Posted on 07/26/2015 12:28:22 PM PDT by Jim W N
Donald Trump delivers remarks at his “Make America Great Again Rally & Picnic” in Oskaloosa, Iowa on July 25, 2015.
The Bad: He's the right guy but when he talks about how “simple” it would be to tell Ford in Mexico, "Hey, every Ford you send us I will tax 35%", that's the wrong idea and the worng message. Who suffers from that 35% tariff? THE AMERICAN CONSUMER and accordingly THE AMERICAN ECONOMY. The American consumer will have to pay 35% more to buy a Ford. People who like Ford are basically SOL. THAT IS NOT free trade and does NOT solve America's economic woes, it make them worse.
The Ugly: Trump's a good guy but economically, he's pointing his guns in the wrong direction. The BIG PROBLEM economically in the country is the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT with their idiotic, mind-numbing, and economically disastrous regulations like minimum wage, corporate taxes, union protection, and regulatory agencies so pervasive it makes business in the U.S. almost impossible. The FEDERAL GOVERNMENT is the REAL SOURCE of manufacturing and jobs going out of the U.S. Trump is never going to fix our economy by raising taxes which is what a tariff is. Tariffs are self-defeating acts that force artificially high prices upon the American consumer and the feds pocket the difference. A healthy economy, thriving businesses and thus, more jobs, will come from LOWER TAXES and a market economy FREE of government interference.
Trump should know better. Maybe he was brainwashed by Keynesian economics at the Wharton School, I don’t know. But IMO, Trump should know better by now. He should know the difference between negotiating private deals in the free market and government interference in the free market. Free-market negations, like what Trump is used to in real estate, are great for the economy and drive for the creation of business and economic expansion and wealth. But tariffs are government interference in the free market, especially those used to “punish” trading partners. Government interference, like penalizing tariffs, drives an anemic economy, creates more poverty, and stifles free trade, and it is free trade that creates wealth in America.
But, his most ardent supporters will point out how good he is on the economy...
Tell Ford they can set up shop in America...cuz that damn forbidding corporate tax is going to be lowered in the USA and the EPA is going into moth balls.
Bush put a tariff on steel, because he needed votes in Pittsburg. Because of the GATT, General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, we were taken to an international court. We lost, as I think we always do. The GATT gives our trading partners the right to retaliate. They retaliated with brilliance and vengeance. They targeted industries in other areas Bush needed to win. The pain was so great that Bush rescinded the tariff. It was an embarrassing thing for this country and it shows the loss of sovereignty and the danger of international treaties. The writers of those treaties know just what they’re doing and my impression is we either have lousy negotiators or statists working for the US in those negotiations. (This is why I opposed giving Obama the trade authority he was seeking. I trust him much less than any other president, including Jimmy I-have-sinned-in-my-heart Carter.)
” THE AMERICAN CONSUMER and accordingly THE AMERICAN ECONOMY. The American consumer will have to pay 35% more to buy a Ford”
No, the American consumer will buy a Chevy, Dodge, Toyota, Nissan, etc. instead.
Pay attention. Trump is setting up a situation....basically waking everyone up. Why the hell is Mexico’s employment rate lower than the USA?
I disagree with you on the “hurting of the American consumer.” Cheap prices from slave labor camps in China or cheap manufacturing in Mexico hurts America more than paying more for a FORD.
In the case of China, especially, all that money they are making off of us, because we want cheap barbie dolls and the like, they not only steal our technology willy nilly, but they are putting all that money into their war machine. We are, as Lenin said of such a strategy, giving China the rope with which to hang us with.
As for Mexico, this country is corrupt and not our friend. I’d rather Ford move their manufacturing to the United States than continue to line the pockets of a country that sends us its rapists and thieves.
What do you think 40,000,000 plus people out of work is costing this nation? Do you have any idea why our national debt keeps climbing. It due in no small part because we have zero tax receipts and incredible outlays in public funds for those 40,000,000 people out of work.
Jim you’re scared of what a 33% tariff would mean for consumers. May I remind you our citizens pay that in capital gains taxes. Have we repealed that?
I can avoid a 33% tariff. Just don’t buy the freakin’ product. I can’t avoid capital gains and an increasing federal deficit.
Our Founding Fathers set up our government based on being funded by tariffs. They did it because they knew the power to tax would lead to what it has.
I’m curious what else you think the Founders were wrong on? Declaration of Independence? The U. S. Constitution?
Sorry, we’ll have to disagree on this one.
Ronald Reagan: Protectionist
https://mises.org/library/ronald-reagan-protectionist
Reagan knew Free Markets were the ideal, but understood that there were limits in the real world.
Oh, there you go, being rational again.
Of course I agree with almost everything you just wrote.
I think we need to answer tariffs with tariffs when protective moves are needed... we know what happens if governments provide protection of their industries long enough... they kill ours.
If it were not for GATT things would have gone better.
the danger of international treaties.
Foreign entanglements.
I am of two minds about protectionism. If the playing field is level and we’re talking about an industry that isn’t vital to the national interest, I’m not for protecting it. That is best for all concerned, except for the people who are working in that industry who will lose out. (Why they lose out is another story. Excessive union costs and state regulation play as big a role as anything. You can’t blame a company for fleeing those if it makes them more competitive.) However, when I say a level field, I mean one were the workers in the other country are free to negotiate their own wages, like India. But in China, the workers are essentially slaves. If you can’t leave your job without permission then you are a slave and American workers are competing against slaves.
As far as protectionism, take the Internet as the classic case. Governments know that taxation kills industries, so Congress exempted the Internet from taxes. That’s being challenged by states who have won numerous battles. If I buy from Amazon I owe state taxes equal to my local tax rate as Amazon located a shipping center in my state. The protection is slowly slipping away. Too bad, as I know some elderly people who make their living off buying at yard sales and selling on eBay. They are essentially living off the difference that vanishes when you start taxing.
Other industries that may need protection is anything that is needed for national defense. But let’s not get ridiculous. I believe that mohair is still a defense priority. Come on, let’s get real.
I think it has to be taken on a case-by-case basis, and throw out the dogma.
Maybe off topic a little, but with respect to the young man Jameile (sp?) Shaw who was shot dead by an illegal:
This is at least the second time he talks about his time with Mr. Shaw, and Trump speaks well of him. But why is Mrs. Shaw not there? If she’s still serving overseas, why is she never mentioned?
I just wonder if she doesn’t want to be seen as supporting a White Republican. Presumptuous I know, but what else could the reason be?
“I think it has to be taken on a case-by-case basis, and throw out the dogma.”
Unfortunately, if you need Senator So-in-so’s vote on your defense budget and he wants to trade that vote to protect his state’s rabbit industry, then you end up the Strategic Rabbit Reserve, or SRR.
That's right, but you can't offer the right solution if you don't know what the problem is.
40,000,000 plus people out of work is not because of China, Mexico, Japan, or the Man in the Moon.
The most serious economic disease in our country is BY FAR the $4 trillion federal government bloated monster that is sucking our country dry with unconstitutional and utterly economically disastrous regulations that literally drive businesses out of business or out of our country along with jobs. Their GROSS interference with our free market economy has lead to forced, artificially high wages which drive prices too high and sends business and jobs elsewhere. If you don't start there you're not ready for the right solution.
The gradual buildup of the $4 trillion federal government and its involvement and interference in the American economy since early 1900 is the reason for our economic woes today. The federal government is a double-barreled shotgun aimed at America and Americans. The first barrel is most of what they do, especially economically, is patently unconstitutional. Unconstitutional federal acts are by definition acts of tyranny. The second barrel is the more the federal government interferes with the market economy, the more poverty and misery is created. Only the free market can create wealth. The government creates poverty. Evey single government program designed to make America a "New Deal" or a "Great Society" has created more poverty, regulations, burdens on business driving costs higher and higher, while the federal government has become a bloated $4 trillion monster sucking productivity dry while not producing a thing.
Our Founding Fathers set up our government based on being funded by tariffs. They did it because they knew the power to tax would lead to what it has.
Yes, but they were used as a tax for revenue, not to "punish" trading partners. Are tariffs a better tax than the income tax? Yes. Are tariffs a tax? Yes. Are they and effective economic tool? NO! Tariffs are like shooting yourself in the foot economically because these who suffer are the American consumer with artificially higher prices and the feds pocket the balance. We don't need more federal taxation and burden on the American People we need less - much less. The tariff thing to "punish" China, etc. is self-defeating, wrong-headed and misguided.
Sure all those things need to be addressed. Who disagrees with that. As for corporate problems our government causes, sure, stop that. I agree.
Tariffs are nowhere near the problem many folks make them out to be. It's utter nonsense what some folks make them out to be.
So...given a choice, you would rather have Americans paying the national debt rather than the Chinese. And you would rather have the American paying that debt have no US manufacturing job to go to, while China builds new factories to sell to us and invests their money in wholesale purchases of American land and property.
Are you a successful businessman?
Tariffs are no answer to our economic woes because tariffs do not address our underlying economic problem which is the federal government, oh BTW, FEW seem to get that, astonishingly.
Tariffs only APPEAR to fix the problem the way so may fall for the minimum wage and how that “appears “ to fix the problem. Neither address the underlying economic problem and both make matters worse.
Corporate taxes in country need to be zero. Michelle Bachman tried to explain it but she did not have a big enough mouth.
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