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The things with tariffs is that they are bad for the stronger side and devastating for the weaker. We are not 2006 anymore when the EU economy was bigger than U

The things with tariffs is that they are bad for the stronger side and devastating for the weaker. We are not 2006 anymore when the EU economy was bigger than US.

saubeidl 9mo ago
They're devastating for the less diversified side. The EU just signed a giant trade deal with Mercosur, creating the world's largest free market.
- ReptileMan 9mo ago
  An economy bloc that is on decline makes a trade deal with economies that have been in shitter for almost a hundred years. I mean I approve it. I love Brazilian and Paraguayan beef and Ron Zapata is quite drinkable. But that idea that it will bring economic might to the two regions enough to push the USA out has yet to be seen if it is realistic.
  - saubeidl 9mo ago
    I'm not sure where you get this decline narrative from. EU markets showed much stronger growth than the US last year: https://www.justetf.com/en/market-overview/the-best-country-etfs-last-year.html https://www.justetf.com/en/market-overview/the-best-country-...
atoav 9mo ago
Tariffs are devastating for the smaller market and highly dependent on whether you can sell the stuff that is tariffed elsewhere in the world and whether the other side can buy the stuff that is getting tariffed elsewhere in the world. The stuff the US gets from Europe is pretty specialized and given the US tendency to continuously isolating itself while others are making trade deals, the others could just decide to do world economy without the US at some point. If the US didn't had the singular role of the USD it would have been in dire trouble a while ago. Now the incentives for keeping the USD are getting less and less. If Trump was an agent to hurt the US position in the world, he wouldn't do anything differently.
jltsiren 9mo ago
You must be thinking of 2008. And the EU economy was not bigger than the US back then. There was a temporary distortion in currency exchange rates, as people saw a significant risk that the financial crisis would cause serious long-term damage to the US economy. It didn't, the exchange rates normalized, and the illusion that the EU economy was bigger vanished. Currencies are speculative instruments, not reliable measures. If you measure the economy of one entity in the currency of another entity, you should never accept the numbers at face value.

The things with tariffs is that they are bad for the stronger side and devastating for the weaker. We are not 2006 anymore when the EU economy was bigger than US.

saubeidl 9mo ago

They're devastating for the less diversified side. The EU just signed a giant trade deal with Mercosur, creating the world's largest free market.

ReptileMan 9mo ago
An economy bloc that is on decline makes a trade deal with economies that have been in shitter for almost a hundred years. I mean I approve it. I love Brazilian and Paraguayan beef and Ron Zapata is quite drinkable. But that idea that it will bring economic might to the two regions enough to push the USA out has yet to be seen if it is realistic.
- saubeidl 9mo ago
  I'm not sure where you get this decline narrative from. EU markets showed much stronger growth than the US last year: https://www.justetf.com/en/market-overview/the-best-country-etfs-last-year.html https://www.justetf.com/en/market-overview/the-best-country-...

atoav 9mo ago

Tariffs are devastating for the smaller market and highly dependent on whether you can sell the stuff that is tariffed elsewhere in the world and whether the other side can buy the stuff that is getting tariffed elsewhere in the world. The stuff the US gets from Europe is pretty specialized and given the US tendency to continuously isolating itself while others are making trade deals, the others could just decide to do world economy without the US at some point. If the US didn't had the singular role of the USD it would have been in dire trouble a while ago. Now the incentives for keeping the USD are getting less and less. If Trump was an agent to hurt the US position in the world, he wouldn't do anything differently.

jltsiren 9mo ago

You must be thinking of 2008. And the EU economy was not bigger than the US back then. There was a temporary distortion in currency exchange rates, as people saw a significant risk that the financial crisis would cause serious long-term damage to the US economy. It didn't, the exchange rates normalized, and the illusion that the EU economy was bigger vanished. Currencies are speculative instruments, not reliable measures. If you measure the economy of one entity in the currency of another entity, you should never accept the numbers at face value.