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Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

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Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#141

Post by jameslk »

Braxton1980 wrote: post #86
jameslk wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consumers will pay more regardless in this type of circumstance. But they will pay less if businesses don’t suddenly start going out of business, eliminating competition and jobs

Doesn't insurance normally work by protecting rare instances whose cost is amortized over the base? This would be a claim by a large amount of insurance clients at once

A sudden claim against many should be priced into the cost of the insurance, offset by some risk adjustment. The goal is ultimately price stability, if the price is not too high (that’s the unknown)

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#142

Post by Supermancho »

hippo22 wrote: post #110
sneak wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would make sense if there were a single labor market. There isn’t, so this simply increases prices (even for domestic goods, as raw materials are frequently imported). There is no meaningful path to restoring much of the US’s lost manufacturing capacity. The rent is too damn high, and the cost of goods is rising quickly as well. Labor is expensive and becoming moreso daily. Manufacturing in the US can never comp…

Low labor costs are not why goods are produced in China. That viewpoint is outdated. Goods are produced in China because they have the most capacity and expertise. Don’t believe me. Believe Tim Cook: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2wacXUrONUY

[dead]

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#143

Post by JumpCrisscross »

bitshiftfaced wrote: post #115
lazarus01 wrote: post #69

In NYC, for the first 6 months of 2025, 994 new private sector jobs were created [1]. During the same period last year, there were 66,000 new jobs created. Higher cost of doing business from tariffs has frozen hiring. With a frozen job market, there’s less revenue coming in. NYC is a leading indicator for the rest of the country. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/nyregion/nyc-jobs.html

Looking at total private jobs over time, growth slowed after the post covid bump, but 2025 doesn't look all that different from 2024: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/SMU36935610500000001SA#

Both the NYC Employment Data the New York Times cites [1] and these Fed data [2] are seasonally adjusted. Would take them with a shaker of salt given the assumptions in those adjustment models are likely currently under assault. (Hehe.)

[1] https://www.nyc.gov/assets/omb/downloads/pdf/sa-methodology-...

[2] https://www.census.gov/data/software/x13as.html

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#144

Post by JumpCrisscross »

lazarus01 wrote: post #69

In NYC, for the first 6 months of 2025, 994 new private sector jobs were created [1]. During the same period last year, there were 66,000 new jobs created. Higher cost of doing business from tariffs has frozen hiring. With a frozen job market, there’s less revenue coming in. NYC is a leading indicator for the rest of the country. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/nyregion/nyc-jobs.html

Would note that the data the New York Times cited are seasonally adjusted [1]. The assumptions of those adjustment models may not currently apply.

It’s going to be difficult to suss out a signal from employment data until October or November, by when we should have about half a year of post-tariff data [2] to compare with ‘24. (We may not know anything surely for a year.)

[1] https://www.nyc.gov/assets/omb/downloads/pdf/sa-methodology-...

[2] https://www.piie.com/research/piie-charts/2025/trumps-tariff...

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#145

Post by jennyholzer »

pydry wrote: post #128
platevoltage wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See this is what I don't understand. Everything you just said about China is a positive. Everything you said about China is achievable in the USA, and we at least HAD a head start on soft-power influence. Instead we should just have tariffs instead of actually making the lives of Americans better while FIGHTING affordable housing, high speed rail, and EVs. We've got an entire team of goons who would rather rack up pe…

The ironic thing is that tariffs are the right tool to reindustrialize America (over the period of ~a decade) but theyre being wielded with the skill and grace of a crack addled ferret by somebody who thinks it's a magic wand.

i don't see any indication that either republicans or democrats intend to reindustrialize america

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#146

Post by jennyholzer »

trasirinc wrote: post #125
haunter wrote: post #97

In the end it's the biggest leopard ate my face moment ever: China has very high growth momentum that surpasses American living standards soon, and not long before it will surpass American security standards too. China's purchasing power is probably more comfortable than most western countries, with extensive housing and high speed rail and electric cars etc. When a country becomes rich, inevitably other countries as…

What numbers are you seeing for the surpassing living standards? Their gpd per capita flatlined in 2024 at $13k. That's with only 80M of their citizens making above $2000/month. The bulk of their citizens make less than $100/month, and there's a declining middle class of around 200M that makes around $800/month. But they have high youth unemployment rate (>40%), there's a massive layoff wave coming in September with…

Why are you so well-versed in these anti-Chinese narratives? Your message reads like you're a victim of anti-Chinese propaganda.

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#147

Post by netsharc »

IncRnd wrote: post #68
sirnonw wrote: post #12

Funny how there is a post-it with a password glued to the screen of the computer in the lede image, now in plain sight for thousands of readers.

I think this is Ccjaas2004. I'm not 100% sure on the letters, but the year is easy to see. Hopefully, they've changed their password sometime in the past 21 years.

The image URL contains a parameter for size in pixel, and it's modifiable...

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#148

Post by sneak »

hippo22 wrote: post #110
sneak wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This would make sense if there were a single labor market. There isn’t, so this simply increases prices (even for domestic goods, as raw materials are frequently imported). There is no meaningful path to restoring much of the US’s lost manufacturing capacity. The rent is too damn high, and the cost of goods is rising quickly as well. Labor is expensive and becoming moreso daily. Manufacturing in the US can never comp…

Low labor costs are not why goods are produced in China. That viewpoint is outdated. Goods are produced in China because they have the most capacity and expertise. Don’t believe me. Believe Tim Cook: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2wacXUrONUY

Oh, that too. China is the best place to manufacture most precision goods today, period, independent of labor costs.

But even if you could wave a magic wand and put the USA on equal footing in terms of skills and experience and capability, it would still cost several times more to make the same goods in the USA due to the labor costs (and labor-adjacent overhead costs like workplace safety).

Both would need to be solved, and I think that solving either one alone is already basically impossible on any short- or medium-term timescale. A tiny bandaid like tariffs isn’t going to move the needle.

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#149

Post by trasirinc »

jennyholzer wrote: post #146
trasirinc wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What numbers are you seeing for the surpassing living standards? Their gpd per capita flatlined in 2024 at $13k. That's with only 80M of their citizens making above $2000/month. The bulk of their citizens make less than $100/month, and there's a declining middle class of around 200M that makes around $800/month. But they have high youth unemployment rate (>40%), there's a massive layoff wave coming in September with…

Why are you so well-versed in these anti-Chinese narratives? Your message reads like you're a victim of anti-Chinese propaganda.

I'm from China. I know what real numbers and news come out of China.

Re: Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

#150

Post by sneak »

kimixa wrote: post #119
platevoltage wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

See this is what I don't understand. Everything you just said about China is a positive. Everything you said about China is achievable in the USA, and we at least HAD a head start on soft-power influence. Instead we should just have tariffs instead of actually making the lives of Americans better while FIGHTING affordable housing, high speed rail, and EVs. We've got an entire team of goons who would rather rack up pe…

I feel it's more they're not actually playing for the scoreline. They want to be the team #1, even if that causes the team to lose in the end.

When people see everything as an ego-based competition, they lose track entirely of the fact that trade is not zero-sum: both parties (or nations) benefit from increased trade.

It’s the zero-sum mindset of leadership that only ever learned to excel by cheating and stealing, not cooperating, building, or synergizing.

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