68 Replies to “Trump’s Tariffs”

  1. ive been predicting for some weeks now that tariffs were going to be a nothing burger. I was wrong, we did punt the empty hair .

    1. I try to predict nothing, but I always wind up predicting “nothing”, and then something happens and I’m proven wrong. I’m going to have to work on my technique.

  3. I was a major buyer of the Dow and NASDAQ today. You’d have to be an ignoramus not to buy this dip. This is the leftist institutional traders making their political … not sound business … point. They are trying to PUNISH Trump. Your pension managers are throwing YOUR money away. No matter. These massive buying opportunities don’t come along very often.

    1. For your sake, I hope you’re not trying to catch a falling knife. There appears to be minor support about another hundred points down in the S&P 500 and below that major support 500 points further down. I’m still hedging until I see a proper bounce. That advice and 10 bucks will get you an expensive cup of coffee.

      1. Oh … make no mistake … I am a dollar cost averaged buyer if it continues to fall. More cash ready to deploy. Even if we go into a long overdue recession … I will hang onto the falling knives until the bleeding stops. At age 69 (which rhymes with goodtimes) … my horizon is adequate … as I have no plans to go all MAID and whatnot.

        1. LOL you’re an idiot and you’re going to lose everything. Have fun dying poor and hopefully soon.

          1. You must be comforted to know that you can MAID yourself at any moment of any day … legally … in Canada. You DESERVE to be put out of your misery. That IS your RIGHT.

          2. And it’s just one of the ways that Canada is now a better freer country than America!

          3. Only idiots believe investments will stay down, making DCA ineffective; stop looking in the mirror.

      2. Didn’t Perry Como have a song about this? “Catch a falling knife and stick it in your gullet, save it for a rainy day”, along those lines?

  4. Good for the US. Now if our “country” would just take note from what Trump is doing and stop stomping their tiny feet in retaliation.

    2. Tariffs are a perfect elegant solution to the problem of how best to massively raise taxes on the working class and cut them for the wealthy, while also preparing your country to be the aggressor in WW3.

      1. The working class already survived COVID and have survived California’s $20.00 min. wage on Fast Food. We will survive and thrive post tariff shock and awe. My advice to you, Andrew? Learn to lathe

        1. Interesting to note that there’s not even an attempt to reconcile your previous values of low taxes, personal freedom, and small government with your current values of self-sacrificial devotion to Orange Jesus and his aggressive imperialism. Thank you.

          1. Aggressive Imperialism? “Reciprocity” … Learn it. Live it. Abide it.

            Low taxes? The revenue deriving from these tariffs will allow the Treasury Secretary to eliminate … ELIMINATE federal income taxes from everyone making $150k and below.

            Personal Freedom? You mean like the Freedom to compete on a truly level playing field?

            Small Government? Yes, I don’t NEED a Bureau of “Education” or “USAIDemocratSlushFund” … but I DO appreciate a government that secures our borders and levels the “Free Trade” playing field.

          2. “The revenue deriving from these tariffs will allow the Treasury Secretary to eliminate … ELIMINATE federal income taxes from everyone making $150k and below. ”

            No it won’t.

          3. It only won’t … when EVERY nation in the world drops their tariffs against American products … and Trump reciprocally drops our tariffs. Otherwise? Let the External Revenue Service grow till they need 70k more Agents.

          4. It won’t raise much revenue regardless. Tariffs have never been good at raising money.

          5. Now you’re arguing tariffs both ways …
            1. It’s a horrific tax on consumers that will crash the economy, oh my!
            2. Tariffs have never really raised any money for any government

          6. Kenji:

            You’re making the classic error of thinking that when a tax is introduced, everything else stays the same.

            Except it doesn’t. When tarrifs are imposed (1) imports inevitibly shrinks, and (2) the economy often shrinks. The result is less total revenue collected then expected.

            At any rate, the numbers don’t add up. Even if everything stayed the same, the amount of tariffs collected wouldn’t come close to replacing personal income tax on those earning $150K or below.

          7. I never said it’s a tax on ‘consumers’ it’s a tax on trade.

            This has been done before it was called Smoot-Hawley and the data are clear and on my side not yours.

          8. No less an authority than Otis Redding assured us categorically that everything still remains the same. If you are disparaging the memory of Otis Redding, Mr. Marmot, we may have to ask you to relinquish the exercise wheel to another rodent.

      2. If tariffs are so awful, then why do so many countries around the world have tariffs on U.S. goods and services?
        P.S. these are not really protectionist tariffs; they are being used in a different way, for different goals

        2. “If tariffs are so awful, then why do so many countries around the world have tariffs on U.S. goods and services?

          Because they are stupid.

          Two wrongs don’t make one right.

  7. Trump has single-handedly forced America into an approach to international trade that almost no one supports. Voters weren’t clammering for it, investors and business leaders are leery of it, and few politicians openly defend it. Even die-hard Trump supporters are likely taken by surprize. And it flies in the face of mainstream economics.

    It’s possible, of course, that Trump is correct and this is a dawn of a new age of unparalleled American affluence. More likely in my opinion is that the army of skeptics of “Liberation Day” are correct, and it will end in tears for almost everyone.

    1. How can it not dampen demand and force a recession? By the time it is done Congress may have to over-ride a veto and take away the president’s ability to claim everything is an emergency. Trump is nuts.

      1. The issue isn’t demand, it’s investment. America now unambiguously uninvestable. She has no business case.

        1. Wow! You actually ARE Trudeau! Hey UnJustin! Why did you think the only business case for German Nat. Gas … was Russian Gas? Isn’t that actually FUNDING Ukraine’s humiliating LOSS to Russia?

          Speaking of things stupid people mocked Trump about …

      2. If the ramifications are severe enough, I suspect that congress will move to remove these tariffs. The Senate has already passed a resolution to remove Trump’s tariffs on Canada, but it needs the approval of the House. But now something has to be done about the Liberation Day tariffs.

        Long term, Congress should rewrite the International Economic Emergencies Power Act of 1977 to greatly limit or even remove the president’s ability to impose tariffs unilaterally. Constitutionally the ability to tax is supposed to rest with congress, not the president.

        1. The IEEPA should be repealed outright, ideally by the SCOTUS because it’s unconstitutional.

          Congress is spineless. The GOP is too dumb to know it’s interests are in undermining Trump and too cowardly to do anything even if they weren’t dumb. It’s up to a massive Democratic wave in 2026 to save America.

          Not that it’s going to be saved anyways. Too broke and not trustworthy. Superpower status: over

          1. The House Republicans might act before then if these tariffs cause a severe economic downturn. They face re-election in 19 months, and unemployed voters are grouchy voters.

    2. So the current “approach” to international trade is to universally kick America in the balls. “Thank you Sir, may I have another”. You imply that both the voters and business leaders prefer the nut-kicking?

      Please provide a detailed answer … why is it acceptable for EVERY “ international trading partner” to tariff the shit out of American products? Why is it acceptable for EVERY “international trading partner” to practice PROTECTIONIST policies … but when America “reciprocates” … Trump is an evil, bad, orangejebus?

      1. “So the current “approach” to international trade is to universally kick America in the balls. ”

        No one is kicking America in the balls except America. Further, America is not ‘reciprocating’, you don’t even know what this means.

      2. Trump had SOME valid points, but not many. His chart of tariff rates against US goods was a work of fiction. What it really showed were American trade deficits with each nation as a percentage of total trade with that nation, divided by two.

        Take Canada (please). At the start of this year, Canada’s tariffs against American goods were tiny, restricted to poultry and dairy products. And even then they were rarely collected, as they were excess tariffs that only kicked in when yearly quotas were exceeded. I’m not defending those tariffs, but they were more than offset by American tariffs against Canadian lumber and steel. The US is not the victim here.

        1. Then you’re all good with Trump’s tariffs … because tariffs don’t work. No one ever collects any money from tariffs … so this entire exercise is much ado about nothing!

          And the institutional fund managers who waited till TODAY … to sell off because “tariffs” are complete MO-rons. They didn’t sell off all of last week … despite knowing tariffs were coming April. 2 … nope, they waited until EVERYONE else was selling off … making a political statement with OTHER PEOPLES MONEY … on the very DAY the tariffs kicked in.

          But then again, you purport to be smarter than Wall Street. You know that tariffs are useless.

          1. The fund managers were stupid for huffing hopium in the belief that Trump wouldn’t go Full Magatard. I was pretty sure he would and that America was an over hyped market regardless so I bailed months ago.

            Also you don’t understand tariffs or the arguments against them.

          2. “And the institutional fund managers who waited till TODAY … to sell off because “tariffs” are complete MO-rons.”

            You’re pretty flippant about calling people MO-rons. But nobody knew what to expect on April 2. The extent of the tariffs seemed to take everyone by surprize. Further, Trump has balked multiple times in the last few months, and he could have done so on April 2.

          3. As IF Trump didn’t give a long, accurate, preview of EXACTLY what his tariffs were going to be? You’re delusional. This massive institutional sell-off of the Market is purely political. It is timed to coincide with long-awaited and promised April 2 implementation… for PURELY political reasons.

            PS … I have been a buyer again here in day TWO of the predictable sell-off aimed to make the people of America angry at Trump. How much longer will the sell-off continue? Not much longer or deeper … or these idiot sellers will completely collapse the pension funds they have a FIDUCIARY responsibility to manage … not a license to use their funds as a political weapon.

        2. Go back and read what I wrote. Canada’s tariffs were (before this year) EXCESS TARIFFS. Trump’s tariffs are not excess tariffs. They are always collected.

  8. The great risk here is that if this trade strategy fails badly enough, the US may find itself having difficulty supporting its enormous national debt, currently at sitting at 120% of GDP. Such fiscal crises, no matter how they’re dealt with by the government, tend to produce a miserable time for the citizenry.

    1. Good point! The world will now look to the Deutschmark as the world currency … because it’s green or something?

      1. The US dollar will be the world’s reserve currency right up until it isn’t. To assume that the greenback is bullet proof shows a perilous lack of imagination. The national debt hasn’t been this high since WW II.

          2. I think you mean the Bank of Canada. And I have no idea what you mean by “devalue to net zero”?

  9. There is no ending globalization, which is, well, global. To crib one of Pauly Shore’s greatest performance quotes, “I’ve got the whole world to see!”. Australia and the UK and NZ are tying up trade deals with the UAE. Other countries are tying up. To the traders go the investment, to mass impoverishment goes America.

    They are going to lose their last AAA rating on USG debt and the USD is going to lose reserve status.

        1. Well. the facts damn well better care about my feelings, or so much the worse for the facts! I’ll hire Rachel Gilmore to check the bastards, we’ll see how they like it!

          1. Fact checking? Ha! I’m prepared for fact striping at a moment’s notice! I’ll go full fact polkadotting if pushed!

    2. There’s no ending globalization = there’s no ending to undercutting the competition.

      Via devalued currencies, slave labor, trashing the environment, product and commodity dumping, theft of intellectual property, cheap fakes, etc.

      Nah … you just opt out. You light their fake economies on fire by tariffing them into oblivion.

      1. You are only lighting your own economy on fire with tariffs. Only the tariffing nation pays the tariff, your list of fictional bogeymen aside.

  10. The biggest factor at play here is uncertainty. It’s unclear whether these tariffs will last weeks, months or years. In the meantime investors will sit on their hands just like they did in the 1930s.

    1. Where else can investors place their money, if the stock market isn’t doing well?

      1. I hear mattresses can be stuffed … since things like unman aren’t bedding anyone anyway

      2. Corporate and governments bonds, treasury bills, term deposits, or simply hold cash.

        None of them tend to pay well.

        1. Wait. Government Bonds ? In the government you just reminded us has the highest debt to GDP ratio since WWII ? The government and dollar you are predicting will collapse …

          1. 1. UJ asked what the alternatives were to the stock market. I answered. I didn’t make a recommendation. You have severe reading comphension problems.

            2. You missed treasury bills, which are also government issued.

            3, If the US government defaults on its debt, there will be few safe harbours for your money. Certainly not corporate bonds. Maybe gold or bitcoins, but I wouldn’t count on it.

        2. Their return rates are not as seductive as playing the stock market, but that’s always been the problem with stocks — it really is just a form of gambling, and thanks to people’s addictions we are (globally) sitting on top of an asset bubble that eventually was going to pop anyway.
          All those other things are not as sexy as stocks, but they tend to be considered by many as more safe investments.
          PS. most will not just hold their cash, not all of it

          And by the way: the S&P isn’t that awful (long at the long range); some people are trying to cause a herd panic — wonder why?

          1. It’s gambling, but it’s a game where the odds are in your favour. Las Vegas built a massive industry on gambling where the odds are in their favour.

            I recommend you read “Stocks For the Long Run” by Jeremy Siegel.

Proudly powered by WordPress & Skyrocket Themes

MENU

Navigation