Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Furthermore, Russia has no plans to invade any NATO country. Not only are you attempting to prove a negative with "trust me bro" but it's especially laughable given recent history. Please tell me how many days before the Ukraine invasion Russia had "no plans to invade". > this war is not how you describe it: said 'much smaller country' Personally I consider 1/3 the population "much smaller" but you do you. > it's n…
I think it's the opposite: with US remaining in NATO, Europe will feel cocky enough to get dragged in a war, Russia will of course retaliate and further escalation (especially if Russia starts losing) highly likely will lead to the nukes. Now look at the news: Germany sends troops (for permanent stationing) to Eastern Europe. GB, France and Germany discuss deployment of their troops to Ukraine. Seems like I'm rather…
Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
671–680 of 777 posts
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#672Earlier quoted context omitted.
Very well put. Alliances take years to build but can be broken in just days. I'm tempted to think (hope? dream?) that the markets and trade will rebound if all this chaos makes American politics swing back towards an interest in global stability, but I think anyone partnering with the US would do so VERY carefully and right now the entire world is plotting how to remove US dependencies.
I was bringing this up with a guy yesterday who was genuinely supporting the policies and somebody chimed in that they were not worried at all, because everyone wants to trade with the big boy in town. Trust is not important if they are afraid of you (I'm paraphrasing). Quite a different perspective, but it is consistent with an observation I made about a lot of US comments, people are quite happy for their country/g…
Automobile Tariffs by Country 2025: put your cursor on a country to see its automobile tariff. European tariffs on autos are roughly four times those of the USA. While you're there you can look up the "sales tax" too!
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/automobil...
European companies have had tariffs on USA products for decades. Those tariffs protect and maintain industries within a country. The USA failed to maintain that protection: the USA lost jobs and harmed industry which guts an economy. Meanwhile, for example, Germany protected it's auto industry with tariffs on cars from abroad.
My feeling is that "What's good for the goose is good for the gander."
There's no doubt that the "Law of Comparative Advantage"(LCA) in economics is a valid argument for trade. However, the LCA is almost always argued in the absence of externalities: costs generated by use of the LCA are usually not taken into account when examining a full economy: job losses, industry shrinkage and failure, etc.
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#673A simple but profound idea that has stuck with me from the days when I religiously listened to The Macro Tourist's podcast: who's on the other side of the trade? In order for AAPL to drop 7% today, someone of course had to agree to sell their shares at a price that is 7% lower than yesterday's. But perhaps more interesting, someone else agreed to buy the shares at that price. Who's buying here and who's selling? Who'…
Asking just for me to learn: Does it really need someone on the other side to buy or can it be like other markets (consumer goods lets say) where you can set the price lower and not necessary have a buyer. You just announce it that you are willing to sell 10k of this type of share at 200 or lower up to 190. Then someone else seeing this says we are also willing to sell 20k at 190 or 180 ? And so even if no one bought…
GP is hinting at a common fallacy -- I call it the "strong hands fallacy." It's common in crypto: "Every time the price of $fartcoin goes down, it's moving from weak hands to strong hands. Price drops are just more reason to be bullish!"
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#674Earlier quoted context omitted.
What do you mean? We can't afford to finance their security anymore. Nor can we afford their protective tariffs against our goods. Why can't we afford it? Because we're running $1.8T budget deficit, and paying $1T+ in interest on our debt next year. Because each man, woman and child in the US already owes $100K+ straight from birth. Do you just want to keep adding to that number hoping that we'll never turn into Zimb…
> Nor can we afford their protective tariffs against our goods. Virtually none of the US’s major trading partners have high tariffs. Per the World Bank: - EU: 1.39% total effective tariffs. - China: 2.3% - Canada: 2.35% - Mexico: 1.21% - Japan: 1.84% US (prior to Trump II): 1.47% US (next week): Estimated at over 20%.
There's also another aspect, beyond tariffs. In a very real sense, we're paying for the security of EU, Japan, and Canada. Why aren't they buying more of our goods or energy? How long can we foot the bill of over 2/3rds of NATO defense spending, _and_ run $900B+ trade deficits? To what end are we funding the security of developed countries, most of which are half across the world, who could fund it on their own? Why are they _still_ buying Russian oil and gas while we do all that? The whole situation is idiotic.
Trump basically has two levers when it comes to trade deficits: boost exports, and reduce imports. Of these he only directly controls the latter, but he's trying to pull both. And crash the treasury yields at the same time.
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#675Earlier quoted context omitted.
> we can just repeal the law [0] being used Only with a veto-proof majority in both chambers.
Maybe, but vetoes are politically very expensive. Even if he threatens to veto, Congress should still do it. Not doing obvious things because they might run into opposition/problems is a recipe for more and worse of the same.
There is no congress any more, not as an independent body. There is Trump, and there is a body of people who will, in the majority, do anything Trump wants them to do, and is not independent in any way.
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#676Has anyone checked out Fox News recently? There is zero, and I mean zero coverage of the implications of the tariffs. W.T.F. At what point do you go “okay, we’re actually on par with North Korea”?
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#677Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#678Earlier quoted context omitted.
The plan is crystal clear: 1. When equities crash, market liquidity floods the bond market causing yields to drop 2. Refinance debt at these lower rates massively reducing interest burden 3. Cut government spending to cause rates to drop further 4. Reduced rates with a balanced budget results in non-inflationary borrowing and an economic upswing Along the way, eliminate taxes for those earning below $150k. If all of…
or they could've... taxed wealth. But the broligarchs who control trump wouldn't be ok with that.
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#679Earlier quoted context omitted.
I find it hard to sympathize, given how much work there is in this country. People cross the southern border illegally without knowing the local language and with close to no skills and still get jobs, build families and give a chance to prosper to their offspring. I'm not saying there's no hardship anywhere in the US, but rather that the US has so much richness as a whole that these towns you talk about should be go…
> People cross the southern border illegally without knowing the local language and with close to no skills and still get jobs, build families and give a chance to prosper to their offspring. Those people work jobs with illegally bad working conditions and illegally low salaries.
I think you can make an argument that the minimum wage is too low, but it's hard to argue that the salary they take is illegal.
Re: Trump's Tariffs Wipe Out over $6T on Wall Street in Epic Two-Day Rout
#680Earlier quoted context omitted.
I was bringing this up with a guy yesterday who was genuinely supporting the policies and somebody chimed in that they were not worried at all, because everyone wants to trade with the big boy in town. Trust is not important if they are afraid of you (I'm paraphrasing). Quite a different perspective, but it is consistent with an observation I made about a lot of US comments, people are quite happy for their country/g…
> "if you don't want it to be done to you don't do it to others" Doesn't work. We opened trade to China in the '70s. They took advantage of us, stealing IP, manipulating currency, paying their people terrible wages, crapping all over the environment. We let their companies freely in the US, they very severely restricted US business ventures in China. Detroit, a former shining city in the industrial heartland, is now…
A lot of the change there is not down to China but limiting the ability to build a cheap house through nimbyism and regulation and then competition from other dual income / high earners bidding everything up. You could fix it by allocating everyone a bit of land and letting them build whatever on it even if it was just a shack. It's not really trade that's the main problem.