Posted on 06/04/2018 12:57:30 PM PDT by detective
Donald Trump is following through on his threat—or promise, as his voters see it—to impose steep tariffs on foreign goods in the name of supporting American industry, starting with levies of 25 per cent on steel and 10 per cent on aluminium imports. Allies and neighbors that had been granted temporary exemptions are now set to feel the brunt of the tariffs: Canada is America’s leading source of foreign steel, and Mexico and the European Union will also feel the pain. They’re all threatening to retaliate, and the press is calling this a trade war.
If this is a war, it’s one the United States will win. The thing to keep in mind when reading about retaliation is that the US has trade deficits with all of these countries—as well, of course, with China, which is not one of America’s leading sources of steel but whose state-subsidized steel industry is responsible for depressing prices globally. Because the US buys far more goods from these countries than they buy from us, they stand to lose much more in a tit-for-tat over tariffs. How can China or Canada put tariffs on American goods that they don’t actually buy? They can’t, and what they do buy, while not insignificant, pales before what Americans buy from them.
(Excerpt) Read more at usa.spectator.co.uk ...
It is simply nonsense.
The U.S. has been in a Trade war since the start of NAFTA. Do liberals even know what’s going on with “free trade”? All our laws designed to protect workers are now competing with foreign slave labor. It can’t win. We need to even the playing field, and stop supporting foreign slavery.
I live in Alberta and I’m all for Trump taking that moron Trudeau out behind the woodshed.
The downside is, I’ll have to buy firearms made here or pay more.
Tariffs were a sideshow during the Great Depression.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smoot%E2%80%93Hawley_Tariff_Act
{Tariff levels
In the two volume series published by the US Bureau of the Census entitled “The Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970, Bicentennial Edition,” tariff rates have been represented in two forms. The “dutiable tariff rate” peak of 1932 was 59.1%, second only to the 61.7% rate of 1830. However, in 1933, 63% of all imports were never taxed which the “dutiable tariff rate” does not reflect. The “free and dutiable rate” in 1929 was 13.5% and peaked under Smoot-Hawley in 1933 at 19.8% which is significantly below the 29.7% “free and dutiable rate” that the United States averaged from 1821 until 1900.[22]
The average tariff rate on dutiable imports [23][24] increased from 40.1% in 1929 to 59.1% in 1932 (+19%). However, it was already consistently at high level between 1865 and 1913 (from 38% to 52%). Moreover, It had also risen sharply in 1861 (from 18.61% to 36.2%; +17.6), between 1863 and 1866 (from 32.62% to 48.33%; +15.7%), between 1920 and 1922 (from 16.4% to 38.1%; +21.7%), without producing global depressions.
After enactment
At first, the tariff seemed to be a success. According to historian Robert Sobel, “Factory payrolls, construction contracts, and industrial production all increased sharply.” However, larger economic problems loomed in the guise of weak banks. When the Creditanstalt of Austria failed in 1931, the global deficiencies of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff became apparent.[15]
US imports decreased 66% from $4.4 billion (1929) to $1.5 billion (1933), and exports decreased 61% from $5.4 billion to $2.1 billion. GNP fell from $103.1 billion in 1929 to $75.8 billion in 1931 and bottomed out at $55.6 billion in 1933.[25] Imports from Europe decreased from a 1929 high of $1.3 billion to just $390 million during 1932, while US exports to Europe decreased from $2.3 billion in 1929 to $784 million in 1932. Overall, world trade decreased by some 66% between 1929 and 1934.[26]
Using panel data estimates of export and import equations for 17 countries, Jakob B. Madsen (2002) estimated the effects of increasing tariff and non-tariff trade barriers on worldwide trade during the period 1929–1932. He concluded that real international trade contracted somewhere around 33% overall. His estimates of the impact of various factors included about 14% because of declining GNP in each country, 8% because of increases in tariff rates, 5% because of deflation-induced tariff increases, and 6% because of the imposition of non-tariff barriers.
The new tariff imposed an effective tax rate of 60% on more than 3,200 products and materials imported into the United States, quadrupling previous tariff rates on individual items, but raising the average tariff rate to 19.2%, in line with average rates of that day.
Unemployment was at 8% in 1930 when the Smoot–Hawley tariff was passed, but the new law failed to lower it. The rate jumped to 16% in 1931, and 25% in 1932–33.[27] There is some contention about whether this can necessarily be attributed to the tariff, however.[28][29] It was not until World War II, during which “the American economy expanded at an unprecedented rate”,[30] that unemployment fell below 1930s levels.[31]
Imports during 1929 were only 4.2% of the United States’ GNP and exports were only 5.0%. Monetarists, such as Milton Friedman, who emphasize the central role of the money supply in causing the depression, note that the Smoot–Hawley Act only had a contributory effect on the entire U.S. economy.[32]}
Unemployment was at 8% in 1930 when the Smoot–Hawley tariff was passed, but the new law failed to lower it. The rate jumped to 16% in 1931, and 25% in 1932–33.[27]
Canada is America’s leading source of foreign steel”
Yes, and much of it comes from China through Canada.
Our great “allies” of Mexico and Canada have been teaming up with China to screw America.
And yet we have 40 million people out of work right now, who could easily be employed here.
Where was the benefit of the lack of tariffs?
Where’s your report on that?
From 2000 to roughly 2012, we added about 2% to our “employed” figures. That figure for the prior 40 years had been 9.75% per four years. For twelve it should have been nearly 30%. It was 2%.
Please include this in your next report, if you’re going to tell the whole story on tariffs.
You could have also touched on how many jobs were lost in the United States due to China manipulating it’s currency to the point it effectively raised prices on our goods going in, by 30-40%. (a pseudo tariff)
We got to watch what the Free Traitors ushered in. It flopped miserably.
Trump is turning it around. Boo hoo... /s
I think it’s also important to note that:
1) Steel is an input for consumer goods, not a final good. As such, in most products, it represents a small percentage of the total cost of production. This will increase the demand for domestic steel, even at a slightly higher price, but the impact on consumers will be relatively small.
2) The tariffs were placed on those raw materials goods because Trump wants to level the playing field for our manufacturing industries. This gives those countries affected several options by which to avoid or lessen the tariffs.
” How can China or Canada put tariffs on American goods that they don’t actually buy? They can’t...”
Sums up the “trade war” perfectly.
“Our great “allies” of Mexico and Canada have been teaming up with China to screw America.”
Yup.
China will soon own Canada.
“China will soon own Canada.”
You kidding me? I’m a Vancouver native. The joke “Hongcouver” has been around since the 90’s for reasons involved in this thread. China OWNS the west coast already. Unlike here in L.A., most municipalities are under yellow rule like Richmond etc.
Guess what first language is in vancouver ATM’s. It’s not English. It’s Mandarin. yeah, that bad.
FINALLY someone in the conservative press acknowledges what us rubes knew all along.
Good points.
Smoot Hawley is joke and lie to perpetuate the globalist lie. If you read contemporary histories of the GD trade is not even mentions in most of them, AT ALL.
It's like they have turrets, trade war, trade war, trade war, as if it's the end of the world, but they never explain.
Trade was not a factor in the GD but it gets all the blame. It’s an idiotic rewrite of history.
The rest of the world is protectionist and mechanistic and gets mad when the USA retaliates in the smallest of ways at the edges.
There will be lots of steel on the market that is not tariffed
An American distributor purchasing agent can buy steel to his specifications from non tariffed sources. India for instance.
If canada persists on maintianing the tariffs Trump wants removed, other will get the business. Trudeau will get the message.
I think he actually got the message and is posturing for the press.
mechanistic = mercantilistic
I wish Free Trader apologists would quit thinking they are patriots. They are traitors.
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