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Here’s What Trump Doesn’t Get About American Manufacturing
Fortune ^ | 2017-01-14 | Bill George

Posted on 01/14/2017 7:14:50 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum

If the Roman emperors ruled by edict, President-elect Donald Trump appears poised to rule by tweet. Even before taking office, Trump has discovered he can move the world’s largest global corporations with simple, 140-character tweets. And though his aggressive approach is winning politically, good politics doesn’t necessarily mean good economics.

Voters see Trump fulfilling his campaign promises to close America’s borders and bring jobs back home. He is using the bully pulpit to stand up for workers by taking on the most powerful American companies, including Ford (F, +0.32%), General Motors (GM, -0.45%), Toyota (TM, +0.14%), Boeing (BA, +0.34%), Lockheed Martin (LMT, +0.76%), and United Technologies (UTX, -0.54%)/Carrier.

Thus far, no CEOs have had the courage to stand up to Trump. General Motors CEO Mary Barra has said the company’s small-car production will remain in Mexico, but it could only be a matter of time before she’s forced to change course. Trump’s sudden tweets likely worry many CEOs who fear they may be his next target. Right now, most have just tried to stay out of his way. Some, like SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son and Fiat’s Sergio Marchionne, have put forth peace offerings to invest more in the U.S.

(Excerpt) Read more at fortune.com ...


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: 2016issues; manufacturing; trumpeconomy; trumptransition
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To: arthurus
While I know that it's become sort of "common knowledge" that Smoot-Hawley set off a trade war, I'm going to have to quote Reagan on you here, sorry: "It isn't so much that liberals free traders are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so."

I challenge you to go look at trade data from that era and show me just how the United States was exporting or importing in any meaningful way whatsoever. It wasn't. The Great Depression absolutely was not caused by tariffs.

21 posted on 01/14/2017 7:42:53 PM PST by RegulatorCountry
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To: arthurus

There are so many lies a and suppositions in your post that I won’t bother. Your post is gloBULList malarkey and mythology sprinkled with the standard scare tactics.


22 posted on 01/14/2017 7:44:03 PM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Lower tax rates plus tax disincentives...makes economic sense

Fortune knows nothing about manufacturing


23 posted on 01/14/2017 7:44:33 PM PST by Nifster (I see puppy dogs in the clouds)
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To: central_va

Turnabout is fair play. If they charge a 25% tariff, then we should charge the same, or the equivalent to what the US competitor pays in taxes (including payroll taxes). That levels the playing field. We don’t gouge, but we provide an equal an opposite reaction.


24 posted on 01/14/2017 7:46:45 PM PST by meyer (The Constitution says what it says, and it doesn't say what it doesn't say.)
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To: Sgt_Schultze

>>It is economies of efficiencies that have been created by government that has forced manufacturing offshore. Environmental and labor arbitrage.

I agree with you. The corporations will only accept the profits they can create with third-world labor. So, they lobby for this and that to grow the government, and then they complain that they can’t afford to be here anymore.

Meanwhile, the government creates socialism for the worker class so they can afford to live while making low wages with no future. The government gives them the handouts and the ObamaCare to pay for the cheap Chinese products.

There is no more America in their minds. There is the government, the Elites, and the workers of the world and all workers are interchangeable. No patriotism. No allegiances, except to the other Elites.

The “laws” of economics are as unprepared to function with the technology of today. They are as obsolete as the “rules” of traditional journalism.


25 posted on 01/14/2017 7:47:21 PM PST by Bryanw92 (If we had some ham, we could have ham and eggs, if we had some eggs.)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Based on the results so far, Trump’s bully pulpit is YUGE!


26 posted on 01/14/2017 7:47:50 PM PST by joshua c (Cut the cord! Don't pay for the rope they hang you with.)
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To: SecondAmendment

Pretty much. But it was unfair, doncha know. After WW2, the US was a manufacturing juggernaut, maybe a lot of which had to do with the fact that most of Europe’s and Japan’s competing factories were in ruins. You just can’t have too much winning - or can you? (DJT)


27 posted on 01/14/2017 7:49:34 PM PST by Sgt_Schultze (If a border fence isn't effective, why is there a border fence around the White House?)
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To: SecondAmendment
I've learned the politics of the "pure" economists.

The trick is to complain about regulations and taxes because that gets the good old boy "conservatives" on your side. Meanwhile, while no one is looking, set up your production facilities in the 3rd world thereby by reducing your labor cost to almost 0. After the move tell everyone it was those nasty regulations that sent you packing. The "Conservatives" lap it up like a dog to his vomit.

This is how we ended up with 70,000 closed factories and still no import tariffs to speak of....

28 posted on 01/14/2017 7:51:22 PM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: Bryanw92
They are as obsolete as the “rules” of traditional journalism.

That's an excellent observation. And a very welcome byproduct.

29 posted on 01/14/2017 7:52:18 PM PST by Sgt_Schultze (If a border fence isn't effective, why is there a border fence around the White House?)
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To: Sgt_Schultze

... and here’s another bit of “common knowledge” that just isn’t so. The United States experienced no large increase in exports after World War II. This is important because the lack of industrial capacity in Europe and Japan has been oddly credited with the postwar economic boom in the United States. Again, go back and look at trade data from that era and show me where the United States was ever even remotely dependent upon exports. It never has been, not even now.


30 posted on 01/14/2017 7:54:45 PM PST by RegulatorCountry
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

When are the gloBULList Free Traitors™ and RINOs going to learn they don’t run trade anymore?


31 posted on 01/14/2017 7:56:31 PM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: RegulatorCountry

[... and here’s another bit of “common knowledge” that just isn’t so. The United States experienced no large increase in exports after World War II. This is important because the lack of industrial capacity in Europe and Japan has been oddly credited with the postwar economic boom in the United States. Again, go back and look at trade data from that era and show me where the United States was ever even remotely dependent upon exports. It never has been, not even now.]

Excellent point!

Our economic boom was created by the demands of a burgeoning middle class lifestyle and all that went with it.


32 posted on 01/14/2017 8:08:46 PM PST by headstamp 2 (Fear is the mind killer.)
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

It seems to me that a company that was bailed out from bankruptcy, like GM, or that depended on US government business to survive, like Lockheed, should expect that they need to demonstrate a commitment to the very government and its citizens that make its economic survival possible. GM’s CEO can bitch about having to move its plants from Mexico to the USA when the Mexican government throws multi-billions of dollars at their operations, like the American taxpayers were forced to do.


33 posted on 01/14/2017 8:14:07 PM PST by DrPretorius
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To: headstamp 2

The postwar boom was almost entirely driven by domestic demand. Exports were barely a blip.


34 posted on 01/14/2017 8:14:13 PM PST by RegulatorCountry
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To: Bryanw92

Lol!


35 posted on 01/14/2017 8:17:24 PM PST by Flaming Conservative
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To: cba123

He ran a very efficient administration, but he’s a globalist.


36 posted on 01/14/2017 8:19:06 PM PST by Flaming Conservative
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To: E. Pluribus Unum
“There is no doubt that Trump is winning the political game and shaking up America’s largest companies. But there is real danger that his pressure may corrode the competitiveness of U.S.-based global companies and cause retaliation by foreign governments.”

Folks, Fortune thinks America's competitiveness will suffer. It won't. The greatest expansion in this country happened with tariffs in place.

We will have much higher employment, much less crime, and the American work ethic will return. Families will be better off. Companies will still make cr@p in China to sell elsewhere just as cheaply as today. Excise taxes only affect imports to the US and how other countries tax our goods coming in which were made here.

This author is freakin’ clueless if he thinks 100% of US manufacturers will be made to make everything in the US.

37 posted on 01/14/2017 8:20:38 PM PST by ConservativeMind ("Humane" = "Don't pen up pets or eat meat, but allow infanticides, abortion, and euthanasia.")
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To: cba123; arthurus

Bush I, patriotic? Seriously? He was the 1st. president to bring up support for a “new world order.” He is and was a Globalist shill.


38 posted on 01/14/2017 8:21:04 PM PST by stilloftyhenight ("Victorious warriors win first, then go to war." Sun Tsu)
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To: Flaming Conservative

All Republican President since Coolidge have been globalist free traders except Reagan. Even Eisenhower was a globalist to some extent.


39 posted on 01/14/2017 8:22:48 PM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: cornfedcowboy; central_va

Corn, our country excise taxed enough to pay for 44% of the entire US Government budget.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excise_tax_in_the_United_States

Do you have another stupid, senseless comment to make or are you done playing the idiot?


40 posted on 01/14/2017 8:25:28 PM PST by ConservativeMind ("Humane" = "Don't pen up pets or eat meat, but allow infanticides, abortion, and euthanasia.")
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