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Tariffs are ‘simply inflationary,’ economist says: Here’s how they fuel higher prices
CNBC ^ | Thu, Mar 20 20253:34 PM EDT

Posted on 03/21/2025 7:41:57 AM PDT by Miami Rebel

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To: Miami Rebel
Temporarily, tariffs are inflationary.

But, we win the war of attrition and the tariffs go away and we have truly fair trade.

And, the inflation from the tariffs will be more than offset by drill, baby, drill and eliminate of billions of dollars of useless regulations.

41 posted on 03/21/2025 8:49:23 AM PDT by Kazan
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To: Miami Rebel

Liberals can only think in static terms. They cannot think in dynamic terms.

Hence, liberals cannot understand that due to tariffs an American company will be incentivized to produce something here that is cheaper.


42 posted on 03/21/2025 8:51:04 AM PDT by CodeToad ( )
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To: Miami Rebel

If something costs more to buy from China people won’t buy it.

Maybe in short term prices go up, but once the free market takes over prices come down

Dumbass article


43 posted on 03/21/2025 8:51:23 AM PDT by nikos1121
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To: Miami Rebel

If something costs more to buy from China people won’t buy it.

Maybe in short term prices go up, but once the free market takes over prices come down

Dumbass article


44 posted on 03/21/2025 8:51:26 AM PDT by nikos1121
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To: Miami Rebel

If something costs more to buy from China people won’t buy it.

Maybe in short term prices go up, but once the free market takes over prices come down

Dumbass article


45 posted on 03/21/2025 8:51:28 AM PDT by nikos1121
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To: Miami Rebel

It isn’t tariff’s that cause inflation, it is the Federal Reserve that causes inflation. The funny money enables government overspending.


46 posted on 03/21/2025 8:57:15 AM PDT by desertfreedom765
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To: Miami Rebel
Empirically, that's just not so. High deficits did not produce high inflation in President Trump's first term.

As regards bringing back manufacturing, what industries do you see as most likely to repatriate jobs?


We were able to fund the deficits at zero interest rates ( there were even taking about negative interest rates before Trump took office) because China was buying our Treasury Bonds with money derived from flooding American markets with low price products dumped onto the United States markets

This artificial demand for US treasury bonds allowed the government to borrow massive sums of money to fund huge deficit spending while keeping interest rates artificially low because the Chinese were recycling the money they were making dumping cheap products onto the US markets by buying near zero interest rate US Treasury Bonds.

The low prices from Chinese dumping put a lid on inflation because price pressure from cheap Chinese imports put a lid on price hikes so domestic manufacturers could not raise prices due to competition from overseas , mainly Chinese producers.

The inability of American manufactures to raise prices also prevented them raising the wages of American workers so this put a lid on Wage Price inflationary spiral and resulted in zero to negative wage growth for American workers.

In reality, American manufacturers responded in several way - some went out of business due to the foreign competition, some sold out to often foreign competitors, some ran their businesses as non reinvestment grade business and either shut down or plan to shut down when they can no longer sustain operations and the rest followed the herd and off shored their production.

It has also become difficult to intitate a conventional Wage - Price inflationary spiral because off shoring to artificially low cost producers overseas has also killed off enough of our manufacturing labor base is so beat down it does not have the economic clout to dominate the economy like it did in the 1950s and 1960s.

The destruction of America's industrial base has been the cost of the Fed's monetary policies that have that have enabled our government to go on deficit spending spree and generate a 35 billion dollar deficits.

Biden broke the system because he amped up the deficit spending to insane levels during covid.

Well, we saw large gains in strategic steel and aluminum during Trump 1 and it's not an overstatement to say that he saved those industries. That should re start under Trump's plan.

Expansion of oils and gas exploration, drilling and production were huge under Trump before being destroyed under Biden. See some gains there.

Chip making was coming back to America under Trump and that process is accelerating as foreign chip makers invest big money in new, US based fabs.

Apple has announced that they are going to be investing billions in bringing back computer, phone and consumer electronics manufacturing and other will probably follow suit.

Our auto makers will see gains under Trump.

I expect significant gains from Trump's commitment to lead the AI revolution and make sure critical investments int he tech are made in the US.

In just the first two months of the Trump Administration foreign and domestic investment groups have announced that they will be investing over a trillion dollars in US operations in the last few months. Not sure what they are going to be spending it on but a trillion dollars buys a lot of stuff. We will certainly see more of this trend towards investment in America as time goes on if Trump's economic polices continue. .

The synergistic effects of increased demand for steel, aluminum, plastics and other industrial raw materials in the petroleum, auto manufacturing and other heavy industries combined with low cost oil and natural gas and reduced regulatory burdens will spur the re shoring of the broad based chemical, pharmaceutical, plastics and fertilizers that have been hurt by Chinese dumping.

Our farmers should see gains as Trump fair trade policies reduces insane tariff barriers to their products in foreign countries and their production costs go down due to Trumps policies on low cost oil and gas production reduce their production costs across the board.

I expect expansion and perhaps even salvation for existing American domestic producers who have been hard hit by foreign competition and have seen their business become non re investment grade operations.

That's a decent start.

47 posted on 03/21/2025 9:20:45 AM PDT by rdcbn1 (TV )
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To: Miami Rebel

Now the press is suddenly concerned that government monetary and other policies are inflationary. Little late in the game, aren’t they.


48 posted on 03/21/2025 10:37:16 AM PDT by lastchance (Cognovit Dominus qui sunt eius.)
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To: Bobbyvotes

I wonder if this ‘economist’ got his economics degree from the same bastion of ‘edumacation’ that the ‘Airhead Of Congress’ did? Inflation is caused by increasing the money supply (aka printing money) without a concomitant increase in GDP. Higher prices can be a symptom of inflation but aren’t the cause. Someone else who never learned correlation isn’t causation. JMO.


49 posted on 03/21/2025 10:44:14 AM PDT by curious7
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To: rdcbn1

I think you’re misremembering recent interest rate history.

The 10-year Treasury paid 2.45% when the 2017 Inauguration took place. It tapped 3.3% by October, 2018. COVID later made it crash briefly to 60 basis points, but that was a multi-decade low that was over in the blink of an eye.

My point is that rates have never been flat, much less negative.

Your description of US manufacturing misses the mark too, I think, If, as you say, foreign competition stemmed wage inflation, that would NOT be a contributing factor to US companies shutting down factories or selling out to foreign concerns. It would in fact forestall those developments. (By the way, foreign purchases of US companies is immaterial in terms of domestic wages and productivity. US workers are paid in dollars whether their employer is based in Cleveland, Frankfurt, or Yokohama.)

As to saving the steel industry, I’ve owned steel shares for decades and I tend to follow the business closely. Steel payrolls have been in steady, slow decline for twenty years, from mid-90,000 workers to low-80,000 workers. A lot of that contraction is the result of that terrific job-killer, automation. No major steel company has been on the ropes since Wheeling-Pittsburgh declared bankruptcy in 1985, (It later re-organized.) Today, US Steel, while profitable, doesn’t have the balance sheet to modernize and expand. Biden’s Justice Department told Nippon Steel to bugger off when it announced its intent to buy it. I hope that that decision is reversed.


50 posted on 03/21/2025 11:43:17 AM PDT by Miami Rebel (pro-)
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To: Miami Rebel
My point is that rates have never been flat, much less negative.

Only in Japan.

51 posted on 03/21/2025 11:45:26 AM PDT by 1Old Pro
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To: Pelham

The other means of restricting trade are included in what Trump seeks to redress through the threat of tariffs. Look at all he has said about them being unfair to American businesses. That is exactly what all this is about.


52 posted on 03/21/2025 12:03:35 PM PDT by _longranger81
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To: _longranger81

Bob Lighthizer is Trump’s US Trade Representative.

If you watch his interview with Tucker Carlson you’ll find out that options other than tariffs are being considered.

The goal is balanced trade and an end to trade deficits with other countries. Tariffs may be replaced other means of achieving this.

“Bob Lighthizer: Why Trump’s Tariffs are the Only Way to Save the Middle Class”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0IUh8kNSqY


53 posted on 03/21/2025 1:46:49 PM PDT by Pelham (President Eisenhower. Operation Wetback 1953-54)
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To: Pelham
Tariffs, like taxes, don’t increase the money supply. They can increase the price of the affected products. But they do not cause the generalized loss of buying power that inflation does to the dollar.

That's a bingo!

54 posted on 03/21/2025 2:57:09 PM PDT by Toddsterpatriot (TANSTAAFL)
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To: KC_Conspirator

+1👍🇺🇸


55 posted on 03/21/2025 6:07:38 PM PDT by MotorCityBuck (Keep the change, you are filthy animal! Re )
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To: Socon-Econ
1. They’ll be higher prices for domestic consumers or produces using foreign inputs. That’s their purpose and effect.

Well every other country has higher domestic prices from all the tarrifs they throw on us, yet they survive.


2. When we import, foreigners don’t just stuff their dollar payments into their closets. If we don’t import, foreigners won’t earn the dollars they use either (a) to import from the USA or (b) to invest in the USA. (Holding dollars in banks is an investment.) This means fewer physical ivestments or higher interest rates.

Why would all of these foreigners leave their dollars in these US? Sure, some stay in their distribution and subsidiaries, but the end profits are oft sent to their owners, they aren't guaranteed to be invested in these US. For our exporters, how many of them leave all those Euros and francs and rubles and pounds and so on and on... How much do they keep overseas to invest? Sure, there's a decent bit of Caymens and tax havens to avoid US patriation taxes, but they don't just leave all their money in the middle of random countries and never actually see their profits...


3. Foreign governments will retaliate, leading to job losses and reduced profits for Americans

If the foreign govs retaliate, won't their economies be hurt by the above? Won't they lose jobs and profits? Besides, almost all of Trump's tarrifs ARE retaliation against all these countries that have been tarrifing us for decades (yet they don't seem to be hurt by any of your points...), yet we just let them. Yes, some is off-tropic against Mebico/Canada to force them to better police their drucs/illegals passing through to us, but most of the world is straight is reciprocating against them. If they do it to us (again), it's just double-secret probation.
56 posted on 03/21/2025 9:37:26 PM PDT by Svartalfiar (-)
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