$200bn? Make that $467bn: Trump threatens to balloon proposed bonus China tech tariffs

Once upon a time....

A long time ago,

We had Empires -

Run by Emperors,

Then we had Kingdoms,

Run by Kings, and

Now we have

Countries....

The beatings will continue until productivity improves. The USA simply cannot afford to lose all manufacturing capability just so consumers can enjoy low prices. We have to make products here. This is a strategic imperative. Past administrations were prepared to destroy the country but the present one is on a different course. That's why we elected him!

We've already started referring to this as the Trump Tax

Many people have figured out that these tariffs don't really do much except act as a form of Federal sales tax. They might encourage local manufacturers but often they're used to disguise an inefficient high cost local source (for example, most newsprint comes from Canada but at the insistence of the sole US manufacturer tariffs were put on Canadian newsprint so the local manufacturer could keep its prices high).

The US is a big market but it only represents about 10% of global trade. If we in the US just stopped buying taxed items then its the local distributors and value added manufacturers that will feel the impact. Overseas suppliers will just find alternative markets. (...and since we're interfering with overseas trade thanks to sanctions policies they've got a huge interest in not using dollars).

Still, I suppose its one way to redress the deficit introduced by the tax cuts. You could say that the way that things are going the only import that's not going to be taxed is money.