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Trump / Musk (other than DOGE)

  • Thread starter Thread starter nycfan
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  • Politics 
nycfan said:
Border communities like Laredo, Texas, could see its unemployment rate soar to the double digits, says Marcus Noland, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute. “That’s where the trucks cross the border. If the jobs are to intermediate trade and there’s no trade, they are going to be out of work,” he said.
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If I remember correctly one of the Latino areas where Trump made big gains in this election was along the Texas/Mexico border. I wonder how those folks will feel when Trump's tariffs start causing them to lose their jobs.
 
aGDevil2k said:


At some point, and likely soon, he will be targeted with some big lawsuits for liability. And I think most people will enjoy watching him burn. He's the worst human alive. And in a planet with some absolutely awful people, that is quite the infamous honor.
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Musk is the co-president and the press should spend less time covering Trump and more time covering the plans that Musk has in store.

Trump is a blustering incompetent buffoon ; Musk is an evil intelligent diabolical loon who, unlike Trump, has the "skill" to destroy the economy and the foundations of our democracy.
 
nycfan said:
The Peterson Institute for International Economics, a think tank in Washington, D.C., estimates that under Trump’s new possible tariffs, prices would rise by 1%. It additionally estimates that by 2026 gross domestic product would be 0.6% lower than it otherwise would have been, and that total U.S. employment would be 1% lower.
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I don't like to second-guess models without having one myself (or being able to point to one), but I gotta say, that 1% estimate seems way too small. Maybe they were only modeling the 25% on Mexico and Canada, without the 10% across the board Trump has previously talked about?

Maybe they were just putting a surcharge on foreign goods and estimating how much total impact that would have on the economy as a whole, after making some adjustments for elasticity. Did they model what can often be the more pernicious effects of tariffs, which is to reduce competition in the domestic market and allow domestic producers to increase prices. There is absolutely no question that if LG and Bosch are subject to 10% tariffs, then American dishwasher makers would hike their prices by a fair amount. Maybe not the full 10% but more than 5%, I would guess.

Remember: the whole point of tariffs is to increase profits of domestic industry by insulating them from foreign competition. Maybe that is incorporated into the modeling, but I doubt it. Not if it only gets to 1%.
 
Trying to get the girlfriend in a new vehicle before Trump's stupid tariffs idea likely causes prices to increase significantly.

I was thinking (yeah, that's dangerous) the other day - What's going to stop companies from just jacking up prices for anything and everything and blaming it on tariffs? We've already seen what they've done the last few years with "needed" price hikes and tariffs gives them another excuse to raise prices, even if doesn't affect them.
 
milom98 said:
Trying to get the girlfriend in a new vehicle before Trump's stupid tariffs idea likely causes prices to increase significantly.

I was thinking (yeah, that's dangerous) the other day - What's going to stop companies from just jacking up prices for anything and everything and blaming it on tariffs? We've already seen what they've done the last few years with "needed" price hikes and tariffs gives them another excuse to raise prices, even if doesn't affect them.
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My thoughts as well. Just like the covid supply hiccups were and still are the rationale for price infltion. Handwringing in the age of record corporate profits.
 
Calheel said:
Putin is worse than Kim?
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Yeah, these "who is the worst" questions usually end up being a measure of capability as opposed to evil.

Why could Mao be responsible for 30-40 million deaths? Because he was in charge of China. By contrast, the Khmer Rouge had maybe a million victims -- which was like 1/4 of the Cambodian population. So who is worse? Would the Khmer Rouge have killed 30 million if in charge of China? What if Mao were leading Cambodia?

I've long thought that Ariel Sharon and Milosevic had more or less the same view of the world. Sharon was leading Israel, which at the time was still a liberal leaning nation with close ties to the US. Milosevic filled a power vacuum after Tito and had near total control. If they had swapped spots, I suspect their behavior would have been more or less the same.

Trying to run a bracket of "who is the worst person in the world" is a hopeless endeavor, in my view. I think it's better to look at things like this: there is a maximum evilness that a person can achieve, because we simply don't care that much about transgressions beyond that point. Like, if there's an alternate universe in which Hitler was able to fully exterminate the Jews in Europe ALONG WITH the slavic population, is that Hitler worse than real Hitler? The body count would be higher, for sure. But once the victims are in the millions, does it even matter how many -- especially since real Hitler wanted to do those things but just didn't have time.

So on this model, I'd say there are many people at that level of maximum evil. Putin, KJU, the "stan" tyrants, the Sudanese ethnic cleansers, the Houthis, the Saudis, etc.
 
milom98 said:
Trying to get the girlfriend in a new vehicle before Trump's stupid tariffs idea likely causes prices to increase significantly.

I was thinking (yeah, that's dangerous) the other day - What's going to stop companies from just jacking up prices for anything and everything and blaming it on tariffs? We've already seen what they've done the last few years with "needed" price hikes and tariffs gives them another excuse to raise prices, even if doesn't affect them.
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You're underselling the problem. It's not that we can't stop companies from raising prices. Rather, higher prices are the intended result of tariffs. If they aren't generating more profits for domestic industry, then they won't create higher wages or spur domestic investment (both of which are dubious results, but that's what the tariff folks claim will happen).

The evidence of the effects of tariffs -- which is extensive, as tariffs are one of the most empirically studied issues in all of economics -- unambiguously shows that tariffs lead to higher prices and lower quality from domestic manufacturers. Which is, again, what you'd expect. Maybe Trump thinks that he wants to go back to the 1970s auto industry, but then we'd all be driving shit cars. It was foreign competition that forced the Big Three to wake up.
 
nycfan said:
We’re talking about a guy who has developed an “economic policy” of tariffs on everything will eliminate the budget deficit and allow him to virtually eliminate income taxes, so, no, he doesn’t get it at all OR he gets it but doesn’t care because his supporters don’t get it.
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I'll take door #2, Monty.
Tariffs can be dangerous. They contributed to the Great Depression. They are a restraint on foreign trade and the free market system. IOW, they are anti-capitalist. Adam Smith is rolling in his grave right now.
 
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I’m pretty sure the reason for the tariffs is because Trump knows he has to do something dramatic.
He can’t claim he fixed everything and the economy is great because of him if he doesn’t do anything.
He’ll create some unhelpful tariffs (and tax cuts) like he did with the soybeans that will hurt Americans, but it will give his acolytes something to point to as the reason their lives are better, as we slink into the next recession (that is most likely coming regardless of what Trump does).
 
ChileG said:
I’m pretty sure the reason for the tariffs is because Trump knows he has to do something dramatic.
He can’t claim he fixed everything and the economy is great because of him if he doesn’t do anything.
He’ll create some unhelpful tariffs (and tax cuts) like he did with the soybeans that will hurt Americans, but it will give his acolytes something to point to as the reason their lives are better, as we slink into the next recession (that is most likely coming regardless of what Trump does).
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I'm not sure recessions exist any more, outside of exogenous shocks like financial crises, pandemics or . . . tariffs.

Like, if Trump does nothing, the economy will probably do just fine. But he wants to fuck it all up. I know it sucks and I don't like to wish hardship on anyone, but we also need MAGA to go down in flames. The tariffs will hopefully do that.

I don't think it's going to be such a light touch this time. China is already preparing "supply chain warfare." Just read an article about it. They aren't going to retaliate with tariffs. They are going to retaliate by withholding from us the things we need to make the products we sell.
 
superrific said:
I'm not sure recessions exist any more, outside of exogenous shocks like financial crises, pandemics or . . . tariffs.

Like, if Trump does nothing, the economy will probably do just fine. But he wants to fuck it all up. I know it sucks and I don't like to wish hardship on anyone, but we also need MAGA to go down in flames. The tariffs will hopefully do that.

I don't think it's going to be such a light touch this time. China is already preparing "supply chain warfare." Just read an article about it. They aren't going to retaliate with tariffs. They are going to retaliate by withholding from us the things we need to make the products we sell.
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You could be right about the recessions.
 
superrific said:
I'm not sure recessions exist any more, outside of exogenous shocks like financial crises, pandemics or . . . tariffs.

Like, if Trump does nothing, the economy will probably do just fine. But he wants to fuck it all up. I know it sucks and I don't like to wish hardship on anyone, but we also need MAGA to go down in flames. The tariffs will hopefully do that.

I don't think it's going to be such a light touch this time. China is already preparing "supply chain warfare." Just read an article about it. They aren't going to retaliate with tariffs. They are going to retaliate by withholding from us the things we need to make the products we sell.
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How could that hurt? They only control about 85% of rare earth production along with a few other things like that that we would scarcely miss.
 
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