Tariffs: Why Is It Fine When Others Use Them, But Not the US?

[Swirlythingy2025]

Lots of countries use tariffs to protect their own industries like China, India, even the EU. But when the US does it, especially under someone like Trump, people act like it’s a global crisis. Why?

I sort of agree. I don’t think Trump has gone about it in the right way, and I don’t think the US economy has historically responded well to huge tariff increases, but I actually think they are a sensible measure on the whole if you want to boost manufacturing in your own country.

I can absolutely see the rationale for making, say, cheap imported steel more expensive via tariffs so that the domestic steel market has a look in - particularly as a lot of the cheap imported stuff will be built on poor employment conditions that wouldn’t be allowed in most of the western world.

I suspect Trump is meddling with tariffs because it’s one of the few things a president can control unilaterally rather than with any considered logic - but generally I’m for tariffs and don’t understand why people are so up in arms about this.

Using tariffs to protect a fledgling industry is economically rational, the calculation of the tariffs other countries have on US goods is incorrect. Trump has looked at the trade balance which and wants this to be positive in relation to all countries - I am interested to how the US is going to suddenly be able to produce raw materials that it doesn't have which it currently imports. His vitriolic point about Cambodia was tbh looked like a playground bully. I hope that China stands up to him and introduces the tariffs proposed. The sooner the rest of world stands up to him the better.

Tarriffs are not smart. But Trump derangement syndrome means that it’s only a problem when he does it.

What hysterical people triggered by Trump don’t realize is that they just make him more popular.

The tariffs will make the cost of living higher for Americans. That's the interesting part. They don't make everything they need (no developed country does).

Representatives of countries used to sit down together and negotiate tariffs down (most recently in the Uruguay Round). Since then the world has splintered into regional trade agreements and become significantly less stable.

Talking and negotiating is good. It gives you common cause. We all know what the alternatives are.

John Maynard Keynes must be turning in his grave.

I don’t disagree with tariffs but I do think the way the U.S. has gone about it is less than ideal. It’ll increase inflation and make life harder for existing industries. There are lots of businesses on Canadian border where goods routinely cross over during production process for example.

I suppose for me the question is what is he trying to achieve? More employment through industrialisation is unlikely as technology has moved on so a factory making those fabled toaster ovens would probably have employed hundreds of workers in the 50’s or 60s. Today probably a handful of engineers to keep the machines running and an admin bod.

Its the same with farming, in years gone by this would of been a massive source of employment. Industrialisation has reduced the need for manual labour. That’s probably a good thing as spending your life tending to a field with a handy oxen or horse sounds pretty shit nowadays.

What Trump is calling tariffs being put on the US aren't tariffs, but a trade surplus.

The fact that he has put tariffs on an island only inhabited by penguins should make anyone pause for thought.

What he is doing is batshit. It's not properly considered policy, they are putting trade tariffs on penguins.

I'm bored of the penguins thing.

If there were no tarrifs on that island then everyone would clamour to move production there, its closing off a potential loophole, nothing more.

But it's a convenient story that he's tarrifing penguins because he's dumb

All the EU supporters should welcome the tariffs. The EU is a club of rich nations that uses tariffs to the enormous detriment of much poorer nations. Free trade and access to free markets have done more to lift people out of poverty than anything else. They've achieved much more than all the foreign aid that's now being cut. But the EU cheerleaders don't like to discuss that side of the coin...

Umm... are you quite mad? No one is going to move production to the Heard and McDonald Islands. 1. It's tiny, 2. It's uninhabited and 3. It is one of the remotest places on earth.

So you disagree that it's not closing a loophole? That it's beyond the wildest realms of possibility and not ever accurate that my entirely plausible but not narrative suiting point is correct?

Oh stop trying to pretend anything he is doing is some sort of 4D chess.

The formula he used to come up with his 'tariffs' has been calculated, and the reason for the tariffs against penguins is known and it's not 'reciprocal tariffs' as claimed. It's a stupid formula applied without any thought.

@Tricho I am saying no one is going to move trainer production to a tiny uninhabited island populated by penguins thousands of miles from anywhere.

I'm not. I'm giving a point of view that doesn't suit your narrative.

Its not 4d chess to close a glaringly open loophole, its basic business.

Also it is not a loophole as the islands are part of Australia.

He considers VAT to be a tariff and factors this into his calculations.

Some of the richest businessmen in the world are trying to colonise space, you think this would be beyond their realms of possibility if it meant avoiding crippling tarrifs?

Oh, babe.

You cannot say he is imposing 'retaliatory' tariffs on a colony of penguins, and yet that was his claimed rational.

You are trying to rationalise his absolutely batshit policy for him for some reason.

No one is moving production to penguin island. He applied the same formula to the penguins as he applied to every other country. The formula that he claimed was based on 'tariffs' and is in fact 'trade surplus'.

You’ve seen Wallace and Grommit. Don’t trust the fucking penguins.

The act the USA had to protect an area of manufacturing was one of the first things Trump got rid of for no reason other than ‘Biden did it’. Trump’s tariffs aren’t doing anything to protect the USA and are totally deranged. The only thing they are going to do is increase the CoL for the average American and make the richest people who shorted the stock market a lot richer. The numbers are entirely fictional and economically illiterate.

No he doesn't. We know exactly what he factored into his calculations because his formula is based on trade surplus with each country and that's it.

They did not look at what tariffs each country imposes.

Technically he’s tariffing penguins because he asked AI for a list of countries and it gave him internet domains. Which is much funnier.

No one is moving their manufacturing to an Antarctic island thousands of miles from anywhere that doesn't even have running water or electricity, stop being ridiculous.

If you want to get around it the Isle of Man is much more convenient.

Interestingly, China have retaliated by matching his 34% tariff and he’s not happy.

Which suggests that they didn't have a 67% tariff against the US in the first place, doesn't it, despite what the tariff board claimed.

If it was 67% originally, he should be delighted by them dropping it to 34%. It's just more proof his formula was bullshit.

Well quite.