Comment on Donald Trump Vows 200% Tariff on John Deere if It Moves Manufacturing to Mexico
JBar2@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Without getting too deep into the intracacies, as a liberal, my thoughts are:
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I would certainly prefer the jobs stay in the US
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I don’t know that Trump - assuming he were to win the election - can impose such tariffs based on USMCA. Like, I literally an bit an expert in that trade agreement, but there may be restrictions
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Tariffs don’t generally work like Trump claims they do. The consumer ultimately pays them almost every time. In this case, I don’t know enough about tractor manufacturing, but there would have to be a viable alternative company manufacturing in the US for this proposed tariff to work as Trump seemingly intends.
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Where tariffs can be really effective is in newer industries where there is limited competition and a tariff can directly level the playing field between a nascent US company and a foreign company where they have either a significant competitive lead or where that foreign company is getting incentovized by their government. Think the earlier days of solar panels or wind power, where the US could have helped prevent China from taking a huge lead in those industries and positioned US companies as the leaders. Tariffs work best when you have 2 major players and you can price one of them out early (in particular, before the manufacturing equipment and skilled labor have already left).
There’s a lot of variables at play. I just don’t see it being as simple as it’s portrayed
SkyezOpen@lemmy.world 1 month ago
Wikipedia’s list of US tractor manufacturers has 34 entries. If JD tractors suddenly become 3 times the price, people will go elsewhere.
Trump is a moron swinging a hammer, but in this case a hammer will probably work. Issues arise when tariffs are put on things that aren’t domestically produced.