Don't panic over the stock market. Trump is fixing holes in our economy

Okay I read the article and it seems the author is a true believer telling the reader not to believe their lying pocketbooks. Trump may very well be trying to fix the economy, but not in the way Americans want, but more like a mobster “fixing” a horse race or boxing match.

Tariffs are a way to protect a country’s business to keep them competitive with foreign companies, but in a global economy where countries rely on each other tariffs are seemingly obsolete. Also making goods in this country won’t necessarily make them cheaper because it’s the shortage that makes them more expensive. Take oil for instance. The “Drill baby drill” mantra works great on the uneducated masses in a campaign speech but the price of oil only drops when there’s a glut. So like in Trump’s first term when oil companies stopped making a profit Trump got the Saudis to quit pumping oil to raise the price.

The author knows they’re in trouble but telling Americans to be patient is a fools errand. Trump said he would lower prices on day one but two months into his presidency prices are higher, the stock market is down, unemployment is up, and right on cue they want you to believe it’s the Democrats fault. Hey MAGA, it’s not the 1950’s anymore.

 

I agree, I was just bringing up a case where it worked. Something like this, targeted on China, I could fully support. Mexico and Canada, however, would need to be partners in that effort so tariffs on them seems utterly pointless.

 

He doesn't know. All he is capable of is linking and parroting existing articles and talking points. Like all MAGA, he's basically a parrot that takes marching orders from his political masters. LOL! And you thought these were honest and arrived at organically. . . LOL!

 

Tariffs/Protectionism are a govt imposed price hike (a tax) and liberal economic policy.

Trying to lie and say tariffs lower prices wouldn’t be much different than trying to argue the govt imposing a minimum wage LOWERS wages. It would be complete nonsense to make such an argument.

Just as with minimum wage, the best case scenario is the govt introduced market inefficiency operates around the periphery of real world economic activity and doesn’t really do anything. If you put in a $15 wage in an area where market wages are $10, then yes you may be increasing the price of that burrito slightly. It’s a question as to whether it’s worth paying up slightly knowing that every worker is making at least $15 and that indeed it may even reduce total hiring/business activity. That is the trade off that an honest discussion would center around. Similarly, if you want things that are “American made” and want govt to impose a trade restrictive tax to accomplish it, you better be prepared to pay up one way or another.

 

The reality is that supply chains are multi-faceted and spread over multiple markets to take advantage of different wage costs. Thus, Canada, Mexico and others - specifically in the Western Hemisphere - would all be part of the same ecosystem. One that is growing due to say, tariffs on Chinese goods. This would actually make sense as we definitely want to eliminate any "dependencies" on China and shift that production to friendlier and closer countries.

Instead we get ham-handed stupidity as a policy.

 

So I guess what the OP is arguing is that this is all "transitory"

 

One consequence of these tariffs is the retaliatory tariffs made by countries on goods already produced in the US. This will cause American companies to lose market share in Canada, Mexico, and overseas.

So not only do we have higher prices with tariffs, we have decreased revenue.

And bringing manufacturing back on shore is easier said than done. It takes a capital investment and time to get facilities in place and the domestic labor force hired. And for many goods, this cost is now expensive than the tariff, especially for complicated items with multiple parts such as automobiles.

 

Trump is fixing holes in the economy the same way that Senator Smoot, Representative Hawley and President Hoover did when they enacted the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act at the beginning of the Great Depression in 1930. I'm not sure that turning a recession into a full blown depression was really fixing the economy. Trump's "fixing" of the economy will result in the most severe recession since the housing bubble burst in 2008.

 

You meant "opinion piece."

(From a kooky Trumpy)

 

Absolutely. The writer is an opinion columnist not an economist.

 

An interesting article about the upcoming New Great Depression that Trump is engineering. The elimination of both federal jobs and federal spending creates a double-whammy on the economy. Public sector workers will now be looking for jobs in the private sector, which will already be hurting due to a lack of federal spending on contracts which went to the private sector. Arguably, you could make it work by doing the cuts gradually, but Trump is incapable of doing anything gradually.

Basically, Trump is playing with fire, and a lot of Americans are going to be burned. Don't worry about the billionaires--they'll be fine. Don't count on Trump's Fox News advisors to tell him he's doing the wrong thing.

‘The Big Short’ investor who predicted the 2008 crash warns the market is ‘underestimating’ the economic impact of DOGE’s mass spending cuts

 

Tariffs>>depression>>lower prices