Welcome to General Chat - GAW Community Area
This General Chat area started off as a place for people to talk about things that are off topic, however it has quickly evolved into a community and has become an integral part of the GAW experience for many of us.
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Rules for General Chat
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Rules For the rest of the Site also accessible on the sidebar.
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The full answer to this is much more complex, but depending on the level of understanding you can explain it in different ways.
In simple terms, there is a huge trade deficit for US against all other countries and this is due to various trade barriers they all put up against US. Trump is using Tariff as a retaliatory measure to even the playing field. They can take away these barriers if they dont want tariffs.
At a much higher level, the question is why US has allowed this unfair trade imbalance all these years. They run $200B deficit with Canada, $200B with Europe and effectively $500B with China. Why is this? USAID is for pumping money into developing countries. Trade deficit is for pumping money into developed countries. This money comes at a cost - These countries have to toe the line that US tells them. Thats why they go along with everything US (deep state) has been pushing the world into. Trump is putting an end to this. Hence its the "freedom day"
As for the effects of Tariffs - the debate of "who will pay the additional cost ?" is a red herring. The tariffs do not simply translate into "additional cost" to someone or other. It actually has a much more powerful effect of undoing what we see in the economy right now - deluge of cheap crap imported from countries like China, and no local businesses can compete with them, unless they compromise on quality or working conditions or both. This is the end of the western world as we are seeing it. Tariffs make it impossible for the cheap crap to deluge the local market, so while there is a short term adverse effect, it will slowly result in rreturn of quality products, local made, with local businesses thriving. We iwll be able to buy the kind of quality stuff we used to buy 20 years ago.
I understand Bubble.. I'm all for tariff creating an even playing field and to untie the power DS has over other countries. I can tell you honestly, except for important products, I'm not willing to pay extra $10-$30 more for US made products because they ARE expensive. Hopefully in long term view, the US made products' prices will come down. because in this economy, most people would rather shop at dollar stores since the prices of food and gas is so high, you won't be spending $100 for a blanket and would rather bundle up in 3 blankets from overseas that cost $15 ya know..
And what my husband was complaining about is the fact that on top of "what's to come" we still be paying income tax,sales tax, real estate tax... unless all these taxes are eliminated I'm not sure how long we'll last.