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American Disruption

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Re: American Disruption

#161

Post by 9rx »

A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #12
JSR_FDED wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think this playbook works for complex products. Before every component needed for an iPhone is locally manufactured, the overseas competitor manufacturers of those components would be many generations further. You’d be competing with the whole world.

The designers of the chips in the iPhone are basically US entities. (And more generally, Apple, Nvidia, AMD, Qualcomm, etc. are US companies.) They can gradually limit foreign production and re-shore with subsidies. Sure, foreign chip manufacturers might gain a leg up, but it might not be totally ruinous. There's a way to do it that's smooth, gradual, and mostly painless.

The US has maintained full employment for quite a long time now. You can bring the factories to the US. You can likely even automate a lot of the work. But not all the work – in a place where everyone who wants a job already has one.

So, the question really is: What are Americans willing to give up? Something has to go if workers are reallocated away from whatever they are doing now into these factories.

Re: American Disruption

#162

Post by renewiltord »

fragmede wrote: post #154
renewiltord wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah then it’s regional. In SF it’s typically 30% more expensive in a taxi from the airport to 4th and king.

it's like $40 to take a car vs like $15 on Bart into the city.

BART takes 2x the time station to station. Try it out right now.

The time is 1256 as of the time of this comment.

SFO International to Montgomery St. Station: Earliest arrival is 1346

Driving: Earliest arrival is 1323

My experience is that the car takes ~6 min to arrive to pick you up for Uber. You can call it earlier, but assuming you call it when you arrive and then wait that's 1322. You lose 23 minutes to BART.

And that's BART station to BART station. Change it slightly, like to my home near Caltrain and it's pointless. The cost in time is way more than $25.

Re: American Disruption

#163

Post by smath »

mullingitover wrote: post #151
flakiness wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1 https://www.theguardian.com/business/2025/apr/09/dramatic-se... > The yield – or interest rate – on the benchmark 10-year US Treasury bond rose to 4.516% on Wednesday before slipping back to 4.451%, up 0.14 percentage points on the day.

Yes, that's what I meant.

Q is anyone knows: would yield on the 10y going down actually help the US to refinance its existing debt (akin to a mortgage refinance), or simply issue new debt more cheaply?

Re: American Disruption

#164

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

ta1243 wrote: post #140
Terr_ wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> a big part of the tariff strategy You mean, a big part of one of the inconsistent explanations people are desperately theorizing, because they're too afraid of the simple answer... that there isn't any strategy at all? [Edit: Or, to be more precise, no strategy which is both (A) sane and (B) designed for America rather than for specific individuals.] > chaos in an effort to drive down the price of the 10-year bond…

> Instead, economic trust in the US--built up over decades--is being actively firebombed into the dirt by the new Republican regime. I think that's an important thing to reiterate. This isn't Trump. This isn't MAGA. This is the entire Republican Party apparatus that is allowing this to continue. The Republicans of the Nixon, Regan, Bush eras are long gone.

I think that drawing a distinction between Trump, MAGA, and the Republican Party may be a mistake. It's all one and the same. Which makes me wonder about all the "moderate" Republican voters, and what's going to happen when Trump kicks it.

Re: American Disruption

#165

Post by hnfong »

iteratethis wrote: post #159

To me (European), there is no strategy behind these tariffs other than Trump's thirst for a dominant display. Just to show that he can, that he has the cards. He introduces a shocking measure and then wants to humiliate the affected by letting them beg for relief. Submission. In a speech yesterday he literally said that "countries are coming to kiss his ass" and he clearly took great joy in this validation of power.…

> And surely "everybody else" is working on alternatives.

Well, it really depends on the competence of "everybody else"...

Re: American Disruption

#166

Post by fragmede »

renewiltord wrote: post #162
fragmede wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's like $40 to take a car vs like $15 on Bart into the city.

BART takes 2x the time station to station. Try it out right now. The time is 1256 as of the time of this comment. SFO International to Montgomery St. Station: Earliest arrival is 1346 Driving: Earliest arrival is 1323 My experience is that the car takes ~6 min to arrive to pick you up for Uber. You can call it earlier, but assuming you call it when you arrive and then wait that's 1322. You lose 23 minutes to BART. An…

What are you going to do on your phone in the Uber vs on your phone on your couch when you get home vs your phone on Bart? If you have an important in-person meeting to get to then by all means pay the surcharge but let's be real about how some of us are spending those "saved" minutes.

Thank you for doing the math - we're only talking about 23 of them? it's entirely possible to capitalize on 23 minutes, but seriously, 23 minutes?

Re: American Disruption

#167

Post by iteratethis »

hnfong wrote: post #165
iteratethis wrote: post #159

To me (European), there is no strategy behind these tariffs other than Trump's thirst for a dominant display. Just to show that he can, that he has the cards. He introduces a shocking measure and then wants to humiliate the affected by letting them beg for relief. Submission. In a speech yesterday he literally said that "countries are coming to kiss his ass" and he clearly took great joy in this validation of power.…

> And surely "everybody else" is working on alternatives. Well, it really depends on the competence of "everybody else"...

Can you be more specific in what you mean by that?

Re: American Disruption

#168

Post by 9rx »

dylan604 wrote: post #46
mjevans wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're more likely to 'on shore' with 3D printer like automated fabricators (think next baby step between CnC machines and Replicators). As far as any mention of jobs? Those are long gone and never coming back. Trade still makes sense for raw inputs and any outputs though.

Even Navarro (or is it that other guy who's name refuses to stick in my brain) that admits that the jobs they want to take out of China (screwing in many tiny screws) will not be jobs in the US but automated factories. So it's not a jobs program they are pushing. It's having manufacturing on local soil and less money going offshore. This is not something they mentioned during the campaign, but are saying it now. Duri…

What really stood out to me is that they say the factories will produce their own power on-site, with approvals for power plants happening "faster than we've ever had before", because the grid is "at risk of bombings". Which suggests to me that it not just about having manufacturing local for the sake of it being local or to stop money going offshore, but because it is preparing for war.

Re: American Disruption

#169

Post by watwut »

fragmede wrote: post #160
inerte wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And since when the US has a “job availability” problem? Unemployment is low. We have a jobs quality problem. Good pay, good hours, benefits. It doesn’t matter if it’s manufacturing or services. Somehow some people think their parents had it easier working for a factory, but a lot of blood and sweat went to get that. We can shed blood and sweat to get better barista jobs too. It’s not about where jobs are performed.

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTjJgfspg/ shows it all too well. Except that people liked those jobs because they were doable for people who aren't bright enough to write code. If you're not the brightest tool in the toolbox, and not the most professional, and have a criminal record, you still need a job, and the trades are open for business. Amazon warehouses skill level, without the dystopia. I'm sure I'll do fine, it's…

Again, America had low unemployment. And low level blue color job can be aw much dystopia as warehouse - your not bright person with criminal record an no skills will be taken advantage as much.

Re: American Disruption

#170

Post by mullingitover »

smath wrote: post #163
mullingitover wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that's what I meant.

Q is anyone knows: would yield on the 10y going down actually help the US to refinance its existing debt (akin to a mortgage refinance), or simply issue new debt more cheaply?

I think it's both, more debt is added all the time and the existing debt gets refinanced as it rolls over.

Just found an article about this whole strategy (and how it's not working) here[1].

[1] https://www.reuters.com/markets/rates-bonds/us-10-year-yield...

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