Economics Thread

thethe said:
But a price goes up by a finite amount to the end consumer and you can attribute portions of that growth to drivers. If inflation is already baked in at 3% then you have only so much to account for on other factors.
Click to expand...
I literally have no idea why you object to taxes on corporations at this point.
 
thethe said:
Because the suppliers are paying the largest chunk of the tariff as I've said from day one.
Click to expand...
This is the circle I hate with the pro-tariff logic. If that were the case, then there’s no incentive to increase domestic production. If foreign firms can adjust to new costs and thus there are no significant barriers to US importers that must be offset by increased prices or job cuts, what are we gaining beyond re-directing capital within the system directly to the United States government?

Also, if that’s the case and job losses are truly due to new technology rather than increased costs due to tariffs, why is inflation (allegedly) only down to 2.7%? Shouldn’t these decreased production costs be resulting in firms lowering prices to gain a competitive advantage within their market?
 
mqt said:
This is the circle I hate with the pro-tariff logic. If that were the case, then there’s no incentive to increase domestic production. If foreign firms can adjust to new costs and thus there are no significant barriers to US importers that must be offset by increased prices or job cuts, what are we gaining beyond re-directing capital within the system directly to the United States government?

Also, if that’s the case and job losses are truly due to new technology rather than increased costs due to tariffs, why is inflation (allegedly) only down to 2.7%? Shouldn’t these decreased production costs be resulting in firms lowering prices to gain a competitive advantage within their market?
Click to expand...
Except price levels remain the same and the government has an additional revenue stream at no cost to citizens. It’s a tax on foreign suppliers and paid by mostly them.
 
thethe said:
Except price levels remain the same and the government has an additional revenue stream at no cost to citizens. It’s a tax on foreign suppliers and paid by mostly them.
Click to expand...
There remains a fundamental flaw here, which is that in many cases we are still seeing price levels rise. But setting that aside, if we’re solely losing jobs to a miraculous super computer and tariffs aren’t diminishing the gains from this massive decrease in human capital costs, we should be seeing more positive economic indicators in these industries than we are.

So if foreign companies are footing the bill entirely and jobs are being eliminated solely due to the AI revolution, I ask again how tariffs will possibly bring about the domestic production increase you claim it will?
 
I hope the irony is not lost on anybody that the proposed answer for why jobs are suddenly disappearing at the exact moment in time that the tariffs were implemented is actually the thing that would render protectionist economic policy unnecessary to begin with. If we don’t have to deal with the added labor costs brought on by domestic production, the market will naturally shift that production state-side to begin with. Nobody is paying to ship all their product halfway around the world because of their deep commitment to the shipping industry.

Not to mention that if jobs aren’t being created domestically as a result of this trade policy that off-set the ones being cannibalized, the relationship that supposedly causes foreign producers to bend the knee and lower profit margins will eventually crater as Americans without jobs stop buying things. At some point, the circumstances leading to America’s economic superiority it’s enjoyed through relatively free trade being blown apart will lead to America no longer enjoying that superiority.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top