4 ms·

It seems from a few comments that some people would rather US suffer than Trump be proven right.

w0utert 8y ago
Proven right on what account? The article only says China affected negatively more than the US is affected negatively. Both still are still being hurt, and nobody is 'winning' anything. The article only compares consumer prices increases, and fails to mention whole sectors needing government handouts (soybean farmers) or business moving out.
- makomk 8y ago
  The confident assertion of Trump critics everywhere was that US consumers would end up paying for his tariffs and that the whole thing was just a horribly regressive tax on Americans.
  - w0utert 8y ago
    And it seems like this is the case, right? 5% price increase in the US vs 20% price increase in China. So who is benefiting? Let me make clear that I'm absolutely not a proponent of China's global economic policies, so I'm not choosing sides here. But one-sided tariffs like they have been instituted by the Trump administration really do not benefit anyone. Hurting less than the other party hardly seems like a win to me.
    - zip1234 8y ago
      My understanding is that the desired outcome is for China to get rid of tariffs and other policies that prop up their local industries at the expense of other countries. The problem before was that China had policies and tariffs that were one-sided and nobody could do anything about it. The US is big enough to do something about it.
  - talltimtom 8y ago
    If you feel like you aren’t paying more for something when you pay 5$ more just because I pay 20$ more, then have some magic beans to sell you. China is “paying for the war” or “losing” in the sense that more of their soldiers are dying (more increase in cost), but at the end of the day no one is better of in the middle of a war than in peace and soldiers are dying on both sides. Also, at the end of it they may end up winning the war even if they do have larger losses along the way.
    - sbhn 8y ago
      Who is better off are the companies that run customs,
    - dexen 8y ago
      You are mixing the analogies here, thus the confusion. Unlike in war, the tariff 'war' casualties is either money being transferred between countries in different direction than per the usual, or more money paid as import/export duties to the governments. No money is magically destroyed; instead it changes hands - between the private sector and the government. Now the supposed "dying soldiers" is just more money to fund infrastructure, or invest in company's growth. That aside, I believe the most important outcome will be diversification of supply providers, as discussed upthread. Right now China has unhealthy near-monopoly on certain key goods and components, especially the cheaper ones, and thus is able to hold the low-to-mid earning americans hostage via the implicit threat of price hikes. Once diversification progresses sufficiently - i.e., a significant chunk of the sourcing and manufacturing moves out of China and into other countries, like India, Vietnam etc. - the USA will be able to negotiate trade with China on much more equal and equitable terms. The diversification of supply and manufacturing will strengthen all the sides.
      - bzbarsky 8y ago
        One casualty you do not mention is the actual physical goods that consumers do not get as a result of the tariff 'war'. That is, consumers spend the same amount of money, but get fewer goods in return. This is an economic loss for the consumers. Put another way, the "no money is magically destroyed; instead it changes hands - between the private sector and the government" argument taken to the obvious limit would imply that there is no problem with the government just confiscating everything. While some people do think that, the empirical evidence seems to be that this is a bad idea: standards of living drop a good bit when this happens. So on its own this argument is not sufficient to prove that a policy is not causing hits to standards of living.
thrower123 8y ago
For many people, Trump is a stop word that makes their brain slip a gear and descend into mindless rage. Trump could say the sky is blue and those people would claim otherwise.
swebs 8y ago
I've heard this phenomenon is called Trump Derangement Syndrome. It's not nearly as bad here as it is on Reddit, thankfully. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_derangement_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_derangement_syndrome
- culot 8y ago
  It's still pretty bad here, as you can see with many discussions the CNN-type opinion tends to be prevalent. What is nice is that discussions here often involve intelligent, analytical discussion around such talking points; a degree less hivemind regurgitation here perhaps. I'm sure there is a heck of a lot less reputation management and astroturfing here. That is probably down to the size of this forum though.
- ConceptJunkie 8y ago
  This is certain. It's impossible to have any kind of discussion on Reddit, outside of a few places like /r/conservative and /r/tuesday. It's one big echo chamber. Hacker News definitely is better than that.
- nil_pointer 8y ago
  It's not as bad here, but just the fact people are downvoting you for stating this suggests it's still common here.

Proven right on what account? The article only says China affected negatively more than the US is affected negatively. Both still are still being hurt, and nobody is 'winning' anything. The article only compares consumer prices increases, and fails to mention whole sectors needing government handouts (soybean farmers) or business moving out.

makomk 8y ago
The confident assertion of Trump critics everywhere was that US consumers would end up paying for his tariffs and that the whole thing was just a horribly regressive tax on Americans.
- w0utert 8y ago
  And it seems like this is the case, right? 5% price increase in the US vs 20% price increase in China. So who is benefiting? Let me make clear that I'm absolutely not a proponent of China's global economic policies, so I'm not choosing sides here. But one-sided tariffs like they have been instituted by the Trump administration really do not benefit anyone. Hurting less than the other party hardly seems like a win to me.
  - zip1234 8y ago
    My understanding is that the desired outcome is for China to get rid of tariffs and other policies that prop up their local industries at the expense of other countries. The problem before was that China had policies and tariffs that were one-sided and nobody could do anything about it. The US is big enough to do something about it.
- talltimtom 8y ago
  If you feel like you aren’t paying more for something when you pay 5$ more just because I pay 20$ more, then have some magic beans to sell you. China is “paying for the war” or “losing” in the sense that more of their soldiers are dying (more increase in cost), but at the end of the day no one is better of in the middle of a war than in peace and soldiers are dying on both sides. Also, at the end of it they may end up winning the war even if they do have larger losses along the way.
  - sbhn 8y ago
    Who is better off are the companies that run customs,
  - dexen 8y ago
    You are mixing the analogies here, thus the confusion. Unlike in war, the tariff 'war' casualties is either money being transferred between countries in different direction than per the usual, or more money paid as import/export duties to the governments. No money is magically destroyed; instead it changes hands - between the private sector and the government. Now the supposed "dying soldiers" is just more money to fund infrastructure, or invest in company's growth. That aside, I believe the most important outcome will be diversification of supply providers, as discussed upthread. Right now China has unhealthy near-monopoly on certain key goods and components, especially the cheaper ones, and thus is able to hold the low-to-mid earning americans hostage via the implicit threat of price hikes. Once diversification progresses sufficiently - i.e., a significant chunk of the sourcing and manufacturing moves out of China and into other countries, like India, Vietnam etc. - the USA will be able to negotiate trade with China on much more equal and equitable terms. The diversification of supply and manufacturing will strengthen all the sides.
    - bzbarsky 8y ago
      One casualty you do not mention is the actual physical goods that consumers do not get as a result of the tariff 'war'. That is, consumers spend the same amount of money, but get fewer goods in return. This is an economic loss for the consumers. Put another way, the "no money is magically destroyed; instead it changes hands - between the private sector and the government" argument taken to the obvious limit would imply that there is no problem with the government just confiscating everything. While some people do think that, the empirical evidence seems to be that this is a bad idea: standards of living drop a good bit when this happens. So on its own this argument is not sufficient to prove that a policy is not causing hits to standards of living.

thrower123 8y ago

For many people, Trump is a stop word that makes their brain slip a gear and descend into mindless rage. Trump could say the sky is blue and those people would claim otherwise.

swebs 8y ago

I've heard this phenomenon is called Trump Derangement Syndrome. It's not nearly as bad here as it is on Reddit, thankfully. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_derangement_syndrome https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_derangement_syndrome

culot 8y ago
It's still pretty bad here, as you can see with many discussions the CNN-type opinion tends to be prevalent. What is nice is that discussions here often involve intelligent, analytical discussion around such talking points; a degree less hivemind regurgitation here perhaps. I'm sure there is a heck of a lot less reputation management and astroturfing here. That is probably down to the size of this forum though.
ConceptJunkie 8y ago
This is certain. It's impossible to have any kind of discussion on Reddit, outside of a few places like /r/conservative and /r/tuesday. It's one big echo chamber. Hacker News definitely is better than that.
nil_pointer 8y ago
It's not as bad here, but just the fact people are downvoting you for stating this suggests it's still common here.