A specific aim of Trump’s economic policy, in particular its tariff policy, is to revitalise U.S.
  • WatDabney@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
    4·
    9 days ago

    The funniest part to me is that “revitaliz(ing) U.S. manufacturing” is one positive that could (to at least some degree) potentially have come from the tariffs IF Trump hadn’t completely fumbled it right from the start by not taking a firm position.

    He and he alone did such a shitty job of it that he and he alone guaranteed that “revitaliz(ing) U.S. manufacturing” is one thing that’s NOT going to happen. At all.

    • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOPM
      211·
      8 days ago

      There was no chance of tariffs alone bringing back any manufacturing, regardless of how firm of a position he took. The only way to bring manufacturing back would be through massive state intervention, the way manufacturing was originally developed in the US during WW2 period.

      • WatDabney@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        4·
        8 days ago

        Mmm… I don’t disagree with that.

        But the fact remains that by not providing any consistency upon which companies could plan, Trump destroyed any possibility of it right out of the gate.

        • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOPM
          151·
          8 days ago

          You can disagree all you like, but there is no historical example of tariffs achieving any sort of industrialization on their own. The reality is that establishing factories, training workers, and building out supply chains requires stupendous amounts of capital investment and decades of effort to build out. No private investor is going to fund this sort of a venture because there’s no immediate profit in it, and long term situation will always be uncertain. It’s much easier to simply work around the tariffs of pass the cost down to the consumer.

          In fact, we have a perfect recent example of this happening with western sanctions on Russian energy. These sanctions didn’t result in Europe developing clean energy industry, instead they simply resulted in a massive cost of living increase for the Europeans as a result of Russian energy being bought through intermediaries like India and Turkey.

  • Rentlar@lemmy.ca
    16·
    8 days ago

    I’ll grant Trump it was a bold goal for the US, but it was never going to happen under him because he’s too incompetent at that kind of thing. Realistically he doesn’t actually care about accomplishing that or not, as long as he can look good or get something out of it.

    Biden coulda done it, he was well on the way of doing it actually with Green new deal, Infrastructure Investment and Jobs act, CHIPS act etc., but of course people were too impatient for results and were swept by right wing propaganda so, Americans can have fun while Trump and Republican squander the booming economy Biden handed them on a platter. This administration really could have done better if they just sat on their hands, done nothing else and spun how good Trump is with the economy and every other issue.

    • ☆ Yσɠƚԋσʂ ☆@lemmy.mlOPM
      61·
      8 days ago

      Biden very clearly couldn’t have done it, and the CHIPS act is a perfect illustration of Biden’s failure to reshore chip production or to stifle China’s advancements in that area.