I think any of the 4d chess theories are pretty dumb. The āthey crash it to buy it for cheapā is particularly stupid. Elon Musk is probably going to end up losing over $100,000,000,000 (if not way more) from this lol. Thereās no way this is going to be net positive for him. The āoligarchsā wealth is in the stock market so crashing it so they can buy things for cheaper is robbing Peter to pay Paul.
The reality is just: Trump isnāt very informed and is stuck in the past. He rightly recognizes that free trade is a race to the bottom that ends with us losing jobs to essential slave labor in undeveloped countries. Buts heās also rash and stupid and belligerent so he canāt intelligently target the worst offenders and instead just indiscriminately tariffed everyone.
TLDR: Trump correctly identifies a problem (that other countries are disinclined to see due to the wealthy not wanting anything to change) but is also a stupid person so he puts forth a solution thatās even
worse.
"He rightly recognizes that free trade is a race to the bottom that ends with us losing jobs to essential slave labor in undeveloped countries."
This is offset by the other longstanding pillar of U.S. foreign policy, which was to encourage democratic governments in all countries. Much harder to race to the bottom if the slave labor can vote.
He rightly recognizes that free trade is a race to the bottom that ends with us losing jobs to essential slave labor in undeveloped countries. Buts heās also rash and stupid and belligerent so he canāt intelligently target the worst offenders and instead just indiscriminately tariffed everyone.
what is the right way to do it, im wondering? i dont get the sense that this even being a problem is widely accepted, let alone that anyone has an idea how to fix it
Wait, you donāt think businesses having the option to pay Bangladeshis 50 cents an hour is a problem for a low skill American worker looking to make a living wage in a similar industry? Come on bro. Would you be cool with us just removing the minimum wage? If not, what is the real difference between paying American workers slave wages vs. paying foreign workers slave wages instead? In a free trade world, there is no difference.
what is the right way to do it
Targeted tariffs on problematic countries and specifically aimed at hitting industries you want to promote back home.
So, imposing a huge tariff on Chinese electric cars might be fine if we were working to increase electric car production here, change our sourcing to get materials from friendly countries, etc. But Trump just put tariffs on everyone and everything. So all he has done is place a 10-40% sales tax on everything imported.
Americans will eventually get this stuff from American companies, but it will take several years to build up the production and, in the meantime, we will all suffer. And so will our allies who we are fucking over for no reason.
Wait, you donāt think businesses having the option to pay Bangladeshis 50 cents an hour is a problem for a low skill American worker looking to make a living wage in a similar industry?
i do, but thats not the sense i get from most of the people talking about the tariffs, they sound to me like they think theres not even a problem worth tackling.
Targeted tariffs on problematic countries and specifically aimed at hitting industries you want to promote back home.
makes sense. we'll see if thats what we end up closer to, or if he really doesnt have a plan to negotiate and just does want blanket fire
20
u/AGI2028maybe 19h ago
I think any of the 4d chess theories are pretty dumb. The āthey crash it to buy it for cheapā is particularly stupid. Elon Musk is probably going to end up losing over $100,000,000,000 (if not way more) from this lol. Thereās no way this is going to be net positive for him. The āoligarchsā wealth is in the stock market so crashing it so they can buy things for cheaper is robbing Peter to pay Paul.
The reality is just: Trump isnāt very informed and is stuck in the past. He rightly recognizes that free trade is a race to the bottom that ends with us losing jobs to essential slave labor in undeveloped countries. Buts heās also rash and stupid and belligerent so he canāt intelligently target the worst offenders and instead just indiscriminately tariffed everyone.
TLDR: Trump correctly identifies a problem (that other countries are disinclined to see due to the wealthy not wanting anything to change) but is also a stupid person so he puts forth a solution thatās even worse.