#Trump's tariffs

[republicansaredomesticterrorists]

#republican assholes #traitor trump #crooked donald #traitor #maga morons #never trump #Trump’s trade wars #Trump’s tariffs

[a-god-in-ruins-rises]

protectionism is back on the menu, boys.

#you love to see it #after decades of trade liberalism and the hollowing out of america's domestic industry #we're finally starting to see the government take some action to reverse course #i've been calling for this for years #good to see things are starting to finally move in that direction #from trump's tariffs and trade war with china to biden's chips act and the ukraine aid bills #and i'm regularly seeing news articles about the need to revitalize our shipbuilding industry #just a few weeks ago i saw that our secnav was in japanese shipyards #inviting investments/talent to come to american shipyards

[azspot]

…Donald Trump is running on a gigantic regressive tax increase and nobody seems to care.

Trump's middle class tax hike

#trump #taxes #tariffs

[liberty1776]

During the 2016 and 2020 campaigns, Trump’s opponents in the Democratic party (and elsewhere) often pointed out that Trump’s protectionism hobbles private markets and the economy overall. Yet, the allegedly anti-protectionist Biden administration has done virtually nothing to end Trump’s protectionists policies put in place from 2017 to 2020. The motivation is unclear, but it is possible that the Biden administration realized that protectionism is a useful political tool. These policies offer a way of punishing opponents, rewarding allies, and pandering to voters. Now that it’s election season, the pandering side of the equation is in full swing. Biden this … Continue reading →

#Taxes #Tariffs Protectionism Trump Economics

[worldofwardcraft]

Another of his mental impediments.

March 28, 2024

One of the many drawbacks of Donald Trump's limited intelligence is that he's unable to foresee the consequences of his actions. Living always in the moment, he is focused only on getting through today. Thus, he is simply incapable of either comprehending the effects of current decisions or anticipating future outcomes.

Nowhere was this more in evidence than in the lead-up to the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2018, Trump ordered the disbanding of the National Security Council's Global Health Security and Biodefense unit. A year later, the position of CDC epidemiologist embedded in China’s disease control agency was eliminated. And just three months before the coronavirus began infecting people in China, his administration decided to end a $200 million early warning program, called Predict, designed to alert potential pandemics.

Trump shut down these programs only because they originated under the despised President Obama. And without a moment's thought concerning any possible ramifications. Such as COVID-19 becoming the third leading cause of death in the US in 2020, with a death rate of 1,027 per 100,000 population and over a million dead between January 2020 and June 2023.

Then there was the time Trump, abetted by an eager Republican Congress, pushed through the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which significantly lowered the top tax rate for high-income earners and slashed the corporate rate to 21%. Wealthy GOP donors loved it, but little attention was given to the resultant economic inequality. Said the Brookings Institution's Tax Policy Center at the time:

When it is ultimately financed with spending cuts or other tax increases, as it must be in the long run, TCJA will, under the most plausible scenarios, end up making most households worse off than if TCJA had not been enacted.

Trump's tariffs on foreign goods and his rejection of international treaties may have seemed like good America First ideas at the time. But the former resulted in increasing prices for American consumers and destroying markets for American farmers, while the latter isolated us from our allies and endangered our national security. Trump evidently didn't see any of that coming.

Even today, Trump puts forward superficially attractive, but ill-considered policies. Like a 100% tariff on cars manufactured outside the US, which would make them cost twice as much. He also promises to deport eight million immigrants, which would devastate the US economy by depriving it of a sizable portion of its workforce. So, if you hear Trump's proposals and wonder what he could possibly be thinking, the answer is, as usual, he isn't.

#trump ignorance #trump presidency #trump tariffs #trump tax cuts

[usnewsper-business]

Beijing Has Plenty of "Dry Powder" To Manage Economic Stresses, US-China Business Forum Finds #beijing #tariffs #trump #uschinatradewar #XiJinping

#Business #beijing #tariffs #trump #uschinatradewar #XiJinping

[factcheckdotorg]

#donald trump #nikki haley #fact check #tariffs #taxes

[faultfalha]

The US Commerce Secretary's secret mission to China unfolded like a dream. The plane left without a trace in the dark of night, carrying a spirit of unknown purpose. Rumors flew of another invisible hand controlling destiny, guiding a course of action to bridge the widening fissure between the two nations. Was the power of diplomacy enough, or was a larger force at work? In the end, the only certainty was that the future was uncertain.

#fault #Wilbur Ross #China #trade disputes #tariffs #Trump administration

[pennyfarthingdash]

AJP Replay 🎩 Trump once called Gen. Mike Flynn in the middle of the night to find out if a strong or weak dollar was better for the economy. Can we please stop saying Trump has a good business mind? We're not sure if he has anything in that huge melon at this point.

#Trump #tariffs #economy #bad business #Mike Flynn #bad politics #lock him up #A.J. Pennyfarthing #DailyKos.com

[unicargo]

When it comes to streamlining your logistics and optimizing cost efficiency, Freight Consolidation Services are a game-changer. Our expert team specializes in consolidating shipments, combining multiple smaller loads into a single larger shipment. By doing so, we eliminate wasted space and reduce transportation costs. Air Freight Delivery Services comprehensive approach ensures efficient route planning, timely delivery, and enhanced supply chain management. With our freight consolidation services, you can enjoy the benefits of reduced shipping expenses, minimized handling, and improved inventory control. Whether you have small or large-scale shipping needs, trust us to provide reliable and cost-effective solutions that will simplify your logistics operations.

#volumetric weight calculation #how to calculate chargable weight #volumetric weight shipping #trump tariffs

[joe-england]

Let's talk about the economy and a democratic problem....

Those stupid trade wars.

#youtube #trump #trade war #beau of the fifth column #economy #midterms #america #politics #democrats #republican #tariffs #pandemic #news #supply chain #recession #messaging

[zvaigzdelasas]

You can’t buy the Seagull in the US. But I bet you wish you could.

A small hatchback around the size of a Mini Cooper, the Seagull is a fast-charging electric car and claims a range of up to 250 miles [...] BYD, its Chinese manufacturer, claims it can go from 30 percent to 80 percent charged in a half-hour using a DC plug. It’s hardly a luxury car but it’s well-equipped, with a power driver’s seat and cruise control. “If I were looking for an inexpensive commuter car … this would be perfect,” veteran car journalist John McElroy said after taking a drive.

The best part? Its base model costs about $10,700 in China.

That’s about a third of the cost of the cheapest EV you can buy in the US. In South America, it’s a little pricier, but still fairly affordable, at under $24,000 for a top-trim version. Even in Europe, you can get an entry-level BYD for under €30,000. These are absolutely screaming deals — exactly the kind of products that could turbocharge our transition away from gas and toward electric vehicles.[...]

The problem for Americans? The Biden administration is hell-bent on preventing you from buying BYD’s product, and if Donald Trump returns to office, he is likely to fight it as well.

That’s because the BYD cars are made in China, and both Biden and Trump are committed to an ultranationalist trade policy meant to keep BYD’s products out. [...] Shipments to Europe have increased astronomically; Chinese companies sold 0.5 percent of EVs in Europe in 2019 but they’re already over 9 percent as of last year. Companies like BYD make cheap, reasonably good-quality cars people are eager to buy.

In 2018, Trump imposed, and Biden has since continued, a special 25 percent tax on Chinese-made autos, on top of the ordinary 2.5 percent tax on foreign-made cars.

That has so far prevented BYD and its Chinese peers from trying to enter the US market. US customer tastes are different enough that Chinese manufacturers would probably prefer to make cars tailored to them — but US policy has been so hostile toward cheap Chinese EVs that so far, the companies haven’t wanted to bother.

So, the result is that we’re left out of the bounty of cheap EV options created by BYD and others. “If you’re a consumer right now, the best place to be right now is China, because you have the best choice of EVs,” Ilaria Mazzocco, senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and an expert on Chinese EVs, says.[...]

Still, China’s price advantage is big enough that even the extreme Trump-Biden import tax might not be enough to deter companies like BYD from entering the US market. Even with the tariffs, Chinese cars might be cheaper than their rivals. “​​Subsidies most likely won’t be enough; Mr. Biden will need to impose [more] trade restrictions,” climate journalist Robinson Meyer predicted recently. The Biden administration is already making noise about imposing even more draconian taxes or trade restrictions against these vehicles. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has described Chinese-made cars as a national security threat, and recently announced an investigation into the vehicles’ data collection abilities and the possibility they could send movement data to Beijing.

On the one hand, Biden is offering Americans up to $7,500 per vehicle to buy EVs (provided they meet certain made-in-North America rules). On the other hand, he’s imposing massive taxes to keep Americans from buying EVs. It’s a bizarre policy that makes no sense from a climate perspective.[...]

[The Biden Administration] has proven shockingly willing to sabotage its own climate policy if it gets to stick it to the Chinese in the process.

“There’s almost an across-the-board apprehension about Chinese EVs, even though they would make an important contribution to [lower] CO2 emissions,” Gary Clyde Hufbauer, a veteran trade expert at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, says.[...]

Realistically, Helveston argues, BYD might not sell something like the Seagull in the US because it’s smaller than most cars Americans buy. They’d probably build plants in the US instead, or its free-trade zone partners Canada and Mexico, to build vehicles tailored for Americans. “If you’re going to really enter a market, you have to make it locally,” Helveston explains. “US automakers like GM sell and make millions of cars in China to sell in China.” BYD would do the same. Indeed, it’s already reportedly scouting sites for factories in Mexico.

If they ever were to set up shop in North America, BYD and other Chinese car companies would still have a major price advantage versus American EVs. They have years more experience and a much more successful track record of building batteries and EVs at low cost.

“Part of why they’re so successful is they’ve been thinking outside the box on cost reduction for a long time,” Mazzocco says. They took the “opposite of the Tesla approach”: starting not with luxury vehicles but ultra-cheap cars fit for taxi fleets and not much else, and constantly improving their early inexpensive prototypes. The result is that Chinese firms have gotten extremely good at making inexpensive EVs, at a time when Ford, by contrast, lost $28,000 for every EV it sold in 2023.[...]

“If you have more affordable EVs in the United States, no matter where you come from,” Gopal says, “that’s better for the climate.”

Still, the Biden administration reportedly wants to restrict Chinese car companies’ access to the US even if they do set up shop in North America. Bloomberg reported earlier this month that the Biden administration is formulating rules that would limit US sales of Chinese-made parts, even if they’re in vehicles ultimately assembled in the US or Mexico.[...]

But the Biden administration’s objections to Chinese EVs are also ideological. The Biden administration represents the victory of a protectionist, trade-skeptical wing of the Democratic party that was relegated to the sidelines during the Clinton and Obama years.[...]

[O]ver 90 percent of American households have a car, and surging car prices were a huge contributor to the 2021–2023 rise in inflation.

Barriers to importing cheap cars make inflation worse and reduce the real incomes of the middle class.

Not only are the administration and other left-leaning institutions opposed to Chinese EVs, but hardline conservatives at places like the Heritage Foundation are calling for outright bans on Chinese EVs as well. Their rationale is security, another theme the Biden administration evokes often. On Thursday, the Commerce Department announced it was beginning a process to “investigate the national security risks of … PRC-manufactured technology in [internet-connected] vehicles.”

6 Mar 24

[robertreich]

The Silent Revolution in American Economics

I don't think you're expecting what I'm about to say, because I have never seen anything like this in fifty years in politics.

For decades I've been sounding an alarm about how our economy has become increasingly rigged for the rich. I've watched it get worse under both Republicans and Democrats, but what President Biden has done in his first term gives me hope I haven't felt in years. It’s a complete sea change.

Here are three key areas where Biden is fundamentally reshaping our economy to make it better for working people.

#1 Trade and industrial policy

Biden is breaking with decades of reliance on free-trade deals and free-market philosophies. He’s instead focusing on domestic policies designed to revive American manufacturing and fortify our own supply chains.

Take three of his signature pieces of legislation so far — the Inflation Reduction Act, the CHIPS Act, and his infrastructure package. This flood of government investment has brought about a new wave in American manufacturing.

Unlike Trump, who just levied tariffs on Chinese imports and used it as a campaign slogan, Biden is actually investing in America’s manufacturing capacity so we don’t have to rely on China in the first place.

He’s turning the tide against deals made by previous administrations, both Democratic and Republican, that helped Wall Street but ended up costing American jobs and lowering American wages.

#2 Monopoly power

Biden is the first president in living memory to take on big monopolies.

Giant firms have come to dominate almost every industry. Four beef packers now control over 80 percent of the market, domestic air travel is dominated by four airlines, and most Americans have no real choice of internet providers.

In a monopolized economy, corporate profits rise, consumers pay higher prices, and workers’ wages shrink.

But under the Biden, the Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department have become the most aggressive monopoly fighters in more than a half century. They’re going after Amazon and Google, Ticketmaster and Live Nation, JetBlue and Spirit, and a wide range of other giant corporations.  

#3 Labor

Biden is also the most pro-union president I’ve ever seen.

A big reason for the surge in workers organizing and striking for higher wages is the pro-labor course Biden is charting.

The Reagan years blew in a typhoon of union busting across America. Corporations routinely sunk unions and fired workers who attempted to form them. They offshored production or moved to so-called “right-to-work” states that enacted laws making it hard to form unions.

Even though Democratic presidents promised labor law reforms that would strengthen unions, they didn’t follow through. But under Joe Biden, organized labor has received a vital lifeboat. Unionizing has been protected and encouraged. Biden is even the first sitting president to walk a picket line.

Biden’s National Labor Relations Board is stemming the tide of unfair labor practices, requiring companies to bargain with their employees, speeding the period between union petitions and elections, and making it harder to fire workers for organizing.

Americans have every reason to be outraged at how decades of policies that prioritized corporations over people have thrown our economy off-keel.

But these three waves of change — a worker-centered trade and industrial policy, strong anti-monopoly enforcement, and moves to strengthen labor unions — are navigating towards a more equitable economy.

It’s a sea change that’s long overdue.

#youtube #Joe Biden #politics #economics #video #videos

[worldofwardcraft]

How he plans to wreck the economy.

March 7, 2024

Most of the alarm over a second Donald Trump presidency revolves around his authoritarian fantasies of turning the office into a dictatorship and using it to extinguish the criminal prosecutions against him, sic the justice system on his perceived enemies, jettison the Constitution, and deport or imprison migrant refugees (starting, he says, with "the bad ones").

Meanwhile, little attention is being paid to the potential damage a Trump 2.0 could have on the American economy. The LA Times suggests one possibility:

Trump hasn’t outlined much of an economic program, but he has promised to impose a massive increase in tariffs on imports from almost all foreign countries — everything from bananas and baby formula to computer chips and machine parts.

Trump, of course, still doesn't have any idea how tariffs work. He continues to believe other nations pay the taxes on imported goods and not the buyers of them (like Walmart shoppers and American companies that depend on foreign products). Trump regales gullible GOPers with tales of how his trade wars brought billions of dollars into the US Treasury — money that actually came out of the pockets of American consumers and businesses.

Thus, the clueless economic ignoramus has announced his intention to compound his error (if elected) with a worldwide 10% tariff. And, just like last time, his proposed tariffs will curb investment growth and spur unemployment. As ABC News observed,

In all, the U.S. levied tariffs on thousands of products valued at approximately $380 billion in 2018 and 2019, according to an analysis by the nonprofit Tax Foundation. Trump's tariffs decreased U.S. employment by 166,000 jobs, the group found, citing increased import costs for U.S. employers.

Trump's plans to reverse America's currently robust economic growth (thanks, President Biden) also include reducing the labor supply by cracking down on immigration and deporting workers already here, expanding the budget deficit with more tax cuts, and gutting federal agencies charged with protecting workers and regulating markets.

In addition, the AP reports that he has proposed "a four-year plan to phase out Chinese imports of essential goods, including electronics, steel and pharmaceuticals." And, according to The Washington Post, "Trump has lately signaled plans to strong-arm the Fed if he recaptures the White House and force it to cut rates."

In a televised interview in January, Trump said he hoped an economic crash would come in 2024 because "I don't want to be Herbert Hoover." But if he ever gets to carry out his moronic plans for our economy, he'll make Hoover look good.

#trump tariffs #us economy #trump presidency #trump legacy

[batboyblog]

In speeches, interviews and campaign videos, Trump has promised to:

Use the military to participate in the largest deportation of undocumented immigrants in American history;

Order the National Guard into cities with high crime rates, whether local officials want it or not;

Prosecute Californians who protect minors coming to the state for gender-affirming care;

Impose a 10% tariff on almost all foreign goods, increasing prices for consumers;

Appoint a special prosecutor to “go after” his political opponents, beginning with Biden;

Purge the federal civil service of anyone who questions his views.

lets be clear here, Donald Trump wants to use the military to hunt immigrants and if you think it'll stop at "illegal" immigrants I have a bridge to sell you. He wants to place major American cities, Democratic cities under military occupation, oh also while he fires any Democrats from the civil service and "goes after" his political enemies. And as a cherry on top he'll make being trans illegal.

right now the world is trying to distract you from this, trying to act like this is a normal election with two more or less equal choices that both have problems and draw backs, thats not true. One side is selling an authoritarian dictatorship that wants to carry out a genocide of trans people, the other side is not.

#Politics #US politics #Donald Trump #Trump #Joe Biden #Republicans #vote #trans rights #trans #immigration #refugees

[usnewsper-business]

Trump's Latest Retail Comment Is No Laughing Matter #retailindustry #storeclosures #tariffs #trump #Trumpadministration

#Business #retailindustry #storeclosures #tariffs #trump #Trumpadministration