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This needs to be repeated. Tariffs are a tax on ordinary citizens. Unlike regular taxes, tariffs are not progressive and therefore benefit the wealthy. These a
by cheema33 1y ago
This needs to be repeated. Tariffs are a tax on ordinary citizens. Unlike regular taxes, tariffs are not progressive and therefore benefit the wealthy.
These are the sort of things the poor and middle class voted for. To make the rich, richer. And then turn around and complain that rich are getting richer and they are getting poorer.
- ryandrake 1y ago[flagged]
- hippo22 1y agoDo you think that cigarette taxes should be repealed then?
- zymhan 1y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
- Spooky23 1y agoThat’s not Whataboutism. Cigarette taxes are excise taxes, very similar to tariffs, and often implemented to encourage behavior by raising commodity cost. In the case of cigarettes and alcohol they are partially “sin taxes” to discourage negative behavior. In the case of the Trump emergency tariffs, they are seeking to pivot the entire economy. So there’s a nuance and multiple ways to look at it. If you’re GM, the ability to make better margins on shitty cars is a net positive. If you’re in the technology or medical field, well, you’re fucked.
- zahlman 1y agoThis is not whataboutism. The argument described in GGP would apply the same way to GP's case. Cigarette taxes are a sales/consumption tax (specifically one aimed at discouraging consumption, but cigarettes are addictive) and they are necessarily, inherently regressive, for the simple reason that people with orders of magnitude more income and wealth cannot feasibly spend proportionately more on cigarettes.
- zymhan 1y agoIt's bringing up an entirely unrelated topic as some sort of "gotcha". Cigarette taxes were not part of the GGP's comment. I.e. a red herring > The communication intent is often to distract from the content of a topic (red herring). The goal may also be to question the justification for criticism and the legitimacy, integrity, and fairness of the critic, which can take on the character of discrediting the criticism, which may or may not be justified.
- hippo22 1y agoNo, it’s not whataboutism. The original comment made a single argument: regressive taxes are bad. I provided a counter example: the cigarette tax is an example of a regressive tax that is good. This invalidates their argument. That doesn’t mean their position on tariffs is wrong, but they’ve provided an insufficient argument to support their viewpoint. There’s also an implicit corollary that they don’t fully understand tariffs if this is their position. Whataboutism would be something like someone from the US arguing that China’s treatment of Uyghurs is bad, and someone from China countering with “well, what about America’s treatment of Native Americans?” The Native American argument isn’t a counter example of the Uyghur argument. Both positions can be true. It’s unrelated. That’s not the case here. You can’t be anti-tariff purely because it’s a regressive tax and also be pro-cigarette tax.
- zahlman 1y ago> It's bringing up an entirely unrelated topic as some sort of "gotcha" Expecting people to be consistent, and treat similar situations similarly, is not a "gotcha". Challenges like this are raised exactly to hold people to their own standards and question whether they are really okay with the consequences of what they just said. The topic described is not at all "entirely unrelated". There is a clear natural category which encompasses both tariffs and cigarette taxes.
- bryzaguy 1y agoIf I were to pick a place to tax, the addictive, harmful substances seem like a good option. But that’s easy for me to say because I don’t smoke. I do like sugar though. Imagine the impact on our health if there were a sugar tax.
- stouset 1y agoThere is in some places. California has a hefty sugary-beverage tax, for example. I'm intuitively "for" things like this, but I'm curious if it's been long enough that we've been able to collect data showing any effects.
- Symbiote 1y agoThe UK sugary drink tax caused a reduction in sugar consumption, and reduced obesity and dental problems in children. https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/jul/09/uk-sugar-tax-explained-what-is-it-and-has-it-worked https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/jul/09/uk-...
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- msgodel 1y agoThey're not nearly as bad as income tax which would have to be raised if we didn't do tariffs. At least tariffs tax consumption rather than production. Taxing production/income is horribly evil and in better times (such as when the country was founded) people who insisted on it would have been shot.
- airstrike 1y ago[flagged]
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- os2warpman 1y ago[flagged]
- bendbro 1y ago[flagged]
- marcosdumay 1y ago> I'm a white upper-middle-class military veteran professional landowning (mortgages don't count, buddy) male If you don't own a stable company, you may still be too poor to benefit from those ones.
- woadwarrior01 1y ago> At least tariffs tax consumption rather than production. Taxing production/income is horribly evil and in better times (such as when the country was founded) people who insisted on it would have been shot. Not true. Producing almost anything in the material world requires raw materials. If any of them are imported, they suffer from tariffs. IMO, if a consumption tax is what you're looking for, then value added tax (VAT) is a more suitable solution.
- colechristensen 1y agoI think it's quite the opposite. Tariffs are flat taxes on corporations AND can't be avoided with the tax shenanigans all big corporations use and many small ones can't. Implementation and motivation details aside I'm in favor of small tariffs for all but the most equal trade partners. Corporate taxes have the problem of small business paying much more proportionally than large ones and a flat tax on businesses that rely on cheap foreign labor and goods is deserved. Trump doesn't get to define all of my opinions by me needing to oppose exactly everything he's done. The problem with the current political situation is the establishment in both parties w were too cowardly or useless to address real problems which are now actually being addressed by objectively stupid fascists. And that is the lesson to everyone, get stuff done or get replaced by awful people doing awful things.
- mlyle 1y agoIn the long run, tariffs basically all fall on the consumer because producer and distributor behavior is near infinitely elastic. Econ 101 predicts that the party who is less able to adjust behavior in reaction to the tax pays most of the tax. In the short run, this isn't true: firms have goods they need to move.
- tsunamifury 1y agoWe are in a world economy which actually needs demand more than supply. This is your missing analysis.
- mlyle 1y ago"We need demand more than supply" is a macro diagnosis. But tariff incidence is a micro question. Elasticity analysis doesn’t care whether the world has a demand shortfall or a supply glut. It asks: when a tax raises transaction costs, which side is less able to change behavior? In the long run, suppliers usually have more flexibility than consumers.
- tsunamifury 1y ago
- sugarpimpdorsey 1y ago[flagged]
- vict7 1y agoFalse dichotomy.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y agoFalse choice. The poor and middle class don't have to be stupid to be manipulated.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- gosub100 1y ago[flagged]
- marssaxman 1y agoWhat "far left" is it that you think you are hearing here?
- paxys 1y agoNot all tax is the same. The left prefers progressive taxation (if you make more income you pay more tax), the right prefers regressive (if you buy or use goods or services you pay tax on them). Sales taxes and tariffs are in the latter category.
- georgeplusplus 1y agoIt’s disingenuous to consider one’s total income when weighing the fairness of a tax like sales tax. The thought that a sales tax is somehow benefiting one group over the other is ridiculous far left extreme thinking. You pay for a service and that service has a rate. To think that the only good kind of taxation are those that are progressive is the dumbest thing I ever heard.
- oblique 1y agoThe taxes will have to come from somewhere. Tariffs are a regressive tax because money spent on goods will increase sublinearly with income. The % of total income spent on tariffs passed onto the consumer is therefore higher the lower your income is. It's not "ridiculous far left extreme thinking", it's basic math.
- czzr 1y agoIt’s very, very basic economics - the marginal utility of money decreases, so progressive taxation is better than regressive taxation.
- SpicyLemonZest 1y ago
- atmavatar 1y ago[flagged]
- helloooooooo 1y agoI don’t think anyone here has yet come to the realization that ending rampant consumerism is the whole damn point of the tariffs.
- shafyy 1y agoNo, that's surely not the point of tariffs. Maybe a silver lining, but for sure not the intention.
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- eagsalazar2 1y agoLol, are you serious? Can you elaborate on your thinking here? Are you suggesting Trump imposed tariffs out of some altruistic goal of reducing waste or the social impacts of consumerism?? That can't be right. What is the motivation in your mind?
- khuey 1y agoThe "point" of the tariffs is that Trump likes tariffs. There's nothing more to it than that.
- lolc 1y agoWhy cut off your thinking there? I can think of many reasons why he would like tariffs. Two off the bat: - Allows claiming various benefits like onshoring production, or reduced taxes. This is for the voters. - Allows threatening other countries' industries with tariffs unless they invest in his friends' enterprises. This is for him.
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- bagels 1y ago
- arghwhat 1y agoTariffs like this is a market regulation that the people pays for. It doesn't "benefit the wealthy" because it's not progressive, it benefits the wealthy that have investments in the tariffed industry by distorting the market to their advantage instead of having to be competitive on a level playing field. The rest of the wealthy are equally annoyed by the tariffs as everyone else, possibly more so as they see their investments tank.
- Gud 1y agoThere is no "level playing field" when you are competing with literal sweatshops though. Frankly tariffs get a bad rep because of from who and how they are implemented but can absolutely serve a purpose.
- Retric 1y agoAutomation consistently outcompetes sweatshops. What’s missing from these discussions is the idea of competitive advantage. It is inherently more efficient to grow crops in climates where they thrive, tacking a tariff to protect domestic production means intentionally lowering the standard of living of everyone both domestically and abroad to favor some tiny group doing something wasteful.
- cuuupid 1y agoAutomation is not replacing sweatshops, they've just made the sweatshop workers more productive (economically) while requiring them to be less productive (in activity). So all that's happened is an exponential increase in the output volume of sweatshops :/
- Retric 1y agoThere’s many industries that have moved beyond sweatshops due to automation. Pepsi can’t get glass bottles from 3rd world sweatshops at anything competitive with a highly automated factory. In the vast majority of industries it’s just a question of levels of automation and climate control inherently makes automation easier by reducing variability in temperature and humidity. Of course the original distinction around climate control that created the term sweatshops is dying as such operations are largely dying out, but that only reinforces the notion of automation killing off the inherent advantages of unskilled cheap labor.
- dfxm12 1y agoI'm sure Japan, and other countries doing similar things, don't like the tariffs either. Hopefully actions like this will change voter behavior, either at the polls or to embolden voters to do whatever it is they can to tell their elected officials to revert these changes. Maybe this is a drop in the bucket, but on the other hand, maybe Japan doesn't want to/can't make a bigger a splash. In any case, it is rare that Americans face consequences for bad behavior of American foreign policy. Hopefully Americans get more engaged and introspective this time around.
- rkuykendall-com 1y ago> Hopefully actions like this will change voter behavior It won't: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93United_States_trade_war#2018 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China%E2%80%93United_States_tr...
- cuuupid 1y agoEveryone has been repeating this for months but inflation remains relatively normal so prices are not rising. Maybe it's a delayed effect that we won't see until later in the year, but at this point it is a theory and far from a fact, not something that needs to be repeated. We have already observed that the opposite does not hold - in 2017 we slashed corporate income tax by 14% across the board, roughly the same as the tariffs but with far more surface area, and yet prices did not react and the benefits were not passed along to the consumer. All we _know_ right now is that this is going to negatively impact economic growth by hitting corporations, the same way slashing corporate income tax positively impacted economic growth by benefitting corporations.
- freen 1y agoCompanies have reserves, local stock etc. Fixed prices are a bet on TACO and hoping to avoid the orange rage: see what happens when you blame price increases on tariffs. Lots and lots of bribes have been paid. This is yet another.
- cuuupid 1y agoWe will definitely see but it's still a theory at this point, and one that has not played out the other way in the past with a reduction on corporate tax _across the board_ > Fixed prices are a bet on TACO Having been part of some of these conversations it's mostly a bet that democrats will win back control sometime in the next decade and do a full reversal. When that happens, you don't want to be caught out with less market share because you adjusted your prices to maintain your bottom line. Same logic as startups burning VC cash on offering free compute, 80% discounts on tokens, etc. to grab market share. If you're in an elastic market, your priority is not to maximize profit, it's to make the market inelastic.
- ethbr1 1y agoIt's not a theory -- every business that imports product from international sellers is staring at their current import prices and their remaining pre-tariff inventory numbers right now. (See the huge import volume burst pre-tariffs) What they're trying to decide is (a) do they eat the cost of tariffs in margin or (b) do they raise prices? That's a decision that doesn't need to be made until they burn through warehoused inventory, but for high-volume businesses (read: retail) it's measured in months at most. Once that hits, either (a) or (b) will be chosen, and neither is great for equities markets / the economy. Moreover, there's no "hiding this under the rug" once publicly traded companies begin to report quarterly financial results AFTER burning through their pre-tariff inventory. They can't not explain to their shareholders why they've taken a hit to profitability. Best possible case is retail prices rise, once, by the amount of tariffs, and that's that. But a 15%+ price hike is going to be an uncomfortable narrative for those in power who insist tariffs won't raise prices... so I'm not betting that conversation goes logically.* * See the reaction part of Amazon got when they "accidentally" line-itemed tariff charges as evidence on how dangerous the administration sees transparency around tariff costs
- bendbro 1y ago> These are the sort of things the poor and middle class voted for. To make the rich, richer. Experts show saving 7.1337% at Walmart is worth losing your job to offshoring! I haven't seen meaningful change for poor or workers with a decade of Democrat policy, so pardon me while I ignore that and vote for some tariffs.
- pessimizer 1y ago> This needs to be repeated. Tariffs are a tax on ordinary citizens. Unlike regular taxes, tariffs are not progressive and therefore benefit the wealthy. No, people need to stop repeating it, because it's an extremely stupid anti-tax argument. Tariffs are meant to onshore production and raise wages. Telling half the story is simply lying. You might as well complain about buying food because it costs money. You might as well complain about all consumption because consumption is regressive. The problem isn't tariffs, you can send that money to poor people. The problem is that nobody cares about poor people, including Trump. A lack of tariffs isn't going to make America moral. One of the only things Trump is doing unbelievably well on is trade. Tariffs haven't been damaging at all. They should be more damaging, but the US is so dependent on foreign poverty that we have to leave any tariff scheme as filled with holes as swiss cheese. The fact is our manufacturing is so based in the exploitation of low-rights and low paid workers from other countries that entire industries would immediately start failing if we ended up in a real trade war with e.g. China. > To make the rich, richer. And then turn around and complain that rich are getting richer and they are getting poorer. These are Koch brothers policies you're advocating as if they're social justice. The reason why every capitalist you know is complaining about tariffs isn't because they make the rich richer (by some method yet to be explained.)
- johannes1234321 1y agoUsing tariffs is A common way to protect local industry. However it is a dangerous weapon, which has downsides. In history tariffs have show to lead to high prices on the domestic market and products which are subpar to globally standards. Domestic companies don't have pressure to innovate, while global market has more competition. Consequence of that is protection by product group for key products one wants to have locally and not per origin on all kinds of goods. This can lead to short term wins, but backfire after a while.
- Sohcahtoa82 1y ago> Tariffs are meant to onshore production and raise wages. Both of which would still lead to higher prices on the consumer. > One of the only things Trump is doing unbelievably well on is trade. Tariffs haven't been damaging at all. I don't know whether to laugh at the absurdity of this statement or to cry because someone could actually say it with a straight face.