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Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

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Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#391

Post by warkdarrior »

superxpro12 wrote: post #311
rootusrootus wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Average family paid 1000 more last year due to tariffs. I definitely noticed things that jumped in price.

A large cap company I totally dont work at paid 4% of revenue in tariffs last year. Our bonuses were cut in half. I dont have visibility into our customer pricing. It is fucking obscene how stupid this tax is. And all for what? So billionaires can get a bit richer? How did this help us, like at all???

Judge actions by their outcomes, not by their stated purpose.

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#392

Post by suzdude »

duxup wrote: post #96

Absolutely absurd that we’re at this point. The courts / SCOTUS let the government roll out a massive and obviously illegal tax on citizens for a long time. They should have stepped in earlier. Now we the people probably don’t get our money back….

courts / SCOTUS let the government roll out a massive and obviously illegal tax on citizens for a long time.

The don't forget about congress. 216 GOP congressional reps voted to handicap congress's ability to halt tariffs. For much of the current session of congress, their calendar wasn't counting days.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/house-republicans-block-con...

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#394

Post by burkaman »

hammock wrote: post #274
satvikpendem wrote: post #30

Cantor Fitzgerald, formerly led by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and is now run by his son, went to various companies that were affected by tariffs and bought the rights to their potential tariff refunds for 20% of the value on the expectation that it'd be struck down by the courts. Now they stand to make huge returns of 3 to 5x for being correct on that bet, while, of course, consumers get nothing. Now if this i…

Source? I saw this claim going around but the one actual source supporting the claim was more like “we have the cash to buy them if folks are willing to sell them” and didn’t go any further than that. Via Newsweek, Cantor Fitzgerald has affirmed it “never executed any transactions or taken risk on the legality of tariffs.” https://www.newsweek.com/howard-lutnick-sons-may-make-money-...

This is contradicted by Cantor Fitzgerald documents obtained by Wired which said "We’ve already put a trade through representing about ~$10 million of IEEPA Rights and anticipate that number will balloon in the coming weeks".

- https://www.wired.com/story/cantor-fitzgerald-trump-tariff-r...

So we don't really know, someone is lying. I'd prefer to let the congressional investigation play out, but if I had to guess right now I would believe Wired over Cantor Fitzgerald.

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#395

Post by evan_ »

cvoss wrote: post #174
throwaway667555 wrote: post #92

I'm gonna have a stroke. The Congressional Budget Office found that consumers paid 70-80% of the tariffs, totaling more than $1000 per household. Where is my refund?

You did not pay the tariffs. You bore the cost of the tariffs. Those are not the same thing. The refund is due to the party that got the bill for the tariff and paid it-- the importer. What you paid for was for the business not to go bankrupt while this was occurring. If the business wants to refund you for that, they can choose to do so. But you are not owed a refund.

So on Earth 2 in which everything is the same except these tariffs hadn't been enacted, would today's consumer prices be the same or lower?

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#396

Post by hightrix »

trymas wrote: post #256

Side topic, but this number puts into how crazy it was for trump[0] to go on tariff war against enemies and friends alike. All the propaganda and extortionist language about how all countries will pay up to USA. Astronomical tariffs in some cases, trade wars and dramas, alienate all allies and from all of this they got only $130B ? $7T of spending, $1.77T in deficit[1] and they planned to fix this hole with $100B?! M…

> tariff war against enemies

This is an interesting way to frame a tax on Americans, but it aligns with this administrations actions.

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#397

Post by ambicapter »

redeeman wrote: post #263
joshlemer wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prices don’t monotonically go up forever, prices come down all the time Edit: Sorry autocorrect thought I said moronically,

it does if you continue to pay

stupid humans needing to eat

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#398

Post by warkdarrior »

redeeman wrote: post #276
freetonik wrote: post #146

There was an interesting case in Finland. Finnish customs used to apply a 22% tax (ELV) on top of the car tax for imported used cars from other EU countries. On top of that, Finnish law required VAT to be charged on the car tax itself. There were multiple court cases and this practice was found unlawful (and actually against EU law). But the government did not issue automatic refunds, and instead requested that peopl…

[flagged]

Ah, yes, the whole world is against me. Do you have anything meaningful to say?

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#399

Post by dav43 »

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #122
satvikpendem wrote: post #30

Cantor Fitzgerald, formerly led by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and is now run by his son, went to various companies that were affected by tariffs and bought the rights to their potential tariff refunds for 20% of the value on the expectation that it'd be struck down by the courts. Now they stand to make huge returns of 3 to 5x for being correct on that bet, while, of course, consumers get nothing. Now if this i…

This is wrong. It's not insider trading. Lutnick didn't have inside information. His son just had a brain. Anyone who read the case knew which way the court was going, it was the least surprising decision ever. Perhaps the only surprising thing is that the court ever heard it.

If his son had half a brain he wouldn’t be trading in this quasi derivative

Re: Judge orders government to begin refunding more than $130B in tariffs

#400

Post by xp84 »

zoobab wrote: post #234
mgkimsal wrote: post #194

One thing I don't see mentioned enough with the whole "the consumers paid these tariffs! we should get refunds!"... We "paid" not just in higher prices, but in many layoffs, reduction in working hours, skipped bonuses and raises. Companies that get 'refunds' will have an opportunity to use that money to rehire and repay workers. I'm cynical enough to think that will happen in large measures across the whole country,…

"use that money to rehire and repay workers" or give it to shareholders.

Everything is taxed including payroll.
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