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American Disruption

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Re: American Disruption

#41

Post by bregma »

morsecodist wrote: post #13

Talking about the merits of these tariffs kind of misses the point. The person who wrote this article is very smart. I am sure they are smarter than I am. He has produced a pretty solid analysis of trade policy. But in articles like this people ascribe their own motivations and goals to the tariffs that aren't actually there. Buried in this article is the assumption that the motivation of tariffs and trade policy is…

> It is like the administration adopted a policy of jailing all Capricorns and only Capricorns and people started writing think pieces about how the criminal justice system would be more efficient if they focused on programs to reduce recidivism.

I was born on January 19. Should I be concerned?

Re: American Disruption

#42

Post by throwanem »

nthingtohide wrote: post #40
throwanem wrote: post #19

Ben Thompson was a leading industry commentator in the 2010s. He was well suited for those times. Less so for these, perhaps.

Has anyone done deconstruction of his thesis / arguments and found his predictions to be lackluster?

He's just spent ten thousand words not very convincingly defending the fundamental misapprehensions which informed one of his own work's major theses, I would argue actually its central one, for the past four years.

Who has the stronger incentive to steelman? And if that's the best he can do right now, I grant that's not the same as saying he will certainly fail to adapt to the post-globalized, much more broadly and deeply impoverished world now taking shape. It is, though, about the same as saying he has not yet obviously begun succeeding.

Re: American Disruption

#43

Post by samtp »

renewiltord wrote: post #28
Jochim wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Uber example is also an outright lie. They acquired those customers by burning billions of dollars to deliver rides below the cost of providing them. Then they raised prices beyond their competition to account for their ridiculous overheads.

Taxis still exist and are still more expensive. You pay for them to use bus lanes in SF and so on. Uber prices are not beyond the competition.

At least in Seattle, it's actually about 50% cheaper to get a taxi from SeaTac to the city than to take a Lyft or Uber.

Re: American Disruption

#44

Post by bryanlarsen »

clodushid wrote: post #17
morsecodist wrote: post #13

Talking about the merits of these tariffs kind of misses the point. The person who wrote this article is very smart. I am sure they are smarter than I am. He has produced a pretty solid analysis of trade policy. But in articles like this people ascribe their own motivations and goals to the tariffs that aren't actually there. Buried in this article is the assumption that the motivation of tariffs and trade policy is…

The primary architect of trumps tariff strategy in his first and second term is Peter Navarro. If you want to understand the tariffs today, just go read one of his many books. His goals are pretty simple: reindustriaize America No more free trade China is evil and the worlds enemy It should be no surprise to anyone observing trump since he took office that the end goal was always to decouple from China.

I think you have cause and effect backwards. Trump pulled in Navarro because Navarro had the plan that Trump's been advocating for since the 80's. IOW, it's Trump's plan that Navarro is actualizing, not a plan that Navarro convinced Trump to make happen.

Trump's first term tariffs happened under Lighthizer, who was much more rational than both Trump & Navarro.

Re: American Disruption

#45

Post by gman2093 »

clodushid wrote: post #17
morsecodist wrote: post #13

Talking about the merits of these tariffs kind of misses the point. The person who wrote this article is very smart. I am sure they are smarter than I am. He has produced a pretty solid analysis of trade policy. But in articles like this people ascribe their own motivations and goals to the tariffs that aren't actually there. Buried in this article is the assumption that the motivation of tariffs and trade policy is…

The primary architect of trumps tariff strategy in his first and second term is Peter Navarro. If you want to understand the tariffs today, just go read one of his many books. His goals are pretty simple: reindustriaize America No more free trade China is evil and the worlds enemy It should be no surprise to anyone observing trump since he took office that the end goal was always to decouple from China.

If this were a goal, the USA would not want to push other countries into China's sphere of influence. The simpler explanation is that non-tariff taxes require congress and are not fully under control of the executive branch. This allows the executive branch to seize the power of the purse.

Re: American Disruption

#46

Post by dylan604 »

mjevans wrote: post #38
clodushid wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The primary architect of trumps tariff strategy in his first and second term is Peter Navarro. If you want to understand the tariffs today, just go read one of his many books. His goals are pretty simple: reindustriaize America No more free trade China is evil and the worlds enemy It should be no surprise to anyone observing trump since he took office that the end goal was always to decouple from China.

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. During the campaign it was all about those manufacturing jobs.

Re: American Disruption

#47

Post by inerte »

mjevans wrote: post #38
clodushid wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The primary architect of trumps tariff strategy in his first and second term is Peter Navarro. If you want to understand the tariffs today, just go read one of his many books. His goals are pretty simple: reindustriaize America No more free trade China is evil and the worlds enemy It should be no surprise to anyone observing trump since he took office that the end goal was always to decouple from China.

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.

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.

Re: American Disruption

#48

Post by bregma »

jonnat wrote: post #25
morsecodist wrote: post #13

Talking about the merits of these tariffs kind of misses the point. The person who wrote this article is very smart. I am sure they are smarter than I am. He has produced a pretty solid analysis of trade policy. But in articles like this people ascribe their own motivations and goals to the tariffs that aren't actually there. Buried in this article is the assumption that the motivation of tariffs and trade policy is…

Worse than projecting one's values onto a rationalization of the new tariffs is to simply take the administration's rhetoric at face value. That other countries are "taking advantage of us" is just a talking point. We have to look at how the tariffs fit historical conservative programs. Republicans have long wished to replace our progressive income taxation with a flat tax system, but that's simply not achievable, ev…

Tariffs are also revenue. It just moves the revenue from income taxes, which can affect the rich if they have incompetent accountants, to consumption taxes, which affect predominantly the poors and middle class.

Tariffs are a tax levied on American consumers, not on foreign governments. Using them to decrease income taxes on the rich is something only an out-of-touch millionaire could dream up. Qu'ils mangent de la brioche!

Re: American Disruption

#49

Post by fanzhang »

morsecodist wrote: post #13

Talking about the merits of these tariffs kind of misses the point. The person who wrote this article is very smart. I am sure they are smarter than I am. He has produced a pretty solid analysis of trade policy. But in articles like this people ascribe their own motivations and goals to the tariffs that aren't actually there. Buried in this article is the assumption that the motivation of tariffs and trade policy is…

Bingo -- analysts of Trump are way too overeager to attribute "4D Chess" super analytics driven goals to Trump.

In reality, he's doing exactly what is on the tin: reducing tariffs, and doing what he wants to do, because he feels like it.

Re: American Disruption

#50

Post by samtp »

clodushid wrote: post #17
morsecodist wrote: post #13

Talking about the merits of these tariffs kind of misses the point. The person who wrote this article is very smart. I am sure they are smarter than I am. He has produced a pretty solid analysis of trade policy. But in articles like this people ascribe their own motivations and goals to the tariffs that aren't actually there. Buried in this article is the assumption that the motivation of tariffs and trade policy is…

The primary architect of trumps tariff strategy in his first and second term is Peter Navarro. If you want to understand the tariffs today, just go read one of his many books. His goals are pretty simple: reindustriaize America No more free trade China is evil and the worlds enemy It should be no surprise to anyone observing trump since he took office that the end goal was always to decouple from China.

I believe the real architect of the strategy is Ron Vara [0]

[0] In case you didn't know Run Vara is a fake economist that Navarro made up in his books and memos to justify his own deeply flawed policies.

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