Posted on 12/04/2016 11:27:46 AM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
Trump warned companies of retribution or consequences for leaving the U.S. Donald Trump warned U.S. companies of retribution or consequences, such as a massive tariff, if they leave the country.
In a series of early morning tweets Sunday, Trump said companies with offshore factories would face a 35% tax on products they want to sell back in the U.S.
The U.S. is going to substantialy [sic] reduce taxes and regulations on businesses, but any business that leaves our country for another country, fires its employees, builds a new factory or plant in the other country, and then thinks it will sell its products back into the U.S. without retribution or consequences, is WRONG! the president-elect wrote. There will be a tax on our soon to be strong border of 35% for these companies wanting to sell their product, cars, A.C. units, etc., back across the border.
The proclamations came after Trumps intervention with Carrier, who decided to keep about 1,000 jobs in Indiana instead of moving them to Mexico. Carrier will receive economic incentives worth $7 million, in a deal negotiated by Vice President-elect Mike Pence, the current governor of Indiana. Despite the Carrier deal, the company still plans to close a plant in Huntington, Indiana, moving about 700 jobs to Mexico.
(Excerpt) Read more at fortune.com ...
Treaties are just pieces of paper, like restraining orders...
I too worry about a situation where American made is sh!t but we’re forced to buy it because of tariffs (because I’ve seen it before), but I don’t believe “free” trade has been good for us either, so I’m agnostic on these trade proposals.
One problem with this approach is that if you make it only slightly less expensive than it is overseas, you’re basically left with the option of going out of business.
Need to cut the root cause of why it’s so expensive to operate here.
I think DJT is going to go for taxes and regulations as an incentive FIRST. Lower costs of goods made in countries like Mexico and China really haven’t been past down to the US consumer, and many of the products are cheap as hell.
That, and the products have been largely globalized to blandness, with not much attention to US preferences aside from an English translation of the manual.
Labor costs are the number ONE reason why companies are leaving, with the costs of payroll taxes, workers comp insurance, hourly wages, and benefits how can companies compete here!!! Other countries have NO workers comp, do NOT match payroll taxes, do NOT have to provide benefits how in the HELL can this country make this work for companies here????
By sending the minimum wage. It is likely that minimum wage will become the maximum wage for many workers
Not everyone is going to go out of business, much less anywhere close to a majority.
By setting
“Treaties are just pieces of paper, like restraining orders...”
International trade is a game, like chess. We agreed to the rules in advance. Unlike retraining orders, these rules have teeth that bite. (I suppose restraining orders do too, but who cares when you’re dead?)
When Bush wanted votes in Pennsylvania, he imposed a tariff on imported steel. The United States was taken to court where we lost. (I’m not aware of any cases where the US has won.) The treaty allowed our trading partners to impose tariffs on our exported goods. They targeted companies in areas where Bush needed votes. In a fairly short time the political pain got to the point where Bush had to rescind his steel tariff. Treaties are one way the Left has been imposing globalization and rules and regulations that they could not get passed through the Congress and President.
I have read that only a small percentage of the TPP dealt with trade. The rest dealt with global warming, refugee rights and other items which, if a future president ignored, our trading partners could create political pain for him.
Yes taxes and regulation makes it expensive to do business here, but lets be honest so do the wages. We can’t compete with third world slave labor. I think most of the people in the US want to be able to work and be able to eat and have shelter. Nobody wants to live in a shack and sell drugs on the side even when you’re working hours a week in a factory.
We can’t compete with 3rd world labor wages. And why should we? All I know is something has to changed because the panacea the free trade at all cost has been pretty disastrous for the middle class.
ugh tell me about it. also, what bothers me are comments from the neo cons and the left on manufacturing jobs. Calling them jobs of the past and this is now a technology driven economy not a manufacturing based economy. Well, every product has to be assembled and manufactured even high end tech products. Everything!
Look at smart phones. They are assembled in China I believe, all because of their low production cost, but is that passed down to the US consumer at almost 1000 dollars a pop for a damn iphone! I don’t think so.
I disagree. Labor cost are one reason, but regulation is the biggest reason IMO.
In the late 50's and early 60's US consumer electronic manufacturers had most of the market share in Japan.
Johnson agreed to give unfair access to Japanese goods to buy diplomatic support for the Vietnam War.
The Japanese responded by shutting out US consumer electronics and dumping product in the US until US manufacturers went out of business and their brands were acquired by Japanese companies.
That's the kind of "free trade" we've always had with East Asia.
The other side to tariffs on imports is effective anti-trust prosecutions in the US, especially in telecoms, airlines and (I would argue) the tech giants (Apple's mobile phone business & Google).
We need external tariffs and vigorous competition inside the US. What we have now is unfair trade combined with monopoly abuse by the firms remaining in the US, who also support unlimited immigration at both the low and high end of the labor market, pauperizing the American middle class and giving us an oligarchy.
The "free trade" fraud and unlimited immigration need to be ended not only for economic reasons but to protect our political liberties.
When only 5% of our GDP depends on exporting to them and 30% of other countries’ GDP depends on exports to us, who has more bite?
You forgot to add, “Abolish ourselves as a meaningful political movement.”
Despite Obama, we are still the “Big Dog.” Trump will do what he wants to do, and nobody is going to pick that fight. JMHO, of course.
That's what socialists say. E.g., increase minimum wage across the board, you just have a new "baseline" from which to charge customers/clients.
Prob w/that is, there are those that drop out of the market because it becomes more effective to do things yourself.
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