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Trump Announces $60 Billion Tariff on Chinese High-Tech and Other Goods (techcrunch.com)
Following months of investigations by the U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, the Trump administration announced on Thursday at a White House briefing that the administration intends to place about $60 billion of tariffs on Chinese goods, with the bulk of them likely to be focused on the high-tech industry. The White House will announce a final list of goods subject to the tariffs in the next few weeks. From a report: "We've lost over a fairly short period of time, 60,000 factories in our country. Closed, shuttered, gone. Six million jobs at least, gone. And now they are starting to come back," President Trump said during the briefing. "The word that I want to use is reciprocal -- when they charge 25 percent for a car to go in, and we charge 2 percent for their car to come into the United States, that's not good. That's how China rebuilt itself."
Can’t be sad about this one.
Because otherwise how are we going to be able to afford all these now more expensive trinkets and toys?
Oh. Wait. We're not supposed to. It's supposed to further expand the wealth gap and pretty much finish off the US middle class.
AI is better than billions of Chinese factory workers. Just ask anyone in SV.
Trump is a blowhard, but he's doing some good stuff. If he keeps it up, the blind, hateful liberals will be dragged kicking and screaming into a functional USA.
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Tariffs on Chinese garbage will kill the WMT stock price.
This is not good for anyone, as the slew of economists and economic reporters have been putting out there for the last few weeks.
But more than that it's every day Americans who are going to be paying for it. 20-30% more on every electronic device, gadget, previously untariffed good that was imported, all to do what? Temporarily prop up industries / companies here in the US that won't significantly change their employment levels, capital investment in manufacturing, or supply chains in time until these tariffs are lifted?
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The man is doing exactly what he promised he would do if elected.
Wonder if he even knows...
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
but every word out of his mouth is a lie, and his administration makes a point of dissing science and information.
We're in a war with Afghanistan
We're in a war with Pakistan
We're in a war with Libya
We're involved in the war in Somalia
We're involved in the war in Syria
We're involved in the Yemeni Civil War
We have a war on drugs
We have a war on terrorism
Christians like to believe there's a war on Christmas
Why not add a trade war to the list. The others aren't ending anytime soon, but we're bored of hearing about them so we need a new war to talk about.
Would it not leave everyone blind?
If China lowered their tariffs, who of you thinks the USA would do likewise and not just keep the money as politicians love to do? I want a show of hands.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
If China imposes 25% on imported goods, Chinese goods would still be more affordable to their citizens than those produced in first world nations by a significant margin.
Trust me, you would not want to buy an American made cellphone, the price would be astronomical, even for an American.
China practically has slave labor.
Then they will just buy $60 billion worth of airplanes from Airbus. We just pissed off Europe not long ago. And they will import chicken feet and other farm products from somewhere else.
So here's the thing, as consumers we have to ask ourselves an important question especially for the folks who can afford it. (If you're close to poverty then it's understandable that you don't have choices.) But for those of you that can afford it, would you buy a cheap gizmo or a more expensive gizmo supporting your own home country? I prefer to buy locally made stuff myself if I can find it at a "reasonable" price.
Trade wars are generally not good for the economy. As happy as I would be too stick it to the Chinese companies, I fear this will do more harm than good. I think it would be better to create incentives, and hold US companies to them, to keep production in America. Igniting a trade way under the guise of national security isn't a smart move but I would expect that coming from a president who's mental agree is that of an elementary school child.
go pop some non-chinese popcorn, sit back and watch.
Trade sanctions are what they are. If the imbalance of trade is that bad, maybe we could start making things in the US for a change.
Of course there would need to be a literal shit-ton of legislation to incentivize businesses to manufacture here, not including robots.
How is he actually selling this to anybody?? Somehow, this idiot actually thinks that power can be transferred from capital to labor (or vice versa) by imposing tariffs on imported goods??? Seriously. Journalists need to do their jobs and publicly call this guy on the carpet. Even economics drop-outs know that this does not work.
Or if his reasoning is to "make things more even"... does he even understand what the hell that means? Especially in a global economic environment. SMH on this guy's logic. Where the hell is he getting his guidance from??
The economies are so interlinked that any real trade war could create unstable and unpredictable times.
... that anything could happen... the problem is it may not be able to be predictable. ... is more than likely just pretending to know and guessing.
The US owes so much debt now, that if China starts dumping accumulated debt they could force a spike in interest rates that basically throw the US into a hard recession.
It could lead to a currency war as China could hit back with devaluation equivalent to the tariffs.
The Chinese banks are not very transparent - and if the current swoon turns into a worldwide stock market crash - could be the start of another Asian crisis (we just cannot know) if it is prolonged.
Companies cannot just turn on a dime and change manufacturing (i.e. move it to other locations), so it could spike inflation and it could also disrupt major American companies supply.
Or it could just be taken in stride. The problem is that the markets were already overly exuberant, and there are many bubbles that could be popped
Anyone that claims to know what will happen
I'm no fan of Trump's authoritarian asshattery. But this may be good for the average Slashdotter, who's likely a tinkerer at heart. More expensive Chinese goods means that the repair-replace balance will be thrown to the left, and money can be made repairing existing hardware vs tossing it out and buying another special at Walmart.
Discouraging people from throwing hardware away instead of fixing it is also environmentally good. E-waste is a real issue, like it or not, and there's no need to make more e-waste if you can just upgrade existing hardware, fix the OS, whatever.
Everything Trump does is a childish ego response to prove he has a bigger dick.
Like the majority of EVERYTHING that is sold in the US is made in China. So how's this in any way good for Americans and American companies?
Of course ... Would be much nicer if things were not offloaded to China constantly as that's usually the first step in loss of the quality of a product.
Remember that tax cut you guys gave the wealthy, with those temporary peanuts for you... well those peanuts are being snatched back by the administration! SO WEIRD! Could never have seen it coming! Enjoy that extra few bucks a week!
the jobs aren't coming back. Not very many anyway. Any factories built here will be run by robots. On the other hand we might end up bringing back the pollution.
The trouble with tariffs is they don't work as half measures. If you want to do isolationism like Brazil does that's fine. But get ready for $1500 Playstations and $3000 video cards. That's why you can still buy a Sega Megadrive in Brazil without irony.
Oh, one more thing. Any chance these tariffs will be passed on to me in the form of services like roads, schools or healthcare? Given the $1.5 trillion dollar tax cut we just did (83% of which went to the 1%) I'm guessing no. It's just like the lottery. They claim the money will go to services but then they shuffle it around and turn it into tax cuts for the rich.
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Since Clinton "opened" to (Red) China over Taiwan, the writing was on the wall for the USA and West. 10c pens that don't write, $1 toys that break and might contain chemicals you don't want to know about. All made with basically slave labor with the sole purpose of undermining (to closure / bankruptcy) every factory in every sector. Starting with shoelaces and ending up with laptops and complex hi-tech machinery. Second prong was luring billionaire empires like the Walfarts and later the Fruit to shift manufacturing to China to "save costs" - aim: to pillage the IP as you had to hand over all the tech. Third prong was what the first two cannot achieve, they outright stole. All this is fairly obvious to a 6 year old if you read the news over the past two decades. But inside the USA the focus has been to see how deeply the nation can be divided into rabidly opposed camps - note the vitriol in past elections, its getting out of control. The 2007/2008 crash has materially affected the US economy. "Gig economy", small startups, people surviving by taking risks on their YouTube channels to gain follower$. The real jobs - gone. The huge empires don't care, their top guys are swimming in gold like Scrooge McDuck (Jobs, Gates, Bezos and club). You and I, the suckers at the bottom, are fed / paid just enough just not to starve, but also just enough to keep buying all these gadgets. No iPhone sales, no Apple empire. No Echo sales, no Amazon intrusion. Etcetera.. It is highly overdue time for The People to stand up for Their Country and make it what the foundation stone inscription says. Or fall. Trump, unrefined as he may seem, is trying to undo 20+ years of damage to the USA. You can't achieve this with the 4-year popularity war cycle. Look at the Other Side - just made their leader a lifer. Not that dictatorships are good, but they get things done. USA can only recover from these blows if the people stand together, no matter who is President. There was an election, person X won, that is your leader, support them 100% till next time and vote as you need to at that point.
I think Trump is pretty much a piece of shit as a human being, but, on this, I think he is on the right track. China needs our soybeans more than we need their shitty toasters that don't last a year.
We've lost over a fairly short period of time, 60,000 factories in our country. Closed, shuttered, gone. Six million jobs at least, gone. And now they are starting to come back," President Trump said during the briefing.
Factories gone for things that can be made much less expensively over seas, gone from a now more services-oriented US economy. Many, perhaps most, of those jobs won't be coming back and, if they do, US consumers will pay a steep price. Trump is longing for a World that was, but has now moved on.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
China's revitalization came about because of two main reasons. They allowed Mines and farms to do whatever they wanted causing massive pollution but an abundance of natural resources. They also provided very cheap labor for factories. This allowed the Chinese to buy/steal technology. It also trained their population to use modern manufacturing methods and machinery. I will admit tariffs helped create a massive market that preferred local goods. But with the Chinese mind set, a large percentage of citizens would have purchased local goods even without the tariffs.
Get those Alibaba orders in quick!
.... from eastern EU, with love :), thanks !
:>
not joking
Prices for everything are about to go to the moon!
It's ok APK.
We understand that you are upset that Hillary lost but you really should stop the shit posting.
Subsidise the wages of US workers using the vastly overinflated military budget allowing US factories to compete with cheap chinese labour.
Home-made technology products become more secure against chinese infiltration and thus justifies the use of the military defence budget.
The US military spend is already higher than the other top 10 countries COMBINED so skimming a billion or two off the top really won't matter much.
Not sure who does your taxes but average tax returns are several thousand dollars in refunds.
That's charming. So, somebody making ten million a year gets a million dollars in lower taxes, and one thousand middle class people get one dollar lower taxes. Net result: average tax cut one thousand dollars!
Would be more useful to look at the median tax cut.
China asks USA to start settling its debts and paying back...
Globalists are always pro free trade, the easier to sell out their fellow countryman. Not hard really.
And what about your fellow country who depend on Global Trade? We don't count? I work in aerospace; this is gonna suck real bad for us. If you wanna buy a jet engine, you have to go to Pratt&Whitney (US), GE (US) or Rolls Royce (GB). We do things ALL over the World. That's right, the US has 66% of the World Wide Jet engine market.
Sure Trump saved a few hundred jobs in the Rust Belt - Maaayyyyyybe. But at the cost of thousands in other places?
Steel making is a cheap commodity. Jet engines are a high margin high tech endeavor.
World trade is globalist. And denying it only hurts ourselves.
"Traitor" is definitely too strong a word here, since the "treason" was against conservatives, and even then, before the election HE TOLD everyone that he was going to push leftist economic policies. Apparently people just didn't believe him, so they feel betrayed if tey voted for him.
I think a lot of conservatives vote Republican just out of habit, because when they grew up, the Rs were more to the right on economic issues than the Ds. Over the last few decades, the parties have traded a lot of lefts and rights, where Democrats tend to be more conservative than Republicans on most things now (not everything, but most things), but voters don't keep up.
But keeping up is voters' responsibility. If they wanted free markets instead of centralized economic planning, it was up to them to vote for someone else. They didn't have to vote for the pinko.
The other people who might say he was a traitor, would be the Republican party itself (as opposed to Republican voters), simply based on his platform being so opposed to their own. But the time to nip that in the bud was during the primaries, because that's when the "treason" happened. If they felt strongly enough about it, they shouldn't have licensed him their trademark.
Imagine if Bernie Sanders, while in the Democratic Party, were to tell everyone he was going to repeal all gun control, eliminate the safety net, lower taxes, and execute any women caught getting abortions. Then imagine he got elected and actually did those things. Plenty of Democrats would be shouting "TREASON!!!" Same with Trump, having all this Soviet flavor but running and winning as a Republican.
Anyway, voters, if you're into free markets, you know what to do: don't vote for Republicans anymore. That was your grandfather's strategy. If you really want to support freedom, then vote Libertarian. If you want to take a step toward freedom but not totally commit, then vote Democrat. And if you have communist leanings, Trump's flavor of Republicans are still there, and there are even some Democrats on the left too still, but you need to study the candidates carefully.
And if you're a Republican Party person and you resent this "treason" then you either better get back to the "rigging" that Trump accused you of in 2016, or accept that you aren't in control of the platform anymore, because your voters are swinging further and further to the left.
Why do you all see everyone else as enemies? Anyone who isn't a White nationalist seems to be the enemy of the US always. Why? Why don't you ever see the White wealthy elites who make decisions on your behalf and to the detriment of you as bad? Do you really think a guy in a Chinese sweat shop is your enemy? Do you really think a guy picking grapes is part of a conspiracy to destroy you? Do you think the poor Black kid who grows up with no parents is plotting to take over?
Seriously man, you all should really listen to yourselves. The problem isn't the other poor guy. The problem is as it always was, the rich wealthy people who do nothing yet own everything. They come in all forms colors and genders. Yet they rule you like they always have, by directing your misery at someone else.
You have to wake up one day.
If they had just let The Donald open a chain of hotels all over China, this could all have been avoided.
I understand the desire to strike back, but do you have anything to support the notion that these specific actions are going to be beneficial? We're pretty tightly coupled with China. Most of our manufacturing is done there, especially all the dirty stuff nobody likes doing. Cheap Chinese goods have been the only thing keeping the American worker from noticing the last 40 years of wage stagnation (well, noticing it any more than they already have). Do you have hard numbers on how this will translate to higher wages? I'm not expecting a raft of new manufacturing jobs and neither should you. Even the Chinese are automating. So if there's no new jobs and no new demand for American workers how is this going to raise wages enough to account for the increase cost of consumer goods?
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a tariff tied to environmental and worker conditions (and by environmental I mean clean air and water, not "Save the Whales" environmental).
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This is exactly what economists said he should have done instead of a blind protectionist tariff on steel and aluminum. How can you argue against mirroring the exact tariffs imposed on US goods overseas?
....and the market dropped 700 points. If Trump's headed for another bankruptcy, he wants to take us all with him.
"Truth is what works" -- William James "It works!!" -- o-dark-AM comment
Doesnt trump and his several members of his family sell various "made in china" goods (trump shirts, etc).
If "Made in the USA" is so important, why isnt his own stuff made there? Do as i say and not as i do?
I see a lot of comments here missing the point somewhat. Regardless of what you think about Trump, this isn't against all foreign manufactured goods, which cannot be brought back, but a way of telling China "fuck you". Other countries, not the US or China, will benefit from this - i.e. South Korea, Singapore, Japan, Vietnam, Thailand, and so on. This is an attempt to shift the growing power in China out, and given what they have been doing I'm not exactly opposed.
I look forward to China being stupid and putting 60 billion on us. Then trump can hit them with another $120 B making it 180 B. All china can do is add another 60B.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Since both USA and China are WTO members, I wonder how Trump administration thinks they can avoid retaliation through WTO arbitration.
Trade wars lead to depressions.
And I ain't talkin bout the kind they prescribe pills for either.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
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China can even the playing field by dropping their own tariffs. If not, well. . . too fucking bad. They have the means to fix this, they just elect not to.
Seriously, why the hell would any country tolerate doing business with China when their polices are blatantly designed to promote Chinese Companies over foreign ones ? As long as China continues this behavior, I have zero issues with cutting them off from the markets they are so obviously screwing over.
Once sales of their top money makers cease, it won't take long for them to realize how dependent their economy is on getting the rest of the world to buy their crap. No sales = no money = economy going to hell in a hurry.
So, to any country ( not just China ) that plays these games, I say bring it on.
You want to be treated fairly ? We only expect the same in return.
Which, really isn't that much to ask.
That's his second lead attorney...
And he apparently plans to "fucking do it his way".
You know... his way.
Trigger warning: You may get an urge to put a gun in your mouth and pull the trigger from all the cringe in that clip.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
On this I support him, but it's a damn shame he's also a traitor.
Trump can declare the universe sucks his dick. You could do the same. Neither makes it true.
China owns a lot of the USA; they have serious power now.
The WTO was bad in so many ways and they don't seem to be making things fair or allowing corrections to be made... I wonder if Trump even is aware of the WTO?
The whole interconnected mess is likely not fixable without a bad bad transition period. It looks like we are headed for a shake up that is not planned. All that avoidance and procrastination I guess was for nothing?
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The whole "level the playing field" argument doesn't change the fact that consumers will pay. Either they pay the higher prices on the foreign goods or they pay the higher prices on the domestic goods that the tariff putatively makes competitive.
What's important here is see China doesn't care if it's populace is punished by paying higher prices.
How dare we let times change! We need to get the jobs back to the conservative leaning blacksmiths and carriage makers! Let's slap tariffs on all cars, planes, buses, trucks, ships, canal barges, helicopters, train engines, and anything else not drawn by horse or mule! Oh wait, what about all the Republican boilermakers who lost their jobs when steam locomotives fell out of fashion? OK, no tariffs on steam locomotives, which will also bring back millions of coal mine jobs and employ billions in steel workers for new rails. Oh, wait, what about all the Diesel engine makers? OK, no tariffs on Diesel engines so that trillions of ultraright Diesel engine mechanics get their jobs back! Oh, wait..... And here we thought Reagonomics was the dumbest idea ever!
I look at this, and I really start to wonder - are the policy decisions being based on Tom Clancy novels?
Tariffs are a really hard thing to nail down. If country A gives it's farmers a 20% subsidy to grow soybeans, is that comparable to telling country B that they need to pay a 20% duty if they want to import them to country A?
The first of those is hard to nail down. How do you know what that subsidy is, and who is getting it? Maybe farmer X gets it, because his daughter is sleeping with the local government official, while farmer Y does not.
The second case is more obvious - if you want to collect that duty, you need to tell the importer they need to pay for it.
Then you get into definitions of what the goods actually are. We've run into that up here in Canada with disputes with the US over how much useful wood comes out of a tree.
Lets not forget quality as well. A pound of Wagyu beef costs a lot more than a pound of normal beef. American corn fed beef is different than American non-corn fed beef. Trees in Canada are a bit more dense, due to the different growing times. If people don't want to buy your goods due to a lower quality product, and you want to buy theirs because it's a good quality product, you'll get the producers of the lower end items screaming about unfair trade practices.
Is importing a pound of Waygu beef equal to exporting 1 pound of regular beef? from a dollar perspective, no.
Good luck with all of this. Me, I'm going to the library to check out a couple more Clancy novels to see what you're in line for next.
One of the biggest components of the cost of an item is salary.
By moving your company overseas, labor is much cheaper, and so you can sell your product cheaper.
If you bring manufacturing back to the US, labor costs are much higher and so the product will cost a lot more.
By imposing tariffs on goods imported, both items imported and items built in the US will cost more.
Bottom line is goods will cost more for everyone in the US.
The additional jobs created will be nothing like before these factories where shuttered, due to automation.
TL;DR Products will cost more, a couple of thousand jobs created, more profit for Trump and his cronies and working people loose out, big time
Completely correct, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan etc(along with the US) make all the parts and make all the money, but China gets all the blame.
Before the tax cut last fall, economists had been warning that the next recession was likely only a few years out. The tax cut likely pushed that out by at least a few more years.
However, the very real likelihood of a global trade war (unless this is just saber-rattling on Trump's part) means that a recession could hit as early as the end of the year.
With the current tax code and budget (just passed last night) we are looking at a $1 trillion per year deficit. When the recession hits, that number will go up, unless taxes are raised or spending is cut.
In a recession, you can't raise taxes. So, the only option will be to reduce expenses. What are the country's biggest expenses outside of the military (can't cut that during a war, after all)?
If you or someone you know relies on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, etc. you/they should starting planning now for the day when those services will be cut, or in the very least severely curtailed.
In a worst case scenario, the poor of this country -- possibly even the working and middle classes, too -- will suffer horrifically.
No, he does not, and they did not. Some items with "MAGA" on it and his name were sold, but not by him. His official merchandise was in fact made in the US.
Think of all the insecure men and their hangups caused by their misconceptions on manhood... and how some special plastic surgery or good therapy (unlikely) would have changed the world today.
Myths about tiny hands or untrained men being poor lovers should addressed so we don't end up with more big problems stemming from petty personal shortcomings...
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World domination... well, the 3rd globally reaching economic empire in history may be worth a steep price or taking a great risk. Especially if one is being nudged in that direction by the great empire falling apart before your eyes.
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is even a tiny little bit communist? They're a Kleptocracy that borrowed Marx's rhetoric. Nothing more. Calling them anything else gives their government more credit than it deserves.
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