” guy. He’s a “nation state” guy and isn’t about to give our friends or enemies control over economic sectors that he sees as critical to our ability to defend this nation state. Davos is over.
Bravo, Bravo!!!! Spot on, on every single point! You sir, get it. Hopefully, more Americans are waking up to this reality every day. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. At this point, what other choices do we have. President Trump and crew are the first ones to try and turn this ship around in forever. I pray that he’s successful, for our country’s sake. I don’t see anyone proposing anything different other than the same old same old. Cutting the government budget would seem to be the first step but maybe we’ll get there eventually. In the meantime, for mercy’s sake, give the man a chance.
All these articles on the impact of tariffs are right, as far as they go, but they leave out some essentials. First, yes, prices are higher but it is NOT inflationary. "Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." There is no new money created by taxing, so the tariffs are a *voluntary* choice on any goods that have a domestic alternative. Second, never mentioned in these articles is the job effect of reshoring, and the knock-on effects of higher manufacturing employment to GDP and general prosperity and the lessening of the need to fund massive welfare programs. Work leads to dignity leads to stable families and lower crime. Although I generally go to great lengths to avoid taxes, I for one am heavily in favor of a mix of tariffs and income taxes and spending cuts to balance the budget and stabilize the dollar.
I would. After years of off shoring our manufacturing base and jobs, I would gladly pay a few bucks more for a product to be manufactured and jobs to be reshored to America. We’ve grown fat and lazy purchasing “cheap” overseas goods for many years. Time to pay the piper. Our politicians never asked us for our opinions on wrecking our economy and off shoring our jobs in the first place. Neither did they ask us what we thought about running our country into the ground with deficits and open borders. I don’t ever recall a vote on giving free benefits to illegal aliens either? If tariffs are so awful, why has the rest of the world been imposing them on the USA for decades? I question EVERYTHING that has been IMPOSED on the American people for the last 50yrs… and longer. Not to mention the wars going back over 100yrs. Gee, I’m starting to see a pattern.
Glad You are starting to see a pattern. From My view it is not a good one. But that is the pessimist in me. Just from My own observations of governments all around us , history is about to repeat and this part of history is not good for You and I. Oh a reset is definitely coming, but I fear it is not here to help You and I. May seem good at first, but not!
Yes Don, 😂😝 I tend towards pessimism, glass half empty, most times. But the Lord did see fit to place me in this here and now for His purposes. Unfortunately, I get your drift. When all else fails, they take us to war, as Gerald Celente is fond of saying! I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Nobody gets to vote on any of this wickedness anymore. It’s just imposed on us. By who?
Wickedness by whom ?. I think that You and I know the answer to this question. My time on this earth is numbered as Yours is also. We live for Our heavenly Father, not mankind.
With all the financial turmoil, wars and rumors of wars, natural disasters, political division, human trafficking, attacks on children and the unborn, pandemics, and every other ill that is going on around the globe, it is easy to lose focus on what is really important. Thanks for the reminder to refocus on what is truly the only thing that matters.
So clear! Economics and Political Economy didn't come naturally to me like poetry and the arts, but Thinking Logically is a gift to all human beings, if they only use it and develop it. Thank you for this article...I'm going to forward it to those who may be a bit short-sighted and overly-trusting of Mr. Trump's big, beautiful, beastly boondoggles. Years of reading what The Mises Institute produces, also FEE and the Cato Institute, plus many other excellent think tanks large and small has been an enriching and educational experience in Libertarian thought. Trump's no libertarian, obviously. But I have to say, despite his tariff fixation (his hammer on every nail) he's a darn-sight better than anything the dems offer us.
"The real solution is to cut spending. Yet politics won't allow it." OK, genius, then what is the answer? ( So long as our current two-party political caste is allowed to stay in power, there is no solution. Just more so-called meaningful words, but powerless.)
What if there is no answer? Everyone always wants a "solution," but no one entertains the idea that there isn't one. As I keep saying, you can't solve a problem with the same selfish nature that caused it in the first place. Everyone will eventually recognize that is true, hopefully before they bend the knee to Lord Jesus after the second resurrection.
Human nature is trouble but not a problem to be solved.
And Lysenkoist-husbandryist-eugenicist-abortionist-euthansia'ist-final solution'ist true believers otherwise are part of the trouble that is not a problem to be solved.
"Your mission, Jim, should you decide to accept it," is to avoid being dissolved by the trouble that is not a problem to be solved.
"As the supply of Treasuries is reduced the continued demand would likely drive interest rates down. "
The basic premise of free market economics, supply/demand, suggests that a reduction in the supply of Treasuries would increase the demand, thus increasing the price. I take this to mean interest rates would NOT go down unless there is something I'm missing here.
OTOH, the point that protecting American producers by limiting market access of foreign producers would lead to a decrease in choice and ultimately increase prices makes sense. That represents a double whammy on American consumers: higher prices to offset importers' tariff cost, and higher prices because of the loss of competition.
This is a very nuanced policy decision and please forgive me for believing that this administration does not do nuance. Shock, yes. Nuance, no.
Joel, Think Pres. Melei has the secret ingrediant ,leave the economy alone, it will find it's way. It seems his way is proven to work. Trump and Powell are both more worried about their legacies than solving the problems at hand.
Every piece of the puzzle is local, right there around you, if your puzzling-piece can parse* it, if you have enough time & energy for your puzzling-piece to parse it.
“Comparative advantage” & “globalism” embezzle-autopen-signs the kited checks that “pay” (postpone reckonings that rake back all the principle plus a big, fat, interest rate …) the subsidy-welfare kings & queens & their armies of subjects & its all due on receipt to the dearth of puzzling-pieces that can parse, that have the time & energy to parse.
Less capable, or worse (much worse), people pretending to be more, better, than they are … & confusing onlookers & acolytes & sycophants - & parsers too/kept/busy - with sleight of hand supply chains-manacles.
Concede the conceit surfeit, & hang ten, or hang together with the parse-nots & swing from noose knots is the ‘to be or not to be’.
***
La Brea Tar Pits, Br’er Fox & Rabbit & Tar Baby & the Briar Patch are all local & misused by “weaponizers” who can’t parse, for whatever reasons.
Tariff babies scooped from tariff pits & ballistically hurled abroad, & inbound-landing from abroad, is what all these zipless velcromagnon fooks are & do - & the job-slots they offer “un-refusably.”
Image: Art Van de Lay, Importer/exporter. From that show about nothing.
All these “countries” are as shell companies in a vast & byzantine ‘avast ye swabs!’ stolen lives & other property fencing & “money” laundering scheme.
All these “countries” are as cell blocks symbolically “paying” inmates to stamp license plates // mil-tech, bio-tech, surveillance-tech … all these “big-brained” can-do-the-crime/time clock-punching technologists** collecting pay-scrip // or be farmed out (paperclipped ops) to other inmates at warden’s discretionary mulcting preference.
And iron pyrite polished for sale to punchline Polish jokes … because the left pole, that little Napoleon POS dumb-but-conductive terminal held aloft by even littler static cling dingleberries, has levered - by human tsunami wave majoritarianism - the right pole that actually groks & knows & pens the prose the proles’ cross-wired poles shorts out to full circle back to short wo/men full of loathing, sound & fury, signifying more-more-more of the same nothing.
Buyology in this never-never wasn’t land of The Big Shorts.
*Parsely, sage, rosemary & thyme … “The song lists a number of impossible tasks given to a former lover who lives in Scarborough, North Yorkshire."
Parse Lee, Grant, Sherman & Crime …
** I just read a bit about a piranha bite outta crime named Gerald Bull. Super-guns. Space-guns. A murder facilitator/inventor engineer murdered in turn by Mossad, or some other same Murder, Inc. You can look him up.
But piranhas swim in swarming schools that defy looking them all up … & they swim in muddy riverine waters that have been “tokenized” since long before the word or Tolkienized Rings wedlocked these Morlock & Eloi freaks unto death do us all part.
Conduction calls out “All aboard!” Abduction arrives at absurd, & disembarks. Crazy-train Locomotive Breath refrain/finity ….
1. The cost of tariffs is not necessarily born by consumers. Blanket statements about who pays for this or that tariff are fine in school…not so much in this world. That depends on the producers margins and the presence, or lack thereof, of alternate acceptable options. Our trading “partners” may not like paying admission to the biggest market on the planet but they’ll deal with it unless and until the playing field is actually level, not pronounced so by unelected theorists.
2. Acceptance of other countries tariffs made excellent sense when our national interests were served by helping war torn “allies” rebuild. That process has been complete for some time and such justifications no longer apply.
3. Trumps tactics are consistent with anyone who has done commercial realty. Demand the ocean, settle for an adequate lake…which your partners/opponents would never have ended on if that was your opening. If the politicians in every country agreed to drop all their cute little trade restrictions we wouldn’t be having this debate…and they’d all be out of work.
4. Trump isn’t a “one world” guy. He’s a “nation state” guy and isn’t about to give our friends or enemies control over economic sectors that he sees as critical to our ability to defend this nation state. Davos is over.
Bravo, Bravo!!!! Spot on, on every single point! You sir, get it. Hopefully, more Americans are waking up to this reality every day. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead. At this point, what other choices do we have. President Trump and crew are the first ones to try and turn this ship around in forever. I pray that he’s successful, for our country’s sake. I don’t see anyone proposing anything different other than the same old same old. Cutting the government budget would seem to be the first step but maybe we’ll get there eventually. In the meantime, for mercy’s sake, give the man a chance.
https://youtu.be/22WoEYfuZN0?si=0nAL1IUdaVEkO2Ao
I agree Mike Ware: "In the meantime, for mercy’s sake, give the man a chance."
All these articles on the impact of tariffs are right, as far as they go, but they leave out some essentials. First, yes, prices are higher but it is NOT inflationary. "Inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." There is no new money created by taxing, so the tariffs are a *voluntary* choice on any goods that have a domestic alternative. Second, never mentioned in these articles is the job effect of reshoring, and the knock-on effects of higher manufacturing employment to GDP and general prosperity and the lessening of the need to fund massive welfare programs. Work leads to dignity leads to stable families and lower crime. Although I generally go to great lengths to avoid taxes, I for one am heavily in favor of a mix of tariffs and income taxes and spending cuts to balance the budget and stabilize the dollar.
Very nice ERIK. Not to mention that some foreign exporters are absorbing some of the tariffs.
Excellent write up. I suspect many are willing to pay more for goods!!!!!????
I would. After years of off shoring our manufacturing base and jobs, I would gladly pay a few bucks more for a product to be manufactured and jobs to be reshored to America. We’ve grown fat and lazy purchasing “cheap” overseas goods for many years. Time to pay the piper. Our politicians never asked us for our opinions on wrecking our economy and off shoring our jobs in the first place. Neither did they ask us what we thought about running our country into the ground with deficits and open borders. I don’t ever recall a vote on giving free benefits to illegal aliens either? If tariffs are so awful, why has the rest of the world been imposing them on the USA for decades? I question EVERYTHING that has been IMPOSED on the American people for the last 50yrs… and longer. Not to mention the wars going back over 100yrs. Gee, I’m starting to see a pattern.
Glad You are starting to see a pattern. From My view it is not a good one. But that is the pessimist in me. Just from My own observations of governments all around us , history is about to repeat and this part of history is not good for You and I. Oh a reset is definitely coming, but I fear it is not here to help You and I. May seem good at first, but not!
Yes Don, 😂😝 I tend towards pessimism, glass half empty, most times. But the Lord did see fit to place me in this here and now for His purposes. Unfortunately, I get your drift. When all else fails, they take us to war, as Gerald Celente is fond of saying! I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Nobody gets to vote on any of this wickedness anymore. It’s just imposed on us. By who?
Wickedness by whom ?. I think that You and I know the answer to this question. My time on this earth is numbered as Yours is also. We live for Our heavenly Father, not mankind.
https://youtu.be/dHJPwI1Qioo?si=dpG5wNG6e9jXYxa_
Thanks for sharing Carl. I hadn’t heard it before. Very good 👍
With all the financial turmoil, wars and rumors of wars, natural disasters, political division, human trafficking, attacks on children and the unborn, pandemics, and every other ill that is going on around the globe, it is easy to lose focus on what is really important. Thanks for the reminder to refocus on what is truly the only thing that matters.
Amen to that brother
So clear! Economics and Political Economy didn't come naturally to me like poetry and the arts, but Thinking Logically is a gift to all human beings, if they only use it and develop it. Thank you for this article...I'm going to forward it to those who may be a bit short-sighted and overly-trusting of Mr. Trump's big, beautiful, beastly boondoggles. Years of reading what The Mises Institute produces, also FEE and the Cato Institute, plus many other excellent think tanks large and small has been an enriching and educational experience in Libertarian thought. Trump's no libertarian, obviously. But I have to say, despite his tariff fixation (his hammer on every nail) he's a darn-sight better than anything the dems offer us.
"The real solution is to cut spending. Yet politics won't allow it." OK, genius, then what is the answer? ( So long as our current two-party political caste is allowed to stay in power, there is no solution. Just more so-called meaningful words, but powerless.)
What if there is no answer? Everyone always wants a "solution," but no one entertains the idea that there isn't one. As I keep saying, you can't solve a problem with the same selfish nature that caused it in the first place. Everyone will eventually recognize that is true, hopefully before they bend the knee to Lord Jesus after the second resurrection.
Human nature is trouble but not a problem to be solved.
And Lysenkoist-husbandryist-eugenicist-abortionist-euthansia'ist-final solution'ist true believers otherwise are part of the trouble that is not a problem to be solved.
"Your mission, Jim, should you decide to accept it," is to avoid being dissolved by the trouble that is not a problem to be solved.
The "solution", unless we change our stupid ways, will closely resemble Germany circa 1930.
The "solution", if we continue to elect a preponderance of self serving representatives, will be ugly. See also Germany 1929 to 1935.
oops.
"As the supply of Treasuries is reduced the continued demand would likely drive interest rates down. "
The basic premise of free market economics, supply/demand, suggests that a reduction in the supply of Treasuries would increase the demand, thus increasing the price. I take this to mean interest rates would NOT go down unless there is something I'm missing here.
OTOH, the point that protecting American producers by limiting market access of foreign producers would lead to a decrease in choice and ultimately increase prices makes sense. That represents a double whammy on American consumers: higher prices to offset importers' tariff cost, and higher prices because of the loss of competition.
This is a very nuanced policy decision and please forgive me for believing that this administration does not do nuance. Shock, yes. Nuance, no.
Yes you are missing something. As prices go up the yield goes down. So yes rates would go down under those circumstances.
Clearly stated, thank you. Don, it isn’t that we are willing to pay more; it’s that our choices are substitution or abstention.
Thank you Joel and MN. No matter how many times I’ve been taught, or told, I need to be reminded. Very well done and appreciated.
Joel, Think Pres. Melei has the secret ingrediant ,leave the economy alone, it will find it's way. It seems his way is proven to work. Trump and Powell are both more worried about their legacies than solving the problems at hand.
Every piece of the puzzle is local, right there around you, if your puzzling-piece can parse* it, if you have enough time & energy for your puzzling-piece to parse it.
“Comparative advantage” & “globalism” embezzle-autopen-signs the kited checks that “pay” (postpone reckonings that rake back all the principle plus a big, fat, interest rate …) the subsidy-welfare kings & queens & their armies of subjects & its all due on receipt to the dearth of puzzling-pieces that can parse, that have the time & energy to parse.
Less capable, or worse (much worse), people pretending to be more, better, than they are … & confusing onlookers & acolytes & sycophants - & parsers too/kept/busy - with sleight of hand supply chains-manacles.
Concede the conceit surfeit, & hang ten, or hang together with the parse-nots & swing from noose knots is the ‘to be or not to be’.
***
La Brea Tar Pits, Br’er Fox & Rabbit & Tar Baby & the Briar Patch are all local & misused by “weaponizers” who can’t parse, for whatever reasons.
Tariff babies scooped from tariff pits & ballistically hurled abroad, & inbound-landing from abroad, is what all these zipless velcromagnon fooks are & do - & the job-slots they offer “un-refusably.”
Image: Art Van de Lay, Importer/exporter. From that show about nothing.
All these “countries” are as shell companies in a vast & byzantine ‘avast ye swabs!’ stolen lives & other property fencing & “money” laundering scheme.
All these “countries” are as cell blocks symbolically “paying” inmates to stamp license plates // mil-tech, bio-tech, surveillance-tech … all these “big-brained” can-do-the-crime/time clock-punching technologists** collecting pay-scrip // or be farmed out (paperclipped ops) to other inmates at warden’s discretionary mulcting preference.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2N_0YiBm28E
***
Pirates.
And iron pyrite polished for sale to punchline Polish jokes … because the left pole, that little Napoleon POS dumb-but-conductive terminal held aloft by even littler static cling dingleberries, has levered - by human tsunami wave majoritarianism - the right pole that actually groks & knows & pens the prose the proles’ cross-wired poles shorts out to full circle back to short wo/men full of loathing, sound & fury, signifying more-more-more of the same nothing.
Buyology in this never-never wasn’t land of The Big Shorts.
Iain McGilchrist:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGqlAg3xHNE
*Parsely, sage, rosemary & thyme … “The song lists a number of impossible tasks given to a former lover who lives in Scarborough, North Yorkshire."
Parse Lee, Grant, Sherman & Crime …
** I just read a bit about a piranha bite outta crime named Gerald Bull. Super-guns. Space-guns. A murder facilitator/inventor engineer murdered in turn by Mossad, or some other same Murder, Inc. You can look him up.
But piranhas swim in swarming schools that defy looking them all up … & they swim in muddy riverine waters that have been “tokenized” since long before the word or Tolkienized Rings wedlocked these Morlock & Eloi freaks unto death do us all part.
Conduction calls out “All aboard!” Abduction arrives at absurd, & disembarks. Crazy-train Locomotive Breath refrain/finity ….