‘Americans Will End Up Paying the Tariffs’

6 comments

1. The headline isn’t controversial at all.

   Isn’t it common knowledge that the importing country that imposes tariffs bears the cost of those tariffs? Sure, it raises the barrier to entry of that market, but the exporting country isn’t paying any of those tariffs. The importers pay the tariff and, in general, pass those costs on to consumers.

   My understanding is that the argument FOR tariffs is that there’s a belief that another country’s government is subsidizing production so that manufacturing costs are artificially low.

   For an oversimplified example, let’s say it costs a US manufacturer $10 to make a widget and country X’s manufacturer produces widgets at a cost of $11. The other manufacturer gets a subsidy of $3/widget from country X’s government bringing the net cost down to $8 and they can now sell widgets at $9 and still profit. The US manufacturer cannot sell at $9 since their cost is $10. In this scenario, the US government could impose a tariff of $3 on the other country’s widgets to offset the subsidy bringing them up to $12. Now, far less people will buy country X’s widgets and importers will buy fewer of them, thus limiting their entry into the US market.

2. It’s not the best analogy, but it’s like “I will build a wall… and Mexico will pay for it.”

   The wall was started being built, a forceful agreement was made using tariffs and Mexico built a wall of soldiers and provided for all the immigrants to remain in Mexico while waiting to be processed. Substantially reducing the end costs of illegal migration to the United States. Probably way more than the cost of building the wall would have been to the United States if it had not been terminated.

   In essence Mexico was influenced to modify their behavior because the cost of satisfying the threat of tariffs, so much so, that they started controlling their southern borders. Did Mexico actually pay for the wall? Well, kinda.

   There is more than one way to skin a cat. Tariffs are just one tool in the tool bag.

3. Sadly, we know [https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-ziklag-secret-christian-charity-2024-election](https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-ziklag-secret-christian-charity-2024-election)

4. Trump Tariffs are much like his health care plan, the drool without substance from someone suffering from mid-stage dementia. I wonder which handler had to remind him today not to Tweet about the audience loving his debate performance (there was no audience).

5. Biden trade war has been a complete disaster. However, his billionaire friends are richer for it and that’s all that matters.

6. US does not have to produce anything. Importing it is always cheaper.