Free Republic

After Trump's Thursday morning twitter taunt targeted Toyota, when the President-elect warned Japan’s biggest carmaker that it will face heavy penalties if it chooses to make cars for the US market in Mexico, writing  "Toyota Motor said will build a new plant in Baja, Mexico, to build Corolla cars for U.S. NO WAY! Build plant in U.S. or pay big border tax", a tweet which sent shares of Japanese carmakers sliding on Friday with a 1.7% fall for Toyota, 2.2% for Nissan and 3.2% for Mazda, an angry Japanese government and corporate establishment pushed back against Trump’s criticism of...

In the latest not too subtle threat lobbed by China's official press aimed at Donald Trump, the mainland media warned the President-elect that he’ll be met with "big sticks" if he tries to ignite a trade war or further strain ties."There are flowers around the gate of China’s Ministry of Commerce, but there are also big sticks hidden inside the door -- they both await Americans," the Communist Party’s Global Times newspaper wrote in an editorial Thursday in response to Trump’s plans to nominate lawyer Robert Lighthizer, who has criticized Beijing’s trade practices, as U.S. trade representative.The latest lashing...

Who’s “we,” kemosabe? Twenty-four hours ago, over Ryan’s own objection, House Republicans were all set to revamp the Office of Congressional Ethics. Then Trump logged into Twitter and, three hours later, the plan was scrapped. Members of Ryan’s caucus were eager to reassure the media yesterday that it wasn’t Trump’s influence that made them reconsider, it was the barrage of angry phone calls their offices were getting from grassroots Republicans, but that seems to be a partial explanation at best: OVERHEARD in the Speaker's lobby: "The guy puts out a tweet and half our conference goes nuts. What are...

Among the first steps being floated by the incoming Trump administration is a 5 to 10 percent tariff on imports, implemented through an executive order. It’s the sort of shoot-first, ask-questions-later action that President-elect Donald J. Trump promised during the campaign. It’s also unconstitutional. That’s because the path to imposing tariffs — along with taxes and other revenue-generating measures — clearly begins with Congress, and in particular the House, through the Origination Clause. When presidents have raised (or lowered) tariffs in the past, they have tended to do so using explicit, if sometimes wide-ranging, authority from Congress. The founders thought...

Lots more nukes? 10 percent tariffs? Remember how the guy operates before you wet yourself Public statements affect different people in different ways. Since the news media think the world revolves around them - since how they react to something is obviously more important than anything else under the sun - they get quite exorcised whenever someone makes a public statement that strikes them as ill-considered. Donald Trump does that a lot. He talks (or more often, tweets) about halting immigration by Muslims. And about imposing tarrifs on foreign goods. This past week, if you listen to the media, Trump...

In the tweet heard round the world, Donald Trump threatened to slap a 35% tariff on companies that shift jobs overseas, then ship their goods back to the U.S. Since his election, the focus has been on the carrots Trump will offer to grow and protect America's manufacturing base: corporate tax cuts and possibly a side order of state tax incentives. That's the menu that will keep open a Carrier plant in Indiana... But now Trump is signaling a more combative approach... ...There will be a tax on our soon to be strong border of 35% for these companies," Trump...

WASHINGTON — House Republican leaders signaled on Monday that they would not support President-elect Donald J. Trump’s threat to impose a heavy tax on companies that move jobs overseas, the first significant confrontation over the conservative economic orthodoxy that Mr. Trump relishes trampling. “I don’t want to get into some kind of trade war,” Representative Kevin McCarthy, Republican of California and majority leader, told reporters in response to Mr. Trump’s threats over the weekend to seek a 35 percent import tariff on goods sold by United States companies that move jobs overseas and displace American workers. Speaker Paul D. Ryan...

WASHINGTON; If President-elect Donald Trump thinks he’s going to impose a 35 percent tariff on companies importing goods, he might want to check with Republicans in Congress. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) suggested Monday that Republicans would not be in favor of imposing the 35 percent tariff on foreign goods that Trump proposed Sunday in a series of tweets.  Trump may not understand how tariffs really work; it would be very difficult for the United States to impose them on specific companies that move jobs to a foreign country; or that Congress, not the president, sets them. But he...

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy on Monday refused to back President-elect Donald Trump’s push for a 35-percent tariff on companies that move operations abroad and then sell their goods back in the United States, saying corporate tax reform is the key to retaining American jobs. “I think that’s a better way to solve the problem than getting in a trade war over a 35-percent tariff,” the California Republican told reporters.

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...

Famed basketball coach Bobby Knight might be the one to call corporate executives and warn them of potential punitive tariffs if they move jobs overseas in a Trump administration, Donald Trump suggested Monday evening. "I'll have Bobby Knight make the call," Trump said in a campaign stop in Warren, Mich., alongside the former Indiana college hoops coach. "I think he could make the call better than anybody," the Republican nominee said.

...Trump called the trade agreement between Canada, Mexico and the United States “the single worst trade deal ever approved in this country” during the first presidential debate against Hillary Clinton. Earlier this year, Bernie Sanders leveled a similar criticism, calling it disastrous when debating the former secretary of date... ...But whether NAFTA has been good or bad for the U.S. economy depends largely on who you ask... ...NAFTA “means jobs. American jobs, and good-paying American jobs. If I didn't believe that, I wouldn't support this agreement,” then-President Clinton said in 1993. Fast forward more than two decades later and NAFTA...

Americans these days are not in a charitable mood when it comes to trade, it seems. The August IBD/TIPP Poll shows that Americans overwhelmingly favor placing restrictions on imports ... Generally speaking, do you think the U.S. trade policy should have restrictions on imported goods to protect American jobs or have no restrictions on imported goods to enable American consumers to have more choices and the lowest prices?

You work and get paid. To whom do your after-tax earnings belong? Do they all belong to you or does some portion of them belong to the neighborhood grocer whose store you patronize? Who should have first dibs on the money you've earned: you or the auto dealer who sold you the last car you bought? In both cases the correct answer indisputably seems to be “you.” But not so fast. Typical discussions of trade policy imply that the answers are “the grocer” and “the auto dealer.” When politicians promise to raise tariffs on imports, they are promising to penalize...

Someone earning $10,000 could be subject to maximum federal taxes under this limit of $1,500 per year. But someone earning 100 times as much at a million dollars would still be subject to maximum federal taxes of 100 times more, at $150,000 a year. The tax burden could still be skewed proportionally more to the upper income earners, but only by reducing the burden on the lower income earners. In other words, lower rates than 15% could still be imposed on those at the lower income levels, while the highest could still be subject to a top rate of 15%.

When it comes to taxes, depending on whichever conservative you talk to they all have a different idea on what sort of tax plan would work best. Some want a national sales Tax, some want an income tax, and some even want a Tariff. So why not UNIFY under a plan that ALL of us can get behind? Here is an idea that I have been thinking about that i have never seen before. I call it the "10% Flex" Tax plan. Why is it flexible? It is flexible as it would allow congress to control what TYPE of taxes...

"The U.S. Senate approved a bill May 12 that would overhaul the process for businesses requesting tariff suspensions and reductions." "The miscellaneous tariff bill (MTB) establishes a new process for manufacturers to avoid having to pay tariffs on imported raw materials and intermediate products for which there are no suitable U.S.-based suppliers."

The ROOT CAUSE of our economic woes including business leaving our shores is the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT unconstitutionally forcing minimum wage on business. Minimum wage, regulations, unions, and high taxes are THE CAUSE of businesses moving elsewhere. Federal government is the problem NOT the solution. Although I support Trump, his tariff proposals are MORE federal government and do NOTHING to attack the ROOT CAUSES of the loss of jobs in our country. Tariffs have the appearance but not the reality of a solution - they are only palliative and delay the actual reforms needed. A tariff is a tax and China...

Overregulation: Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s CEO Andy Puzder has people all in a huff over his idea to automate restaurants. But why be upset with Puzder? This is an inevitable consequence of massive minimum wage hikes by the government. “With government driving up the cost of labor, it’s driving down the number of jobs,” said Puzder. “You’re going to see automation not just in airports and grocery stores, but in restaurants.” He’s right. That’s why whenever the minimum wage rises above the market-set prevailing wage, jobs are destroyed. Who would pay someone $15 an hour to do a job that’s...