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Germany isn't a "trap". They're a crystal clear illustration of the problem with no hypotheticals necessary. Their economy is in recession, businesses are colla

Germany isn't a "trap". They're a crystal clear illustration of the problem with no hypotheticals necessary. Their economy is in recession, businesses are collapsing, and and their "solution" is to swap one dependency for another. All the while they're left entering into unprecedented levels of debt just to try to keep their economy from outright collapsing. The most likely outcome for them is long-term stagflation and decline (be it relative or absolute). Germany as we knew it in our lifetimes, well dependent on your age I suppose, is probably dead. Creating dependencies on other countries isn't smart. The point of the tariffs is to raise the price of foreign products, enabling domestic competition and/or to encourage foreign producers to create onshore production facilities. You're not isolating anybody or anything. Some companies will try to eat the costs, others will pass it onto the consumer. In general though, trade is still 100% possible - it simply makes it possible for domestic entities to competitive more effectively.

forgotoldacc 1y ago
>Their economy is in recession, businesses are collapsing >All the while they're left entering into unprecedented levels of debt So is America because of the tariffs and tax cuts for the ultrarich. Also, a lot of the tariffs were delayed or canceled. Is that a good idea? Also, those canceled tariffs were brought back. Was that a good idea? Those brought back tariffs were also delayed again. Was that a good idea?
- somenameforme 1y ago
  With due respect, I really don't think you're thinking about your arguments. You're complaining about tax cuts and tariffs in the same sentence. You probably don't realize that tariffs are literally a tax, generally paid by the richest companies in America. The partisan takes on these issues often don't really make any sense whatsoever. America entered into unprecedented debt exclusively by unprecedented spending. Government receipts (all the money the government takes in each year) has exponentially increased and basically never decreased except during major economic crises. [1] It's just that for every $1 the government takes in, they invariably decide to spend $1.20 more. For the US this was more tolerable than for other nations because of a variety of factors - essentially coming down to the "special" place of USD in the world economy. But for a country like Germany diving into the debt hole will likely be catastrophic, even more so as they don't have control over their own currency. Gerexit starting to trend would be amusing, but also not entirely surprising if you've been paying any attention to German politics. As for the implementation of the tariffs - no I don't think it's been done well. Of course I can take a purely ideological stance while the government is more obligated to take a pragmatic one, balancing the short-term pain such a change will entail against public support of it. [1] - https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FGRECPT https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FGRECPT

forgotoldacc 1y ago

>Their economy is in recession, businesses are collapsing >All the while they're left entering into unprecedented levels of debt So is America because of the tariffs and tax cuts for the ultrarich. Also, a lot of the tariffs were delayed or canceled. Is that a good idea? Also, those canceled tariffs were brought back. Was that a good idea? Those brought back tariffs were also delayed again. Was that a good idea?

somenameforme 1y ago
With due respect, I really don't think you're thinking about your arguments. You're complaining about tax cuts and tariffs in the same sentence. You probably don't realize that tariffs are literally a tax, generally paid by the richest companies in America. The partisan takes on these issues often don't really make any sense whatsoever. America entered into unprecedented debt exclusively by unprecedented spending. Government receipts (all the money the government takes in each year) has exponentially increased and basically never decreased except during major economic crises. [1] It's just that for every $1 the government takes in, they invariably decide to spend $1.20 more. For the US this was more tolerable than for other nations because of a variety of factors - essentially coming down to the "special" place of USD in the world economy. But for a country like Germany diving into the debt hole will likely be catastrophic, even more so as they don't have control over their own currency. Gerexit starting to trend would be amusing, but also not entirely surprising if you've been paying any attention to German politics. As for the implementation of the tariffs - no I don't think it's been done well. Of course I can take a purely ideological stance while the government is more obligated to take a pragmatic one, balancing the short-term pain such a change will entail against public support of it. [1] - https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FGRECPT https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FGRECPT