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These new tariffs are posturing. Trump seems to understand how to negotiate and is willing to take short term hardship for long term gain. We need to have bala

These new tariffs are posturing. Trump seems to understand how to negotiate and is willing to take short term hardship for long term gain. We need to have balanced trade agreements. Not balanced in the sense of trade amount, but balanced in the sense of tariffs and subsidies. Access to US consumers is a big bargaining chip. If China won’t deal, there are other countries that will. I think we all understood we had an unhealthy relationship with China.

Ensorceled 8y ago
And the rest of the world? Some how the US is the most powerful economy in the world, it’s corporations the richest but the US is being ripped off?
- IanDrake 8y ago
  I’m not sure you understand how nations work. We elect people to work in our best interests. We are in competition with other countries. Our blue collar jobs have stagnated since we’ve been off-shoring manufacturing to China. The poor in the US were getting poorer. Not everyone has the ability to transition into a thinking job and we need a balanced economy for these people.
  - what-the-grump 8y ago
    Then tax the rich and feed the poor. Don’t erode the competitive advantage of America. The solution is pretty simple. People are looking east instead of west for everything.
    - IanDrake 8y ago
      How does one tax the rich? Please be specific.
  - 1over137 8y ago
    Not to disagree (or agree), but it seems to me most USians were quite happy to buy cheap Chinese crap at Walmart & Amazon in the last decades, thus off-shoring their own jobs. The chickens are home to roost.
    - zrobotics 8y ago
      This started well before the Chinese were into manufacturing, clear back in the 70s with cheap Japanese imports. Then it moved to Taiwan, and now China. Honestly, wages in the US have been too high to avoid this for quite a long time, and the only way I see consumer manufacturing moving back is through increased automation. Unfortunately, I see no realistic way to bring back the kind of manufacturing jobs in the same numbers we had in the 50s-70s. And nobody wants to work them anyway, a family friend runs a small company making material handling equipment, and he is always short of assemblers. At one point he was starting assemblers higher than welders, and still struggled. We're fighting too many years of telling kids to avoid the trades and go to college. I can't find the link, but NPR recently ran a story about innovative schools that are starting maker spaces. All schools used to have that, it was called shop class. These moves from the trump administration seem to me like closing the gate after the horses have already bolted, and stand to harm what manufacturing jobs we have left as well as pissing off our allies.
      - IanDrake 8y ago
        I don’t disagree with most of your analysis. Especially your point about automation. Now imagine a world where the US can make things again at a cost competitive rate due to automation. Ok, now look at how those goods would be taxed overseas... We still would have an export problem due to other country’s protectionist tariffs. The point of the trade negotiations is to get better terms for US exports. This is critical as we come to a turning point in manufacturing.
        zrobotics 8y ago
        The trouble, as bunnie points out in the article, is that the tariffs apply to things like components, not finished assemblies. So why would I locate a SMD assembly line in the US if my raw materials are higher, when I can also assemble the product overseas and avoid these tariffs?
  - dalore 8y ago
    It's the whole competition mentality. If anything the US is in a competition against themselves. Everything seems to fight against helping your fellow man and all about gettings yours before anyone get's theirs. Healthcare for you fellow citizens? So controversial. Billions of dollars for war and killing others? Well that's ok then, let's spend that money no questions asked. You guys are at competition so much with each other that you create scary fake bogeymen (like the chinese) to distract that you're really fighting yourselves. The whole world isn't always a competition to win. I'd rather cooperate and we can all have a win/win instead of a win/lose.
    - innocentoldguy 8y ago
      I don't think anybody is fighting against helping their fellow man. What they are angry about is having the big guns of government pointed at their heads while the rewards of their labor are siphoned away under the guise of charity. Once you help someone at another person's expense, you've crossed the border between charity and extortion.
      - AlexandrB 8y ago
        > Once you help someone at another person's expense, you've crossed the border between charity and extortion. You're talking about the subsidies for electric cars, right?
        innocentoldguy 8y ago
        I do not understand how you arrived at that conclusion. Could you explain? I think my point is simple and clear. If you choose to help the poor at your own expense, it is charity. If you want to help the poor at my expense, it is extortion. People don't mind the first. They mind very much the second. That's it. That is the entirety of my point. There are no hidden layers to peel back. No need to downvote me for being against electric cars. I own one myself.
        AlexandrB 8y ago
- melling 8y ago
  Everyone is spinning their own narrative. Can’t we simply find all the tariff data and examine it, with any necessary context like amount in dollars traded? I’d rather start with the numbers than an emotional appeal like you have given.
tinus_hn 8y ago
> If China won’t deal, there are other countries that will. All these countries he hasn’t alienated yet, which is a list that mostly consists of North Korea.
- IanDrake 8y ago
  That’s just hyperbole. The US is throwing its weight around for the first time since Reagan. Last time it worked out pretty well. Things have changed a lot since then with the rise of China and the EU. With the new big players in the world it’s time the US put on its big boy pants and renegotiated its place.
  - endorphone 8y ago
    The entire worldwide trade order was created by the US throwing its weight around. Those cheap Chinese goods, Korea, Japan, the WTO, the poles of axis. Drug prices, intellectual property protections. All courtesy of the US. That order that made the US the richest country in the world, home to the most powerful companies in the world. So the whole Trump narrative that you're regurgitating is a bit odd. And it is already backfiring spectacularly, and is poised to get much worse. Those "big boy pants" turned out to have a smattering of urine and feces in them. Trump's ignorant, hap-hazard way of "negotiating" has alienated friends and foes, and made the world re-evaluate why it is playing the US agenda. Another post noted that the whole thing has been unfair to low income earners in the US, as if the outrageous disparity in the US is really the result of those damn foreigners. Only that disparity has only gotten worse under Trump's ignorant policies.
    - frockington 8y ago
      It seems like they are forced to play the US agenda. Are they going to end their military protection agreements with the most powerful military in the world? Are they going to close access to the world largest market? If they want to have a nation in 20 years they likely will not stop playing the US agenda
      - 8y ago
detaro 8y ago
> Access to US consumers is a big bargaining chip Which is why finished consumer products are not part of the new tariffs, so companies that make stuff in China and ship it to the US are better off than companies buying parts in China and assembling in the US? Or was there a big push of end-product tariffs before that didn't make headlines? In most cases, buying all your parts locally is fairly impractical. (The documentation of various "fair trade" electronics projects is often interesting in that regard, since they often are willing to accept higher prices from trustworthy local sources, and often find that only a few things can be gotten locally at all, and often only in specialist variants, e.g. high-precision parts, with matching prices). Maybe it'll be enough push to restart some component industries, but I'm skeptical.
- IanDrake 8y ago
  I think you’re making an assumption that the ongoing trade negotiations is static. It’s not. Today it’s parts, tomorrow it could be fully assembled goods. If you’re going to negotiate, you don’t play all your cards at once. I don’t think the end state of the negotiations is protectionist tariffs for the US, it’s to get China to drop their protectionist tariffs. If we reach that end goal, how is that a bad thing?
  - detaro 8y ago
    It just seems odd to put tariffs on things that'll hurt local industries and make life harder for companies that have moved at least some production steps into your country (after lots of talk to encourage companies to do that, and apparently at least some successes doing that) over those that operate entirely outside. > I don’t think the end state of the negotiations is protectionist tariffs for the US We'll see, at least some of the recent tariffs seem to be exactly that, e.g. the steel and aluminium tariffs against the EU (which are now countered by the EU with tariffs on american exports) to limit their exports to the US, all the while complaining about Canada doing the same for agricultural products.
- Nasrudith 8y ago
  I suspect it is about pandering to his base as opposed to health of the nation - assuming it isn't just mindboggling economic illiteracy. He is noticeably promoting trade completely backwards. Normally advanced nations push for more complex, higher capital and infrastructure requirements, or later in the supply chain goods both because of externalities and comparative advantage - any third world nation can cut down trees and allow pollution in - meaning less profit. Instead he has been pushing steel and coal at the expense of finished goods like even kegs. Economically it is like trying to get rich by being a mercantalist colony - the ones that wound up usually lost over mistreatment and doing better after independence. The US makes most profit via services but is still #2 in manufacturing via the advanced end and remained #1 for a while even during their rise. Given the sheer effort and scale involved by China and it cannibalizing world markets to so that is still very impressive. It brings to mind the US agricultural sector - it is at the top and it is still a tiny portion of the GDP. The top end strategy pays economically.
s73v3r_ 8y ago
Trump is clearly not a negotiator. If he was, he wouldn't be isolating all of our allies, instead of getting them to side with us to push change in China.
- IanDrake 8y ago
  IMO, your confusing consensus with power. I don’t think consensus gives you power. Ultimately consensus is only useful if all participants are willing to take the same action together. That is powerful. But consensus that says “hey, China, you should have better dealings with us” but then none of the participants have the backbone to do anything, then there is no power and the concensus is worthless.

Ensorceled 8y ago

And the rest of the world? Some how the US is the most powerful economy in the world, it’s corporations the richest but the US is being ripped off?

IanDrake 8y ago
I’m not sure you understand how nations work. We elect people to work in our best interests. We are in competition with other countries. Our blue collar jobs have stagnated since we’ve been off-shoring manufacturing to China. The poor in the US were getting poorer. Not everyone has the ability to transition into a thinking job and we need a balanced economy for these people.
- what-the-grump 8y ago
  Then tax the rich and feed the poor. Don’t erode the competitive advantage of America. The solution is pretty simple. People are looking east instead of west for everything.
  - IanDrake 8y ago
    How does one tax the rich? Please be specific.
- 1over137 8y ago
  Not to disagree (or agree), but it seems to me most USians were quite happy to buy cheap Chinese crap at Walmart & Amazon in the last decades, thus off-shoring their own jobs. The chickens are home to roost.
  - zrobotics 8y ago
    This started well before the Chinese were into manufacturing, clear back in the 70s with cheap Japanese imports. Then it moved to Taiwan, and now China. Honestly, wages in the US have been too high to avoid this for quite a long time, and the only way I see consumer manufacturing moving back is through increased automation. Unfortunately, I see no realistic way to bring back the kind of manufacturing jobs in the same numbers we had in the 50s-70s. And nobody wants to work them anyway, a family friend runs a small company making material handling equipment, and he is always short of assemblers. At one point he was starting assemblers higher than welders, and still struggled. We're fighting too many years of telling kids to avoid the trades and go to college. I can't find the link, but NPR recently ran a story about innovative schools that are starting maker spaces. All schools used to have that, it was called shop class. These moves from the trump administration seem to me like closing the gate after the horses have already bolted, and stand to harm what manufacturing jobs we have left as well as pissing off our allies.
    - IanDrake 8y ago
      I don’t disagree with most of your analysis. Especially your point about automation. Now imagine a world where the US can make things again at a cost competitive rate due to automation. Ok, now look at how those goods would be taxed overseas... We still would have an export problem due to other country’s protectionist tariffs. The point of the trade negotiations is to get better terms for US exports. This is critical as we come to a turning point in manufacturing.
      - zrobotics 8y ago
        The trouble, as bunnie points out in the article, is that the tariffs apply to things like components, not finished assemblies. So why would I locate a SMD assembly line in the US if my raw materials are higher, when I can also assemble the product overseas and avoid these tariffs?
- dalore 8y ago
  It's the whole competition mentality. If anything the US is in a competition against themselves. Everything seems to fight against helping your fellow man and all about gettings yours before anyone get's theirs. Healthcare for you fellow citizens? So controversial. Billions of dollars for war and killing others? Well that's ok then, let's spend that money no questions asked. You guys are at competition so much with each other that you create scary fake bogeymen (like the chinese) to distract that you're really fighting yourselves. The whole world isn't always a competition to win. I'd rather cooperate and we can all have a win/win instead of a win/lose.
  - innocentoldguy 8y ago
    I don't think anybody is fighting against helping their fellow man. What they are angry about is having the big guns of government pointed at their heads while the rewards of their labor are siphoned away under the guise of charity. Once you help someone at another person's expense, you've crossed the border between charity and extortion.
    - AlexandrB 8y ago
      > Once you help someone at another person's expense, you've crossed the border between charity and extortion. You're talking about the subsidies for electric cars, right?
      - innocentoldguy 8y ago
        I do not understand how you arrived at that conclusion. Could you explain? I think my point is simple and clear. If you choose to help the poor at your own expense, it is charity. If you want to help the poor at my expense, it is extortion. People don't mind the first. They mind very much the second. That's it. That is the entirety of my point. There are no hidden layers to peel back. No need to downvote me for being against electric cars. I own one myself.
        AlexandrB 8y ago
melling 8y ago
Everyone is spinning their own narrative. Can’t we simply find all the tariff data and examine it, with any necessary context like amount in dollars traded? I’d rather start with the numbers than an emotional appeal like you have given.

tinus_hn 8y ago

> If China won’t deal, there are other countries that will. All these countries he hasn’t alienated yet, which is a list that mostly consists of North Korea.

IanDrake 8y ago
That’s just hyperbole. The US is throwing its weight around for the first time since Reagan. Last time it worked out pretty well. Things have changed a lot since then with the rise of China and the EU. With the new big players in the world it’s time the US put on its big boy pants and renegotiated its place.
- endorphone 8y ago
  The entire worldwide trade order was created by the US throwing its weight around. Those cheap Chinese goods, Korea, Japan, the WTO, the poles of axis. Drug prices, intellectual property protections. All courtesy of the US. That order that made the US the richest country in the world, home to the most powerful companies in the world. So the whole Trump narrative that you're regurgitating is a bit odd. And it is already backfiring spectacularly, and is poised to get much worse. Those "big boy pants" turned out to have a smattering of urine and feces in them. Trump's ignorant, hap-hazard way of "negotiating" has alienated friends and foes, and made the world re-evaluate why it is playing the US agenda. Another post noted that the whole thing has been unfair to low income earners in the US, as if the outrageous disparity in the US is really the result of those damn foreigners. Only that disparity has only gotten worse under Trump's ignorant policies.
  - frockington 8y ago
    It seems like they are forced to play the US agenda. Are they going to end their military protection agreements with the most powerful military in the world? Are they going to close access to the world largest market? If they want to have a nation in 20 years they likely will not stop playing the US agenda
    - 8y ago

detaro 8y ago

> Access to US consumers is a big bargaining chip Which is why finished consumer products are not part of the new tariffs, so companies that make stuff in China and ship it to the US are better off than companies buying parts in China and assembling in the US? Or was there a big push of end-product tariffs before that didn't make headlines? In most cases, buying all your parts locally is fairly impractical. (The documentation of various "fair trade" electronics projects is often interesting in that regard, since they often are willing to accept higher prices from trustworthy local sources, and often find that only a few things can be gotten locally at all, and often only in specialist variants, e.g. high-precision parts, with matching prices). Maybe it'll be enough push to restart some component industries, but I'm skeptical.

IanDrake 8y ago
I think you’re making an assumption that the ongoing trade negotiations is static. It’s not. Today it’s parts, tomorrow it could be fully assembled goods. If you’re going to negotiate, you don’t play all your cards at once. I don’t think the end state of the negotiations is protectionist tariffs for the US, it’s to get China to drop their protectionist tariffs. If we reach that end goal, how is that a bad thing?
- detaro 8y ago
  It just seems odd to put tariffs on things that'll hurt local industries and make life harder for companies that have moved at least some production steps into your country (after lots of talk to encourage companies to do that, and apparently at least some successes doing that) over those that operate entirely outside. > I don’t think the end state of the negotiations is protectionist tariffs for the US We'll see, at least some of the recent tariffs seem to be exactly that, e.g. the steel and aluminium tariffs against the EU (which are now countered by the EU with tariffs on american exports) to limit their exports to the US, all the while complaining about Canada doing the same for agricultural products.
Nasrudith 8y ago
I suspect it is about pandering to his base as opposed to health of the nation - assuming it isn't just mindboggling economic illiteracy. He is noticeably promoting trade completely backwards. Normally advanced nations push for more complex, higher capital and infrastructure requirements, or later in the supply chain goods both because of externalities and comparative advantage - any third world nation can cut down trees and allow pollution in - meaning less profit. Instead he has been pushing steel and coal at the expense of finished goods like even kegs. Economically it is like trying to get rich by being a mercantalist colony - the ones that wound up usually lost over mistreatment and doing better after independence. The US makes most profit via services but is still #2 in manufacturing via the advanced end and remained #1 for a while even during their rise. Given the sheer effort and scale involved by China and it cannibalizing world markets to so that is still very impressive. It brings to mind the US agricultural sector - it is at the top and it is still a tiny portion of the GDP. The top end strategy pays economically.

s73v3r_ 8y ago

Trump is clearly not a negotiator. If he was, he wouldn't be isolating all of our allies, instead of getting them to side with us to push change in China.

IanDrake 8y ago
IMO, your confusing consensus with power. I don’t think consensus gives you power. Ultimately consensus is only useful if all participants are willing to take the same action together. That is powerful. But consensus that says “hey, China, you should have better dealings with us” but then none of the participants have the backbone to do anything, then there is no power and the concensus is worthless.