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Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

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Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#111

Post by s2g »

craftyguy wrote: post #47
jcranmer wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, not so much states that voted for Trump, but small-population states that rack up lots of Senate votes. Put punitive tariffs on corn, soybean, and pork exports, and you'll have a dozen senators imploring Trump to back off.

Interesting that it's perfectly legal for foreign nations to pressure folks into voting one way or another by punishing them for voting in a particular president (and possibly hurting his/his party's chances of re-election), but it's not if they run ads to try and pursuade voters. It's almost like indirect election influencing vs direct election influencing (Russia in 2016). Somehow one is bad, but the other isn't.

All's fair in love and [trade] war.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#112

Post by AnimalMuppet »

Karishma1234 wrote: post #68

What is the point of political discussion on HN ? Isn't HN meant for quality technical discussions ? Nothing good can come out of these sort of flame wars here.

Well, HN is meant for quality discussions of things we find interesting. Sometimes politics is relevant to us (or at least to enough of us to qualify).

The trick is to keep it a quality discussion, rather than letting it degenerate into a flame war. That's not easy. But if it can't happen here, where can it? (And if the answer is "nowhere", well, I'm not sure that the answer is wrong, but that's one of the most cynical statements possible about the current state of politics.)

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#113

Post by dguaraglia »

messick wrote: post #87
dguaraglia wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not exactly sure how the United States trying to walk back an agreement (NAFTA) and slapping tariffs on our allies makes Canada a "shithole country". If anything, it makes us the shitty neighbor.

It was a sarcastic reference to Trump’s “shithole countries” remarks about African nations last year.

Oh, I know what it was about. I was just pointing out that Canada is clearly not a "shithole country" and that the current US attitude towards our long-time allies everywhere makes us the shithole country.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#114

Post by throwaway5752 »

ameister14 wrote: post #106
throwaway5752 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not science, it's a survey. And you know that about the respondents because they were transparent about their data . And the self-identified conservatives rated him in the bottom five, too.

Surveys are very much a scientific tool. This one surveyed social scientists, who use surveys (like this one) regularly as part of conducting social science. Yes, they were transparent. You, on the other hand, implied equal numbers. Nobody likes Trump. There's no need to inflate how bad he is - it's very apparent.

It bothered me the first time you posted this and didn't say anything then, but I didn't imply equal numbers of respondents and I don't know why you think I did. Unless you have some kind of deeper knowledge about partisan alignment in the population, for all we know this is representative. The rankings are very consistent regardless of party identification in the responses across the board, party identification of respondent seems to be a weak factor in the rankings.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#115

Post by BurningFrog »

kakwa_ wrote: post #103
BurningFrog wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tariffs can be good for big companies and other special interests in a country, but never for the country as a whole. So when you ask if they result in "better economic or social outcome", you have to be careful to think about "for who?".

Not necessarily. Let say you are a large developing country and you want to bootstrap a domestic car industry. The first cars coming out will probably not be that great as you don't have the engineering knowledge or the experience building cars yet. Cars built by foreign companies are definitively better, and maybe cheaper to buy and/or to operate. If you do nothing, this new car industry would die quite soon. So you…

So while you protect the local industry, your population is forced to overpay for inferior cars. I think we agree on that fact.

You're saying that that is more than compensated for by the later emergence of a competitive car industry, and the various wealth effects it spreads across the nation over many following decades.

I just don't think there is empirical support for that. I'm sure you can cherry pick examples in hindsight, but if you do an honest accounting of these attempts, including those that failed I don't think it looks good.

Except for the favored industry of course, who makes a nice living during the protected era.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#116

Post by Karishma1234 »

akhatri_aus wrote: post #98
Karishma1234 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You call them sanctions when you talk about your enemies, you call them tariffs when you do it to your friends. The difference is nearly 0.

Sanctions involve a total ban on trade. tariffs involve a tax on imports, quota impose a limit on imports. If only 0 was an asymptote it would fit your description.

Think of ban as a variable between 0 - 1. Sanctions = 1.0 and Tarrifs (Increasing taxes on something is a partial ban).

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#117

Post by bobosha »

andrewstuart wrote: post #66

Another option is not play tit-for-tat and instead appeal to the American people by refusing to impose tariffs in return. Make it about Trump, not America. There's a chance Trump will lose all his power within a few months anyway if the republicans do very badly in the midterm elections.

They also have to play to domestic audience - where it likely won't fly. Lying passive in response to what many perceive as bullying, won't get any politician far.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#118

Post by ameister14 »

throwaway5752 wrote: post #114
ameister14 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surveys are very much a scientific tool. This one surveyed social scientists, who use surveys (like this one) regularly as part of conducting social science. Yes, they were transparent. You, on the other hand, implied equal numbers. Nobody likes Trump. There's no need to inflate how bad he is - it's very apparent.

It bothered me the first time you posted this and didn't say anything then, but I didn't imply equal numbers of respondents and I don't know why you think I did. Unless you have some kind of deeper knowledge about partisan alignment in the population, for all we know this is representative. The rankings are very consistent regardless of party identification in the responses across the board, party identification of r…

I do actually have deeper knowledge about partisan alignment in the greater population. Even if I didn't, the conservatives did not rank Trump worst. They ranked Buchanan worst, Trump was #40.

When you say this: "Donald Trump is objectively (ranked by presidential historians of all political parties) as the worst president in the 242 year history of the US."

That usually means that presidential historians of all parties ranked him worst, or at least that a poll controlling for party/political leaning as a variable concluded that he was worst. Neither was the case here.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#119

Post by verelo »

s2g wrote: post #109
verelo wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I work in tech, my salary is less than 1/2 what it would be in the US (not just Silicon Valley). Yes, but I'd argue that SV income might look higher, but after you try living there you'd gladly go back to Canadian expenses if the compromise was that you also had to take your Canadian income once again. Also, income inequality in Canada isn't as bad as the US (yet...)

Why? Do you think people are too stupid to do basic math? Totally ignorant of their monthly expenses? What is it that compels people like you to bring up "cost of living" as though anyone who says "higher salary" is a complete moron? Is it just bay area zealots on both sides embracing the meme that "IT'S SO EXPENSIVE". We get it. we know. We don't look at SF and go "oh wow, 10 k more a year" while paying 2000 a month…

I’m not saying everyone cannot do the math, but for sure, lots of people are in denial of the math.

Re: Canada hits back at 'punitive' U.S. tariffs in 'turning point' in relations

#120

Post by mastazi »

jcranmer wrote: post #95
mastazi wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tariffs on corn prompted a guy called James Wilson to create The Economist, of course you may or may not regard that as a positive outcome: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist#History

Tariffs on wheat and rye, mostly. Note that, in British English, "corn" generically refers to grain, while in American English, "corn" is synonymous with "maize."

Yes, a bit like the German equivalent körner
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