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Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

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Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#261
post #72
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that those in command are also waiting for the next President to undo all that but it is going to have a tremendous effect for a decade or more. Hopefully for the US they won't go in a similar crisis like the UK is going through... Cutting off countries like Japan or Taiwan like that when we know their geopolitical situation with China and how critical their economy is to the US is quite crazy.

> Hopefully for the US they won't go in a similar crisis like the UK is going through... Err.. do tell about the UK's larger crisis than US'?

Brexit was pretty bad for the UK proportional to the size of their population/economy, and is still causing problems even though the initial dislocation is over. If you think it's a lesser crisis, you could just say that. I haven't done the numbers to make an exact comparison, but they both have the qualities of being being abrupt, severe, and self-inflicted.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re right about all you say. But the US has struggled to implement even the simplest forms of industrial policy because other countries are so extremely price-competitive, and our markets so unbridled, that our “elites” have eroded our industrial base to drive shareholder returns. If not through tariffs, how else do you force reindustrialization? Industrial policy will always fail if it’s driven by a chimeric poli…

Why is it important to force reindustrialization?

Let’s axiomatically presume that vertical integration (of your supply chain, manufacturing, software development, labor force, etc.) is the key to “innovation” in the abstract. You can see this starting to happen with BYD, the Chinese electric car company, for example.

With the above in mind, let’s say your goal as a country is to develop your industries so you can achieve broad vertical integration.

Soft economic assets (financial markets, legal structures, software, pharma, IP, etc.) are easier to bootstrap once you have hard economic assets assets (commodities, energy, manufacturing, transportation, logistics, etc.). If you lose your hard economic assets and only have soft ones, you are at a strategic disadvantage because your opponent (in this case China), can bootstrap their soft assets relatively quickly. By comparison, it will take you much longer to get your hard assets back (through the mythical process of “reshoring/reindustrialization”).

More in my comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43589566.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#263

I was looking at used cars on Carmax about two or three weeks ago. I looked again today. They're another $1-2k. This is the shareholder/political class trying to eat their cake and have it too. Pay people a stagnant wage for 40 years while taking most of the surplus value and dedicating it to equities, then pretend to do something about it, but in a way that passes the buck to the people who have been making a stagna…

Are you claiming that the 'shareholder class' would rather depress the economy and wipe out trillions in shareholder value...over inflating the economy and lowering interest rates?

Not "the shareholder class" but the actual super wealthy, those few thousand individuals at the top.

A way I have recently seen this put is that if you have a billion dollars another billion doesn't do that much for you in real terms. But if you're a billionaire who likes to sexually harass your child's nanny, you would much prefer she be desperate and precarious rather than economically secure or with a lot of other viable options. This is one crude example but the dynamic is in play in many other situations.

So idk, it's plausible to me that the class interests of the wealthy extend beyond mere wealth accumulation. I can imagine circumstances where they would be willing to give up some of their absolute wealth in exchange for greater relative wealth.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#264
post #15

WAI. Trump is crashing the T-note yield to refinance $9T (which is how much US debt is going to mature in 2025) at a lower rate. That, for those of us who know arithmetic, is approximately one quarter of all US debt. It seems to be working.

Trump's been talking about tariffs for far longer than the current t-note cycle. He was talking about it a decade ago during his first time in office. IIRC he ran for POTUS as a Reform Party candidate in the 90s or 00s, and that party was started by Ross Perot, who was against NAFTA on the grounds that it'd cause a giant sucking sound of American jobs to Mexico. He doesn't care about the debt; you can see this in how…

> The surplus value that used to head to shareholders as a result of cheap foreign goods will go down, but that can be offset by layoffs and the like.

could you just do the layoffs without the tariff if it were a conspiracy?

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#265
post #8

This is an inherently political subject, but I would appreciate a dispassionate argument explaining how this could be even remotely good for the U.S.'s economy in a way that is light on MAGA ideology and doesn't simply claim the overwhelming majority of economists are dumb. I'm simply not seeing even a glimmer of a possible upside right now. I see even less possibility of an upside for those of us North of the border…

[flagged]

Well, you should then accept that some things will be very expensive for you as well. Is that what you want?

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#266

Isn't it obvious that Trump's goal are not these tariffs, but renegotiated trading agreements? But everybody just seems to love to proclaim this the end of US.

This is what all of the smart people have been saying. So pretty much yeah.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#267
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hopefully for the US they won't go in a similar crisis like the UK is going through... Err.. do tell about the UK's larger crisis than US'?

Well before what's happening now the US still was doing very strong on the economy (plus their advantage to be that big, their military advantage, them owning half of their continent, etc...). But with what is unfolding now... If you want to know more about the current situation in the UK I would recommend this video [1]. His channel is amazing for geopolitical content. [1] https://youtu.be/OTWDzMjgsEY?si=hxoB8ef_y2Q…

Some stats from this video:

- The UK has one of the worst homelessness problems in Europe, with about 1 in 50 Londoners experiencing homelessness.

- The UK economy stagnated for 10 years following 2008, resulting in a "lost decade"

- The median disposable income in the UK was slightly lower than the US and Norway before the GFC by 6-8%, not it's 16-20% behind.

IDK if I'd call this a crisis, i.e. people aren't rioting in the streets. That said, this is not the direction you want to be moving in as a developed country. The trend of people in formerly dominant countries electing leaders who keep making stupid own goals (increasing economic inequality, Brexit, gutting the NHS, gutting US foreign aid, tariff-pocalypse) is very worrying.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#268
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I started wondering if there's a way for citizens to push the issue that these tarrifs are unconstitutional. Like a lawsuit that got escalated to the Supreme Court or some thing if congress isn't going to. Some of the senators are breaking away though. If the country survives this though the next thing through executive order could be just as bad or worse. There doesn't seem to be any realistic way out of this insani…

are they unconstitutional? i imagine, like many things, congress has constitutionally saw fit to cede its authority to the executive many many moons ago

They could be unconstitutional. The ability of Congress to delegate its authority to the President does have limits. If companies (the ones in a financial position to do this) sued, they'd have standing and could make their case. Whether it's successful or not would take a while to find out, and this is an instance where judges would likely leave the tariffs in place until the suit was settled in a court (before appeals) if the plaintiffs won.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

because that's the way he likes to do things?

"it's obvious that he's negotiating because he likes to negotiate in an incoherent way" I don't really know how to read what you're saying

No, I was replying to you second question.

Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout

#270
post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Almost all the trade deficit numbers being thrown around by the US administration don't include trade in services which the US generally has a large surplus. A lot of that is very high margin tech SASS/advertising. If this continues it seems like this could be a "digg->reddit" type moment for US tech. In some ways it is easier for a lot of people to leave facebook than it is for a single person. If you look at gross…

>Almost all the trade deficit numbers being thrown around by the US administration don't include trade in services which the US generally has a large surplus. Then why don’t other countries tax US services? I don’t even hear this from anyone in the media too

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