Beyond the SCOTUS

[woodtoo]

Originally Posted by elysiantraveller

That much is obvious.

How has the trade war increased national security in your mind?

At the highest levels it has, until Joe China takes over then he will fold like the empty suit he is. Then China will be BFF to Joe.

[Track Collector]

Originally Posted by elysiantraveller

That much is obvious.

How has the trade war increased national security in your mind?

Transferring large sums of wealth to China (via unfair trade agreements) makes us a weaker country. The tariffs we are currently collecting are helping to correct that situation.

And with some of the recent bilateral trade agreements with other nations Trump is helping the US to decouple from supply chains within China that are without a doubt under the heavy hand of the Chinese government, even if they are "owned" by foreign countries.

Economic Security and National Security are very much linked together.

[elysiantraveller]

Originally Posted by Track Collector

Transferring large sums of wealth to China (via unfair trade agreements) makes us a weaker country. The tariffs we are currently collecting are helping to correct that situation.

And with some of the recent bilateral trade agreements with other nations Trump is helping the US to decouple from supply chains within China that are without a doubt under the heavy hand of the Chinese government, even if they are "owned" by foreign countries.

Economic Security and National Security are very much linked together.

1)

No. Tariffs are taxes on American consumers. Me choosing to buy a widget made in China is not a national security issue.

A national security issue would be running trillion dollar deficits supported by the Chinese government.

I don't recall you caring about the Trump tax cut though.

2)

There has been virtually no decoupling. The balance of trade is virtually unchanged. Try again.

[woodtoo]

Originally Posted by elysiantraveller

1)

No. Tariffs are taxes on American consumers. Me choosing to buy a widget made in China is not a national security issue.

A national security issue would be running trillion dollar deficits supported by the Chinese government.

I don't recall you caring about the Trump tax cut though.

2)

There has been virtually no decoupling. The balance of trade is virtually unchanged. Try again.

So you do know Jack Shit.

[Thebart]

Amen on your first point #1. One of the biggest Trump lies is that China is paying the increased tariffs. Pure bunk. American consumers are the ones forking out the money on increased costs of the tariff.

[elysiantraveller]

Originally Posted by Thebart

Amen on your first point #1. One of the biggest Trump lies is that China is paying the increased tariffs. Pure bunk. American consumers are the ones forking out the money on increased costs of the tariff.

Also while "decoupling" sounds cool its not really happening.

The balance of trade is unchanged and the shift in goods being imported to more refined products is a result of a shift in the Chinese economy as a whole than a result of anything trade war related.

[thaskalos]

Even with the higher prices due to the tariffs, I still buy Chinese stuff. I just bought a case for my iphone for $8.99...and I couldn't be happier with it. AT&T wanted $29.99 for something similar at their store...marked down from $39.99 for the holidays, the AT&T salesperson told me. Right...

[Track Collector]

Originally Posted by Thebart

Amen on your first point #1. One of the biggest Trump lies is that China is paying the increased tariffs. Pure bunk. American consumers are the ones forking out the money on increased costs of the tariff.

Food for thought. An article from 2019:
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news...ffs-and-its-c/

Perhaps some things have changed since then. I have not researched the values of inflation and the PPI (Raw Material) since the time of the article.

[JustRalph]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

Even with the higher prices due to the tariffs, I still buy Chinese stuff. I just bought a case for my iphone for $8.99...and I couldn't be happier with it. AT&T wanted $29.99 for something similar at their store...marked down from $39.99 for the holidays, the AT&T salesperson told me. Right...

I don’t even know how to tell where half the shit I buy, comes from..........

[lamboguy]

the supply chain is being depleted very fast onshore here. back in the first week of March, i went to a car dealer and bought a $27,000 sticker priced Toyota Camry for $18,000.. i thought i was paying to much for the car but couldn't get it anywhere else for less so i succumbed to the day and bought the sucker.. fast forwarding to today, i tried to buy another car from the same dealer and they wouldn't budge one penny off of the sticker price. the owner of the dealership was a guy i have known for quite some time and he tells me that his allotment has been cut in half and that he can't afford to give away a car that has high demand right now because its tough to replace.

i just brought this up because i imagine that these types of circumstances are going on in other industry's and will continue to happen to different things.

what i really don't understand is that our company's ship some raw materials 10,000 miles away to take advantage of cheap labor and then ship it back another 10,000 miles to sell..

when this country opens back up again, we are going to need more industry's here so that there will be less unemployment. maybe these big company's can figure out how to sell their products for less and still make a decent profit.

one thing i know that is in the cards is that Robots will be paying withholding tax just like regular living humans. the new factories here will have half humans and half robots.

[JustRalph]

Originally Posted by lamboguy

the supply chain is being depleted very fast onshore here. back in the first week of March, i went to a car dealer and bought a $27,000 sticker priced Toyota Camry for $18,000.. i thought i was paying to much for the car but couldn't get it anywhere else for less so i succumbed to the day and bought the sucker.. fast forwarding to today, i tried to buy another car from the same dealer and they wouldn't budge one penny off of the sticker price. the owner of the dealership was a guy i have known for quite some time and he tells me that his allotment has been cut in half and that he can't afford to give away a car that has high demand right now because its tough to replace.

i just brought this up because i imagine that these types of circumstances are going on in other industry's and will continue to happen to different things.

what i really don't understand is that our company's ship some raw materials 10,000 miles away to take advantage of cheap labor and then ship it back another 10,000 miles to sell..

when this country opens back up again, we are going to need more industry's here so that there will be less unemployment. maybe these big company's can figure out how to sell their products for less and still make a decent profit.

one thing i know that is in the cards is that Robots will be paying withholding tax just like regular living humans. the new factories here will have half humans and half robots.

Toyota Camry. The timeless sedan is manufactured in Georgetown, Kentucky and nearly 70% of its parts are American-made!

[clicknow]

Originally Posted by elysiantraveller

1)

No. Tariffs are taxes on American consumers. Me choosing to buy a widget made in China is not a national security issue.

A national security issue would be running trillion dollar deficits supported by the Chinese government.

I don't recall you caring about the Trump tax cut though.

Originally Posted by Thebart

American consumers are the ones forking out the money on increased costs of the tariff.

"where's the credit card honey?"

[lamboguy]

Originally Posted by JustRalph

Toyota Camry. The timeless sedan is manufactured in Georgetown, Kentucky and nearly 70% of its parts are American-made!

maybe because only some of the parts come from abroad is the reason why they didn't double the price yet!

[OntheRail]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

Even with the higher prices due to the tariffs, I still buy Chinese stuff. I just bought a case for my iphone for $8.99...and I couldn't be happier with it. AT&T wanted $29.99 for something similar at their store...marked down from $39.99 for the holidays, the AT&T salesperson told me. Right...

That's just corporate greed... AT&T case was made in China right next to the one you bought from walmart or amazon.

[clicknow]

Originally Posted by JustRalph

Toyota Camry. The timeless sedan is manufactured in Georgetown, Kentucky and nearly 70% of its parts are American-made!

Not"exactly". They are, but they are heavily supervised by the guys who made Toyota greatness.
They are still either subsidiaries of Toyota's Japanese suppliers, or joint ventures between American and Japanese parts makers, and/or very carefully curated by Toyota. And here is why.

Back in the 90s Toyota got top 200 US auto execs for a come-to-jesus moment, and Toyota was brutally honest about their low assessment of our "work". Toyota said it was finding 1,000 defective parts out of every million ..and US automakers (wanting to remain in denial) were saying the figure was inflated. (toyota's standard in Japan at the time was 10 parts per million)

Welp. They found out quick. If you want a piece of the Toyota pie, you do things the Toyota way. As it turns out, the biggest "trade barrier" was lack of quality manufacturing here.

(One US parts company lost all its business with Toyota they refused to respond to suggestions from Toyota about changning their materials to make a lighter, more durable part.) Guess what? They decided to go their separate ways.......and use old parts they thought were "good enough" for American makers.. (I often wonder what happened to them and how they fared, and what car company they ended up supplying to.......hope nobody bought those vehicles )

Toyota didn't get to where they are by allowing low quality parts into their network, so they had to have quite a few humiliating Boot Camps to get things right over here.

So Toyota did suggest getting more local suppliers for Toyota's assembly lines in the United States. But "we" don't have much wiggle room because we haven't proven trustworthy when it comes to cutting corners for profit.