China Raises Tariffs on US Goods To 84% as Rift Escalates (bloomberg.com)
- Reference: 0176984189
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/25/04/09/1131225/china-raises-tariffs-on-us-goods-to-84-as-rift-escalates
- Source link: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-09/china-raises-tariffs-on-us-goods-to-84-as-trade-rift-escalates
> The Chinese countermeasures are effective April 10, according to a government statement Wednesday. China's move came after Trump's latest tariffs went into force at midday Wednesday in Beijing, taking the cumulative rate announced this year to 104%. A day earlier, China vowed to "fight to the end" if the US insists on new tariffs.
[3]Where US-China Decoupling Is Hardest :
> After decades of trade integration, Chinese companies have become increasingly essential suppliers of goods and materials that range from niche to ones many Americans can barely do without.
>
> At $41 billion last year, smartphones -- largely consisting of Apple's iPhones -- were the single largest US import from China. More than 70% of all smartphone imports are from China, according to Bloomberg analysis of 2024 trade data from the US International Trade Commission.
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> Farther afield, China supplies the entirety of hair from badgers and other animals imported into the US for brush-making. It also delivers almost 90% of the gaming consoles US consumers buy from overseas.
>
> Over 99% of the electric toasters, heated blankets, calcium, and alarm clocks the US imports are from China. Ditto for more than 90% of folding umbrellas, vacuum flasks, artificial flowers, LED lamps, and wooden coat-hangers.
[1] https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/04/07/1558211/trump-opens-trade-talks-window-while-threatening-china-with-steeper-tariffs
[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-09/china-raises-tariffs-on-us-goods-to-84-as-trade-rift-escalates
[3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-04-09/badger-hair-and-iphones-where-us-china-decoupling-is-hardest
China's economy will collapse (Score:2)
Bringing down Australia, Europe, and of course America
Re: (Score:2)
Never forget the stubbornness of an authoritarian regime. Just look at Russia. Their economy is crap. They do not invest in things that matter like health, education, infrastructure and instead put all their money into the military. And people can't complain, they just suffer in silence because that's better than going to jail.
Not bad for a set of peasants (Score:4, Interesting)
Though I am slightly confused. After Vance's latest remarks, could someone tell me what the difference is between a "Chinese peasant" and an "American hillbilly"?
Re:Not bad for a set of peasants (Score:5, Funny)
The chinese peasants had their ruthless, heartless psychopathic tyrant forced on them by force and violence.
The american hillbillys freely, willingly, and knowingly chose their ruthless, heartless, psychopathic tyrant.
Re:Not bad for a set of peasants (Score:4, Informative)
> The american hillbillys freely, willingly, and knowingly chose their ruthless, heartless, psychopathic tyrant.
Specifically because he promised to use force and violence against brown people... even the brown American hillbillies voted for him for that reason, they just thought it would happen to other brown people.
Re: (Score:2)
One voted him into office and the other didn't.
Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not from the US, so I keep wondering: is unemployment so bad in the US? Are American citizens truly so desperately in need of those manufacturing jobs?
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Here in the US - we couldn't keep the factories running at full capacity even with the large amount of immigrant employees. With the demonization of immigrants and the desire to bring back more manufacturing, who the fuck do the republicans think are going to fill those jobs?
I do agree, to a point, that we should incentivize products manufactured in the US for domestic sales but think it's ridiculous to burn the whole world down to achieve it. Not everything can/should be made domestically but we do nee
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Of course, bringing back onshre manufacturing is good. However, tariffs are not the tool for that, at least, broad tariffs.
Especially since it doesn't jive with the second part of Trump's goal of "ensuring fairness for our producers". It's one thing to manufacture for domestic use, but if you're starting a trade war, selling your goods to other countries you're at war with isn't going to happen. Because the importing and exporting of goods and services is trade, and a trade war naturally hurts both directio
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Americans don't even want to do those jobs. Especially not for what a Mexican or Chinese worker earns. Which defeats the purpose because then it increases the cost of whatever they are making anyway which gets passed onto customers.
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You presume there is a plan for this madness.
It's simply economic xenophobia, an extension of that person's social xenophobia.
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A decent chunk of Biden's term had unemployment at 3.5% which economists generally agree is about the bottom (ie. you'll never reach 0% unemployment due to natural flows and ebbs in hirings and firings, personal situations, etc.) So no, we don't. We need a lot of things but torpedoing our economy (and the global one) was not needed to secure a scant few manufacturing jobs.
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> I'm not from the US, so I keep wondering: is unemployment so bad in the US? Are American citizens truly so desperately in need of those manufacturing jobs?
Disclaimer - I'm not standing up for anyone. No, it isn't that bad.
But there is a great strategic value to having internal manufacturing capability. It's a nasty world out there. An example is WW2. The US ended up swamping the Axis powers because we could produce materiel in huge amounts, because we had the manufacturing capacity, and could even ramp it up.
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> I'm not from the US, so I keep wondering: is unemployment so bad in the US? Are American citizens truly so desperately in need of those manufacturing jobs?
Are we in need of those manufacturing jobs? Yes and no. People can be fully employed via current job offerings. However, taking some business courses one is taught that there are only 3 sources of wealth, wealth being things that result in something that can be sold, and they are agriculture, mining, and manufacturing.
The manufacturing jobs, I think because of this fact, tend to be higher paying. What we have now is people working multiple jobs, with multiple family members contributing to the house
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> I'm not from the US, so I keep wondering: is unemployment so bad in the US? Are American citizens truly so desperately in need of those manufacturing jobs?
We in the US NEED to be able to manufacture for our own needs.
This became clear during covid, about how dependent we were on OTHER countries, to supply us with damned near everything.....and handing this type of power to an antagonistic country like China is a major national security threat.
I dunno if this is the best way to rectify this, BUT it has to
Re: Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:5, Informative)
How was Kamala Harris an extreme leftist?
Was she promoting communist principles or something?
Re: Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:5, Insightful)
She was even a former prosecutor. I thought stuff like that made their peepees hard. Oh wait she was a woman and darker than a latte? Too extreme for me! I’ll take the orange guy who bankrupt casinos and sells tacky products made in China.
Re: Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:5, Informative)
Because Fox says she is, that's where he gets his ideas.
Never mind that she's a centrist who might have been Republican a short time ago, that's she's an attorney with a prosecution background and that her opposition in California is mostly because she was not progressive enough. None of that matters, it's only the caricature that matters to MAGA, whatever they are spoon-fed by professional liars.
Re: Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:4, Interesting)
Because she cared about minorities? Or because she cared about people in general?
Re: (Score:2)
Way to hold on to your nonsense world view even when you cant support it.
Re: Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:4, Interesting)
I have no idea what woke is and neither do you.
That said, what made Harris extreme?
Re: Do US reaaaaaaally need those jobs? (Score:5, Informative)
> Kamal Harris was picked as VP BECAUSE she had a vagina and black skin
Harris was WAY more qualified to be president in 2024 than Trump was in 2016. She had a public leadership role in the country's largest state and had served in the Senate. Trump was a TV celebrity with a history of bankruptcies, not paying taxes, and not paying contractors, but, hey, he had a catchphrase! But please, go on about how her gender and race disqualifies her from service.
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"Moral: When your country's left is woke, extreme and unelectable, the demented right will win elections and destroy your country."
LOL Are we now to believe the "demented right" is not YOU? Funny how in this thread the virulent right wingers aren't in that tribe anymore. And if you're gonna pretend you haven't argued for Trump all along, maybe don't blame the current problems on left wokeness, you moron.
Finally, everyone knows you don't have morals, you're MAGA.
Re: (Score:2)
> Your question is like asking "Is Britain better off with Brexit?" It is not, and America does not need those jobs, but conmen managed to persuade enough genius voters that these things are true, and those dumb fucks voted for them, and fucked up their countries as a result. Moral: When your country's left is woke, extreme and unelectable, the demented right will win elections and destroy your country.
That's pretty concise and accurate. The Dem's took a weird swing into kookooville in 2024. The country finally had the shitz of woke. Woke, like all extreme politics, never knows where to stop. Just one example of how far it can go is that legally, a public school can transition your child, and you as a parent have no right to know they were. [1]https://www.dailywire.com/news... [dailywire.com].
So now the public schools have rights the parents don't have and can chemically alter their children without input. By force of law
[1] https://www.dailywire.com/news/major-court-rules-parents-have-no-right-to-know-a-school-is-transitioning-their-child
Dedollarisation (Score:2)
You're gonna start hearing a lot about this and soon.
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That's what Russia and China want, so Trump views it as a positive. He can use that collapse to justify his slush fund for the "crypto reserve" aka his historically enormous pump and dump scheme.
It doesn't matter how much Trump destroys, it only matters how much he ends up owning. This is a totally expected outcome that have been saying all along. We're acting like it's news now?
Re: (Score:2)
It really looks like Donald “Kompromat” Trump is a Russian and/or Chinese asset more and more every day now. He’s making US electoral systems more like Russian and Chinese standards, as well. [1]https://edition.cnn.com/2025/0... [cnn.com]
[1] https://edition.cnn.com/2025/04/09/politics/election-security-systems-trump-invs/index.html
Okay, buying my MacBook Pro before prices change (Score:2)
What a f*ing disaster. Of course so many bigger disasters going on in the U.S. compared to little ol me's purchasing needs. But am overseas, meaning might even get another tariff to ship it here if they are assembling it in Cupertino. Need to replace my vintage MBP and wanted a near top of the line MBP. Now considering whether to go for a much cheaper model, but if there is no end in sight I might need this to last a while.. That and maybe I'll need to locally source a windows or linux machine that already
Losing fight for us (Score:5, Interesting)
This is a losing fight for us. China only has to deal with the tariffs that we put on them and that they put on us. Meanwhile all of our imports will be effected and many of our exports will be effected when the rest of the world finishes retaliating. China knows this which is why they arent backing down. They know these tariffs will wreck the US economy which will cause the Republicans to lose control of the House and the Senate in two years which will bring some sanity back to our governance and someone reasonable to deal with.
Declaring a trade war on the entire world is the most dumb-shit thing Trump has ever done. We have no leverage because every country knows they're taking less hurt over all from us than we are from the rest of the world.
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This is Trump. The same dumbfuck retard that thought drinking bleach and shoving a UV light bulb up one's asshole was a valid way of curing covid.
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He also decided the economy was ripe for a boom in the real estate market....in 2007....2008-9 happened roughly a year later. He's a terrible gambler and Americans handed him a free resource to gamble with. Anyone want to bet on how it will turn out? Check out el Bunko's casinos for a look at the future.
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We only make up 15% of their exports. That's hefty but not a crippling amount.
> We have a much stronger hand here.
I have no idea how you're arriving to that conclusion. As I said, we're fighting the entire world, China only has to fight us. Almost all of our exports and imports will be effected by this trade war where as China only needs to worry about the share of their economy that touches on us. We're in an absolutely awful position right now.
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Maybe if we were just in a trade war with China, but doing the rest of the world at once means that instead of buying counter-tariffed American goods they will buy Chinese stuff for cheapo merch, and EU stuff for high precision goods. The microelectronics are already not made in the USA and won't be anytime soon. I'm not sure how we'll see an employment spike here with all the RIFs in the gov and academia. It'd be a spike of the underemployed.
Long term, this is great for Europe! (Score:4, Interesting)
Europe has always been great at innovation and starting companies with great potential, but bureaucracy and lazyness has prevented most of them from growing beyond Small Cap size. The long term exit strategy of VC in EU is almost always to get bought by an American (or Chinese) Mega Cap once it reaches a size where EU red tape becomes too cumbersone and makes it hard to compete with foreign, less restricted competition.
Suddenly, this is all changing very quickly. When the USA is no longer a stable, friendly and reliable partner but rather an incomprehensible psychotic maniac fighting everyone and everything windmill style, the EU realized that it has no choice but to become that stable and reliable adult on short notice. It's like when a parent kicks a lazy and naive rebel teenager out and he suddenly has to pay for his own food and rent.
Soon (as in a decade or two from now), Europe is going to be fully self-sufficient superpower and no longer reliant on the US. Looking back, this spring will be seen as the turning point that made the EU strong.
This plus the bond market is pretty catastrophic (Score:4, Insightful)
It really looks like the bond market is turning, which is no great surprise, because the wrecking ball that Trump has taken to the US economy's credibility is considerably larger than the one that Truss took to the UK's, and the bond market reaction to her was a pretty substantial GFY.
Just to lay it out for those unclear about what comes next for US residents:
- The demand for house purchases falls off a cliff because first time buyers disappear as mortgage rates go through the roof
- Loans of all sorts become dramatically more expensive
- Loan defaults, foreclosures, etc rise
- Property values fall
- Unemployment rises as companies lay off workers to manage costs and because they can't afford to invest
- Prices rise dramatically, wages don't
What a shit show
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I'm still waiting to see how the oligopolies benefit from all this. Some of them are screaming loudly as well. Yeah, they buy everything cheap, now what?
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I think some of the billionaires appear to have forgotten the first rule of dealing with Trump: you're going to get shat on. Seeing Musk, Koch, Ackman et al be shocked by this is one of the few strands of silver in the storm cloud's lining.
Re:This plus the bond market is pretty catastrophi (Score:4, Interesting)
Percentages. You and I lose 75% of our wealth, and we're looking for a dry cardboard box to sleep in on the nearest street corner when we're not begging for food. A billionaire loses 75% of their wealth and it doesn't affect them at all. With the remaining 25%, they buy up all the stuff you're selling off at rock bottom prices. Their standard of living doesn't even hiccup.
It's a profit opportunity for them. They don't even think about the suffering it's causing, because anyone without a billion dollars is just too damn poor to register as human to them.
It's not peril-free though, the process can be chaotic enough that a few of the big players will end up with nothing, so you will find a few of them screaming.
Not A Problem (Score:2, Troll)
> electric toasters,
Europe, Japan, and South Korea all make better versions
> heated blankets
Safer (less toxic, less likely to catch on fire) if made in the USA
> calcium,
Safer if the dietary supplement is made in USA
> and alarm clocks
Total trash. China stole a *horrible* schematic.
> folding umbrellas,
Trash, almost anywhere else makes them better.
> vacuum flasks,
Canada makes better ones.
> artificial flowers,
Broad category with a variety of materials. Sourcing would vary.
> LED lamps,
Not sure if this is accurate. America makes plenty of LED lamps/diodes (required for federally funded projects). What is imported from China are craptastic LED
Trump Cunning Plan (Score:2)
There isn't one.
We're fucked.
"The hopeless search for Trump’s cunning plan"
https://www.ft.com/content/0f3e2041-3665-4c0c-a2cb-a0d88165c88f
Remember the last time the US had a Tarriff war? (Score:4, Informative)
It made the great depression longer and worse.
Cause of Great depression:
The Great Depression (1929â"late 1930s) was caused by a combination of factors:
1. Stock market crash of 1929 â" massive loss of wealth and confidence.
2. Bank failures â" people lost savings, credit dried up.
3.Overproduction + underconsumption â" too much supply, not enough demand.
4. Debt from WWI and uneven wealth distribution.
Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930
Raised U.S. tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods.
Meant to protect American industries and jobs⦠but backfired.
Why it made things worse:
Other countries retaliated with tariffs on U.S. goods.
Global trade slowed dramatically.
Export industries suffered, especially farmers.
Made the worldwide depression deeper and longer.
So to recap causes of the great depressions.
1 and 4 are a check or majorly in process.
3 is coming fast
2 will follow.
Add the tariffs and we can have the Biggest Best ever great depression!
Trump's Treasury secretary admitted on Fox News (Score:2, Interesting)
That the jobs aren't coming back. Fox made him admit that the factories will be automated.
This is about taxes. They want to create a national sales tax. They've said this a couple of times like when they said we used to get all our taxes from tariffs. Never mind that one we did that children would get rickets because they weren't allowed to have exposure to sunlight but hey, The good old days right?
Look at what you paid in taxes last year. Now double that. That's what's coming. Oh, in $15 a gallon g
at this rate when Musk accidentally imports a part (Score:2)
he is no longer going to be rich, Wonder does he feel he is getting value for his monry currently?
Big business vs small business (Score:3)
Wouldn't this affect big business more than small business?
The average small business in america isn't having things built in China. It's the walmarts, apples, etc. Wouldn't that make it easier for small business to compete?
So much for knock off flow hives... (Score:3)
Overnight these went from $200 to $700... the flow hive is an aussie company but they have a US wing, the flow hive classic they are knocking off is $649 in the US.
Just bought an original instead of the knock off so I guess the tariffs are working.
Re: (Score:3)
Tariffs are an effective tool to counter a hostile country putting tariffs on you. No one ever said otherwise.
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GATT/WTO and international cooperation in the field of foreign trade is a much better and more effective tool to stave off tariffs in general and unjust tariffs in particular.
But it is too hard to comprehend, hence the substitution for that one-line formula.
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The CCP is betting on Democracy, funny enough. They're betting Americans will finally get off their asses and demand action from their GOP representatives as soon as the PAIN starts being felt.
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Punching you in the face works (in so much as it pisses you off, maybe gets you to do something I want, etc). I don't *have* to punch you in the face, however, if you punch me in the face first, I'll do the same to you.
How either of us "win" in a situation like that, I don't know. You'd have to ask the Stable Genius about that one.
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(with Father Jack Hackett's voice) More tariffs!
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Who is "our" craft/manufacturers? Who is the "we" you are talking about, they aren't yours, you do not own them, speak for them or control them.
And the beauty of any economic system is that people can specialize to produce higher quality work and lower prices. It's not "nonsense", it's the most basic economic principle there is. Like it or not, the economy will increasingly globalize, there will be no "our" manufacturers because there will no longer be a "they".
But sure, the problem is that you cannot ma
Re:"countermeasures" (Score:5, Insightful)
They are countermeasures in retaliation to Trump raising tariffs on China a second time.
Seriously, why do the right-minded get so confused when they receive a perfectly logical consequence to their actions? I cannot count the number of times I have seen a right-wing type person express total bewilderment when a person responds exactly as one would expect after receiving hostile behavior from them.
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> why do the right-minded get so confused when they receive a perfectly logical consequence to their actions?
There is nothing which does not confuse them, they are being consistent.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
There were no tariffs preventing Chinese from buying US goods. The reason why the trade deficit was so lopsided was because the US refused to sell anything that China actually wanted. All the US was able to sell was primary economic goods like fucking coal and agriculture. Anything tech related was basically banned, e.g. semiconductors. How the fuck were the Chinese supposed to balance the trade deficit when the US was acting like it was a 3rd world country trying to sell China goods that it could get a
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wait what? are you serious?
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Hell no. My country's existence and my freedom now depends on the USA falling apart smoothly enough that we don't get invaded for our resources. A complete trade failure means American soldiers taking what the US economy wants, and from there we get decades of guerilla warfare and terrorism.
Let's have the US keep as much of their shit within its own borders and let it sort itself out without hurting too many others in the process, please.
Destroying your country (Score:5, Insightful)
just because you're a dumb orange fuck who thinks nobody appreciates your stable genius - priceless!
Re:Destroying your country (Score:5, Informative)
This will hit American consumers really hard. A lot of the cheap stuff they rely on to survive will become unaffordable, and a lot of the high end goods they want will too.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:4, Insightful)
Everyone knows this is a bad thing... except for Trump. If he had laid out his tariff plans a few years in advance, the industry could have anticipated. Production in the US could have ramped up to compensate. It could have been defendable. But the way he handles it now? This is how kids act in kindergarten!... The dumb ones. The emperor has no clothes.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:5, Insightful)
Ramping up production in the U.S. would have baked in price rises as the U.S. does not have the low costs that other countries have. Then there the after-effects of Americans having less money to spend so U.S. producers will not be able to produce enough to cover the shortfall, and thus increasing their costs a bit more since they won't have the same lot size to ship.
Just to point out how silly the alleged Administration is, from [1]https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com]
Bessent "cheered that fired federal civil servants are now available to work in U.S. factories."
And one of his "points" that gave him comfort over the tariffs was that U.S. stock exchanges failed to crash their computers even though it made just about everyone's 401K's shrink.
Oh, and just what will the scientists from NiH be producing, smartphones for peanut wages? Or, will they be lured to work outside the U.S. as other countries are already making a play for U.S. scientists. And there will be more scientists on the market now that la Presidenta and Elmo are cutting research funding. Now we can look forward to the U.S. not being as competitive in the future as well as being sicker due to medical research being cut.
[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/04/08/trump-tariffs-economy-trade-war/
Re: (Score:2)
I have been saying this for a long time.... Trump wants to make the US full of workers indentured to companies and companies indentured to him. All his focus on heightening the border security with Mexico and Canada is out of fear that Americans will be trying to escape. It's the only thing logical since a negligible amount of drugs come from Canada and it's not Canada's job to keep drugs out of the US. There have already been a couple doctors and highly educated scientists that have gone to Canada. Go
Re: Destroying your country (Score:4, Insightful)
"Trump wants to make the US full of workers indentured to companies and companies indentured to him."
Trump wants to own the country like Putin owns his. He doesn't care about indentured servitude himself, but the oligarchs that funnel him money want that. The out come is the same but Trump's mind is not that complex.
"All his focus on heightening the border security with Mexico and Canada is out of fear that Americans will be trying to escape."
That's not true. Trump doesn't focus on heightening border security at all, it's performative. Trump focuses on outrage, he doesn't give a shit about security. If fact, Trump willingly destroys the security of the country. Trump doesn't care at all about the Canadian border, Canadians are not brown.
And isn't this your party?
Re: Destroying your country (Score:5, Insightful)
Au contraire, Trump did a lot of complaining about the level of security coming into the border in his first days. He said Canada was killing Americans with large amounts of Fentanyl even though it's like 1% of the Fentanyl. Most of it comes from China, and it's America's job to protect their own country from it.
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I believe the claim was that it was coming from China but through Canada to get to the US. If it was actually true there might be something to the US *asking* Canada to tighten boarder security up some in the interest of keeping our shared boarder fairly open as it is now. There's no data that supports significant amounts of fentanyl coming into the US from Canada though so he's full of shit.
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Funny part about the Canada boarder. There are is the Canadian boarder with their guards, AND the US boarder with US guards.
The easy part would have been to hire more US boarder guards at the US / Canada boarder.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:5, Insightful)
If it was actually true there might be something to the US *asking* Canada to tighten boarder security up some in the interest of keeping our shared boarder fairly open as it is now.
Here in Canada we have a huge problem with illegal smuggled American guns flowing into our country.
At no point do Canadian officials think it is America's job to prevent that. It is Canada's job to defend our border.
Yet bizarrely somehow Americans think Canadians should prevent things flowing into the USA?
When I drive up to the US border the first and only checkpoint I go through is an AMERICAN checkpoint. If I were to illegally cross the border the people who would interdict me would be American border enforcement.
(Not that I'm gonna travel to the USA at all any more, but the point stands.)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't agree with you about EVs, but I do agree with you about this... the classic despot playbook, get everyone in hock to the king, including every company, so that they have to curry favour to survive
Re: Destroying your country (Score:3)
US, you will get through this! Maybe a bit more humble, but that has good sides as well. Take care!
Re: Destroying your country (Score:4, Interesting)
> Ramping up production in the U.S. would have baked in price rises as the U.S. does not have the low costs that other countries have. Then there the after-effects of Americans having less money to spend so U.S. producers will not be able to produce enough to cover the shortfall, and thus increasing their costs a bit more since they won't have the same lot size to ship.
ROTFL. Wages will go up as demand for American labor goes up. People always seem to forget that part. If you think robots are going to take the jobs, go look at a satellite view of the BMW factory in Spartanburg, SC and explain why there are so many parking places at a so-called automated factory.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:5, Insightful)
It will take at least a decade to ramp up manufacturing in the US, and that's if they go all-in with an Apollo Programme style effort.
To build something like a laptop there would need to be LCD factories, numerous high end silicon fabs, and a huge expansion of passive component and machining capacity. And even then the price will be 2x what it costs to make in the Far East.
It's extremely dumb and only accounts for goods, not services. It's been rumoured that China is considering banning Hollywood movies, which would take a massive chunk out of their income, for example. Microsoft and Apple could be kicked out too. Much of what he thinks is a trade deficit is only because he's not including services in it, e.g. with the EU.
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The state of California is already suing the Trump administration. I think the question is not whether the US takes over Canada but whether the US loses American states TO Canada. If Canada were to gain an economy like California's then it would make the healthcare system a lot better and no Californian would need to worry about medical expenses ever.
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Ha, I'm a pretty patriotic American but a nice healthcare system would be nice (I live in California) and Canada isn't a bad country at all. Twenty-five years ago I almost ended up living there due to work and I never thought that would have been too bad of a thing.
I don't think we actually want the US breaking up though, the last time that almost happened it caused an utter blood bath of a civil war. Succession is not allowed for in the constitution so we'd need a constitutional amendment which requires 2/
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I actually moved the other way, from Canada to the USA (California.)
The USA has a great health-care system. But it has a shitty health- insurance system. Lots of great care, but good luck affording it if you don't have decent insurance. Despite the ACA, insurance is still incredibly expensive in the USA.
As for California seceding from the USA and joining Canada, [1]I suppose one can muse about that [wikimedia.org] but I agree we (in both countries) don't want the USA to break up if at all possible.
[1] https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Jesusland_map#/media/File:Jesusland.png
Re: Destroying your country (Score:4, Insightful)
> The USA has a great health-care system.
The USA doesn't have a healthcare system . It has a medical services industry. An industry that delivers sub-par care in nice surroundings.
My wife and I live in the USA and, checking with doctors in the UK, it's quite clear that the healthcare in the USA is generally not particularly good. Instead, the healthcare is designed to maximize billing.
Re: (Score:2)
States can't secede, they cannot leave to country to join Canada. No, that's not the question.
Of course, there could be a civil war that destroys the country and some of the remnants could eventually become part of Canada, perhaps that would be worth it for "Californians" to not worry about "medical expenses", real clear thinking there.
Re: (Score:3)
The ultimate irony in justifying everything through creative interpretation of laws while ignoring inconvenient laws and the courts that interpret them. Having one's cake and eating it too.
Re: (Score:2)
Sure. Because I guess sending the Proud Boys to protect Musk's dealerships where people are protesting against them isn't raising the possibility of violence. Nor is firing people who have worked for 20 years in the same job and have nowhere to go, who will now watch their families starve and become desperate. Or getting rid of 1/3 of the CIA, or the FBI, or the NSA. None of those people prevented violence at all I guess. Nor is he encouraging terrorism by attacking known terrorist nations, either verb
Re: (Score:2)
I saw a think on Linkedin, and no, I didn't check the facts or source, but it claimed an iPhone could cost between $30,000 and $100,000 if made entirely in the USA.
If true, you're going to need more tariffs. A lot more.
its these services retaliatory taxes will hit (Score:2)
The EU has always been unhappy with how low the effective tax rates for the big US internet platforms are - and they are now preparing a digital tax on these services.
Re: (Score:3)
Exactly, there is no reason to hold off or negotiate with the US now, because the EU needs to bring in reciprocal tariffs anyway.
The guys over at framework laptops (Score:5, Interesting)
Said that it would be closer to 20 years. The guy is pretty good at logistics and the point he made that the basic infrastructure necessary for it just doesn't exist. I'm talking just stuff like roads and whatnot.
While back Apple tried to make the newest MacBooks here in the States because they didn't want the lead time from China. Motorola tried that too with high-end cell phones. The idea was that you could put out a new model much faster.
For Motorola they just gave up because the cost wasn't worth it. And it wasn't even close Trump's 104% tariff wouldn't make it worth it.
But for Apple their problem was screws. They could not get screws. The American suppliers just could not keep up with demand they weren't set up for it and they weren't going to because Apple was a single supplier and it wasn't worth the risk of building out all that infrastructure.
They could potentially get the government to do it but the right wing and the Republican party is not going to spend trillions on infrastructure. They fart Joe Biden tooth and nail on his infrastructure bill and Trump is currently trying to dismantle that.
So no new jobs, a completely destroyed economy, and even if the factories come back it'll be a complete cluster fuck and take 20 years.
You have to start asking why the hell Trump would do this and the only answer is a national sales tax. And then you have to ask why he'd want that and the only answer is because it shifts his tax burden onto you and me
Re: Destroying your country (Score:4, Interesting)
> Everyone knows this is a bad thing... except for Trump.
There are A LOT of people out there, well past working age, who watch FOX News. They're being told that this will be a character building exercise for the rest of us.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:2)
I'd expect support for Trump to start to flake soon, once enough of his supporters figure out/admit that he is an idiot. Of course it will have to punch through layers of denial. I hope signs of that happening are more and more emerging. Read that the republican party members are starting to resist...
Re: (Score:3)
The pricing hasnt trickled down to the consumer level yet. Once that happens and people start actually feeling the financial pinch we'll see his support flake off pretty quickly. He'll still keep about a third of voters (because cult) but the Republicans will never hold onto congress.
Re: (Score:3)
> There are A LOT of people out there, well past working age, who watch FOX News. They're being told that this will be a character building exercise for the rest of us.
Reminds me of Josef Goebbels "Total war" speech.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:5, Informative)
"If he had laid out his tariff plans a few years in advance, the industry could have anticipated."
Two problems with that, (1) he wouldn't have gotten elected, and (2) he had his billionaire friends wouldn't be able to exploit the volatile markets that have resulted. The mistake you make is assuming what Trump's goal is. His goal is to generate headlines and chaos, you don't plan that "years in advance".
"This is how kids act in kindergarten!"
Well yes, that's who was elected. Saying that Trump is a grade school bully is not hyperbole.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:5, Insightful)
When a political figure violates the law, all attempts at justice look political. That doesn't mean political figures should be above the law however. And of course the other side, the blatantly political decisions from the likes of judge Cannon appear to be brought up a lot less.
I quite like the South Korean model where every president ends their term with a prison sentence (ok exaggerating, but only a bit). Might have been symbolic, but it's a good thing Boris Johnson was prosecuted for absolutely flagrant violation of his own laws and while his party was still in power too. I think the American model of essentially untouchable politicians because it's "political" is a bad model. Even worse than the Hollywood immunity.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll go further: the USA created one of the world's greatest democracies, but with a terrible flaw. Will Rogers said it best:
> On account of being a democracy and run by the people, we are the only nation in the world that has to keep a government four years, no matter what it does.
Other countries (e.g., with parliamentary systems) have found a way to deal with that: votes of non-confidence cause the government to fall, and thus an election can be called at any time. Other things too: the head of state doesn't have nearly as much power as in the USA, and the people who perform the executive functions of the government are available for questioning in the House of Commons (analogous to Congress) not cloistered several blocks away with constitutional cloaking.
Re: (Score:2)
> If he had laid out his tariff plans a few years in advance, the industry could have anticipated. Production in the US could have ramped up to compensate.
That's not Trump's objective. He wants China to remove the barriers already in place for U.S. companies trying to do business there. He seemed to think China would cave under the threat, but that obviously did not happen. The question now is, which president is more stubborn?
Re: (Score:3)
> Everyone knows this is a bad thing... except for Trump.
To be fair, Trump get his economic advice from Peter Navarro, who gets advice from expert "Ron Vara" who he made up -- Peter quotes Ron in his books. (Maybe that Ron guy hangs out with Trump's made-up guy "John Barron".)
[1]Peter Navarro Invented an Expert for His Books, Based on Himself [nytimes.com]
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/16/us/politics/peter-navarro-ron-vara.html
Re: (Score:2)
> This will hit American consumers really hard. A lot of the cheap stuff they rely on to survive will become unaffordable, and a lot of the high end goods they want will too.
I don't know that Americans will be keeling over dead in the streets because they can't survive, but it is a remarkably stupid thing we are doing.
I think Cheeto thought that tariffs are a one sided thing. Sorry Cheeto, but there are other countries in the world, fully capable of their own tariffs agains us, and at some point if we piss off the world enough, sanctions could happen against us.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't be so sure American's won't be dying in the streets. [1]https://www.reuters.com/world/... [reuters.com]
I'm sure folks of fixed incomes are going to love the cost of the medicines they need rising. They can pick between diabetes medicine and food.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-says-us-will-soon-announce-tariffs-pharmaceutical-imports-2025-04-09/
Re: (Score:2)
> This will hit American consumers really hard. A lot of the cheap stuff they rely on to survive will become unaffordable
Here in Europe, it would seem that avocados are half the price they are in the US ( [1]source [tridge.com])
[1] https://www.tridge.com/stories/us-avocado-prices-are-double-europesnot-tariffs-but-mexican-dependency
Re: (Score:2)
> This will hit American consumers really hard. A lot of the cheap stuff they rely on to survive will become unaffordable, and a lot of the high end goods they want will too.
Reportedly, about 70% of all (presumably, non-perishable) goods sold at Walmart come from China. Lots of people shop at Walmart -- lots of people in his base...
Re: Destroying your country (Score:2)
The color is irrelevant. It's just conservatism. The six or seven prime ministers the UK burned through is another example.
Conservatism, at least in its current modern form, is never a good choice to make.
Re: (Score:2)
> The color is irrelevant. It's just conservatism. The six or seven prime ministers the UK burned through is another example.
> Conservatism, at least in its current modern form, is never a good choice to make.
Ain't it weird? Conservatism is so far mutated from its original form that it really needs a new name. I used crypto-conservative for a while, but that doesn't have the old razzle dazzle.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:2)
May I recommend to hire Chinese supervisors to oversee the production lines when Americans start to fabricate stuff themselves? They have the right temperament to get things done. Better start exercising.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:2)
Now that I think of it, tariffs towards China probably have to double to be competitive without big wage reductions in the US. Oh well. Not my problem.
Re: Destroying your country (Score:2)
You'd have a stronger point if Republicans were actually bringing down the debt. That isn't what they are doing, though. They are increasing the debt considerably while transferring the tax burden away from billionaires and onto consumers, while simultaneously destroying the services their voters rely on.
When all is said and done, the same problems will still exist, greatly magnified, along with a host of new problems. You're being robbed, and if you haven't figured that out yet, you will soon.
Re: (Score:2)
Irresponsible spending while growing the debt to a level that can never be repaid is a purely republican thing.
For example, the orange menace promised 1 trillion to the Pentagon yesterday. Can you guess where will that money come from as the other promise of the shitgibbon - tax reduction - is implemented by the republican congress?
Also, can you guess which party is the main culprit for the exploding debt, starting as far back as tricky dick?