Lots of people profit short-term by trading with China. It's easier to make a profit as a middleman with China than as a manufacturer in a western country. I'm definitely left wing, but I applaud Trump for the tariffs. Tariffs are a must for the western world if we want to maintain our standards of living and survive long-term.

Germany is also a predatory exporter in Europe, but fewer people seem to care about that. The US definitely doesn't want to end up having the same relations with China as Southern European countries ("PIIGS") have with Germany. You can't win if you have zero leverage left to negotiate.

Germany is the prime exporter of the EU. It has the benefit of the Euro in the internal market for buying power due to its size and it has the benefit of the Euro in the external market because German bonds denominated in Euros are cheaper for it than the other EU states.

I'm a democratic socialist, but tariffs are not the way to control trade and standards of living. That is a mercantilist attitude from the 19th Century. Tariffs are paid by the consumers in the country that has the tariffs (ie Tariffs on China by US is paid by people in the US). It primarily hits those that spend most of their income on consumption, which is those that are poorer.

What is needed is the power of Labor (ie unions etc) to be applied in the foreign country, by having restrictions on goods and services that are not provided by Labor with fair conditions.

That's not the same as pay or money, there are comparitive advantages in things like the supply and demand on local food production etc.

> Tariffs are paid by the consumers in the country that has the tariffs (ie Tariffs on China by US is paid by people in the US). It primarily hits those that spend most of their income on consumption, which is those that are poorer.

But consumers are already paying for the current situation in Germany. Instead of tariff, Germany decided to put downward pressure on salaries via the Hartz reforms. The effects are not far from tariff in that it shifts money from consumption towards savings/investments. That's why Germany has such a large trade surplus. And like tariff, it's a losing solution. In the end, your currency should reevaluate. Germany is just lucky to have the euro.

For a long time, I was really puzzled by why the German European partners stuck with Germany in the currency union were so tolerant of pretty much being spoiled. But after Macron, I think it's pretty clear: the richest are far too happy to be able to present lowering salaries and degrading work conditions as an inescapable part of modern economic competition. They are after all on the right side of the rising inequality.

>What is needed is the power of Labor (ie unions etc) to be applied in the foreign country, by having restrictions on goods and services that are not provided by Labor with fair conditions.

Although this would generally negate the need for tariffs, there are serious issues:

-You can't enforce this. It's a very different country on the other side of the globe.

-You can't properly observe working conditions for the entire supply chain (and conversation on what constitutes "fair conditions" can enter the realm of philosophy very quickly)

-Even if labor was in control of production, they could still act maliciously as a group

-Small transient fluctuations in efficiency are magnified without a hard cutoff to stop them from using the extra capital to become too big and undercut competition

And on top of that, rich countries have to face a sharp recession while the poor countries catch up. That's not a small amount of time. In much of Europe we already have 1-2 generations that faced very harsh economic conditions because of this. Generosity has limits. Yes, free trade (generally, not always) allows poor countries to develop faster, but they grow asymmetrically and the working/middle class of rich countries suffers too.

> I'm definitely left wing, but I applaud Trump for the tariffs.

I thought tariffs are leftist proposition. At least in Europe it is.

Tariffs are supported by both left and right for different reasons. People like Trump represent national/regional industrial interests so they want local production and less competition from abroad. Leftists (in the european, non-neoliberal sense) want to empower the local workers and economies. The resulting action is the same. And it makes sense from a geopolitical perspective too.

There are valid reasons not to implement tariffs too, but having completely unrestricted trade imbalances is a bad idea no matter how you look at it.

The opposite of tariffs is not "completely unrestricted trade imbalances".

The opposite of tariffs is common quality, safety, labor, ecological impact requirements.

Tariffs are just a tax on one part of the local population to subsidise another part. Tariffs are paid by the importer, not the exporter.

For the exporter, not being able to export to a particular country, if there are other markets available, is a hindrance, not a killer.

The US is a big market for Chinese solar panels, but so is the rest of the world.

China was a big customer for US soybeans, now it buys none. This has ruined US farmers, but the global soybean market has taken up that slack.

Tariffs are dumb, clunky, 19th century tools for a global, multinational world. We need to accelerate not just the flow of capital, but also of labor, we need to make sure that the benefits of development are shared, not "trickled down".

We need to bring the 3rd world to the level of the 1st, not drag the 1st down to the 3rd. It's not a zero-sum game.

explain how China is the world's fastest growing economy and has the fastest growing living standards while being one of, if not the most protectionist countries on earth?

According to most economists and their textbooks their growth should be terrible because they are so anti free trade

The only people who benefit from low tariffs are the rich, who can then outsource production and ship goods back into the country with no consequences. That's why income inequality has skyrocketed in the last few decades. The supposed savings of outsourcing weren't passed back to consumers, it was pocketed by the rich

I wouldn't say tariffs are China's reason for success or anywhere near it. That said, China and the US are drastically different.

It seems that most of their protectionist polices are about moving China from dumb labor into a tech hub. Global companies are forced to partner with a local business. This keeps some profits in China as well as locks businesses in and gives the local company the ability to do its own designs or even just steal IP outright. While frustrating, this is actually a pretty cheap exercise for the global entity. Sign a deal, do some meetings, fill some paperwork and boom you have access to a billion users and very cheap labor. The cost of competition comes later and many many businesses take the deal.

Contrast this with tariffs that are just a dumb tax that immediately bite into profits and don't directly promote growth locally. If you actually want to target US businesses, you'd be supporting subsidies not tariffs.

>The supposed savings of outsourcing weren't passed back to consumers, it was pocketed by the rich

I mean, this is just clearly false. The savings literally have to be passed back to the consumer or the Chinese goods would not out compete local goods and there would be no problem.

USA and a number of Western countries are waaaay more protectionist than China.

The idea that China is the most protectionist country in the world is no more than a meme.

Ranks of ease of market entry are very objective proofs of that.

It gas been definitely easier to setup a viable business in China than in US for a few years now.

>It gas been definitely easier to setup a viable business in China than in US for a few years now.

Where are you getting that information? Every international index disagrees with that assertion.

Ease of doing business report only deals with formal legal requirements and paperwork, but running business is not only about law/tax compliance.

Access to labour, facilities, depth and readiness of local market to accept new things - all that matters.

I am not agreeing with assessment that legal compliance in USA is easier than in China at all. USA has hideously complex tax system, you can't do a single thing without a lawyer, and any dealing with securities is past all hope for a person who have not purposefully studied that.

>Tariffs hurt US consumers

US consumers are first and foremost US workers first -- and only consumers in as much as they have a job and they make enough to pay rent, consume, etc.

So while they might not get cheap global shit as easily, they'll be able to get jobs easier...

If your manufacturing employer consumes steel and that steel is now more expensive it means less of those jobs, not more. You're only pulling money from other US citizens and companies so its not really a gain to the US overall. It increases the cost of US manufactured goods that have to buy tariff laden supplies. This ends up hurting US manufacturing exports over all. All of this assumes we actually do pay for US steel but the reality is we'll just go to the next cheapest supplier which may or may not be local.

>If your manufacturing employer consumes steel and that steel is now more expensive it means less of those jobs, not more

Then don't impose a tariff on steel, impose a tariff on consumer products. It's an instrument of economic policy, not a binary all-or-nothing choice.

That steel is only cheap short term. Once China has a monopoly they can charge whatever they want. The only reason Chinese steel is cheaper is because it's lower quality and their government subsidizes it with long term strategic intent

There's some merit to this argument. If your goal is to hurt China's competitiveness in spite of what it costs US buyers than its a legitimate strategy.

However, this policy is being sold as a way to help US manufacturers and that's not quite the same thing. The benefits could easily go to other imports with weaker tariffs. This coupled with the problem of hurting down stream US manufacturers means that the only benefit is hedging against a Chinese monopoly and not the direct benefits that are usually talked about.

But it helps local businesses raises wages, etc.

Tariffs are important to keep certain industries alive locally.

There's no incentive to raise wages. At best it forces Americans to pay more for certain goods but the idea that that money goes to workers is indirect. These Chinese tariffs just increase the cost of Chinese goods so unless the US is second in cost, they cut into US profits but increase the profits of other global entities. In the case of steel, Russian imports are up.

It's not just John Q Public that sees increased prices either. Increasing steel costs hurt US manufacturing jobs that use steel. Because tariffs don't bring in any new money abroad, it's US companies that are footing the bill. The net gain to the US is zero or even less if there are less manufacturing jobs because of increased resource costs. Less manufacturing ripples back into less profit for steel.

Tariffs help US businesses and american workers. It's why the first major act of congress was a tariff.

https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-...

The US economic might was built on tariffs protecting american businesses. We became the largest economy in the world in the late 1800s due partly due to tariffs. It's also why europe, japan, korea, china, etc used tariffs to become economy powerhouses.

It's true that it can hurt consumers, but given how big our economy is and the resources at our disposable, I highly doubt it. Also, it could hurt american businesses globally, but considering the US is the biggest market in the world, I doubt it.

Also, anyone who believes Trump is propping up russian steel is watching way too much CNN, MSNBC, etc.

As everything in life, tariffs aren't all good or all bad. It can be good, it can be bad. To make a general claim that "it's not good policy" is factually incorrect. History proves this.

"Tariffs help US businesses and american workers. It's why the first major act of congress was a tariff."

Well, one can argue about whether or not tariffs help domestic businesses and workers, but that was not the reason tariffs were one of the first major acts of congress.

It was one of the first acts because tariffs were THE major revenue source for the US federal government. Remember, those were the days before things like income tax.

Absolutely, like most things economic, we can debate the merits forever. But what's not debatable are economic and historical facts. The blanket claim was that tariffs hurt US businesses and workers. We know this is factually incorrect because we can look to the US economy and businesses in the 1800s where we rose from a relatively underdeveloped nation to the largest economy in the world with the world's largest businesses under a tariff heavy century. We can look to west germany, japan, korea and now china also.

Now that doesn't mean tariffs never hurt businesses. My belief is that tariffs can help or hurt businesses. I don't like ideological blanket statements like "Tariffs are always bad" or "Tariffs are always good". Tariffs are a national tool. Like any tool, it can be use for good or bad.