In today’s episode of The U.S. Economy v. Trump’s Bigly Stupid Tariff War, President Donald Trump basically became the living embodiment of that one meme with the dog sitting calmly in the burning house, declaring, “This is fine,” when he took to social media to tell America to “BE COOL” amid the economic turmoil that has happened as a direct result of the tariff attack he has imposed on some 185 countries, including allies (or maybe former allies at this point) who are now imposing retaliatory tariffs on the U.S.
“BE COOL!” Trump wrote on his ludicrously named Truth Social platform. “Everything is going to work out well. The USA will be bigger and better than ever before!”
So, the stock market is still shakier than Trump was when he mocked that disabled journalist, and his tariff tantrum is projected to cause an enormous increase in the prices we pay for imported items, potentially costing U.S. families $2,100 per year. But Trump wants everyone to remain calm because he knows how tariffs work better than the myriad top economists (including the ones his administration has cited) who have told him tariffs don’t work the way he thinks they do.
Clearly, Trump is just giving us his best-and-also-laziest attempt at damage control now that his self-inflicted tariff debacle has prompted so much bad press. Meanwhile, Trump appears to have narrowed the focus of his international tariff tirade on one country in particular—his old arch-nemesis (in his own mind), China.
According to CNBC, the country Trump loves to hate (and blame for COVID) has hiked up its levies on U.S. imports to more than 80%, causing tariffs on U.S. goods entering China to rise to 84% from 34%, effective April 10. The Chinese government made this decision in response to Trump’s latest U.S. tariff increase on Chinese goods to more than 100%, which went into effect at midnight (April 9).
In response to China’s tariff increase, which came as a response to America’s tariff increase (it’s like the movie Inception but with bumbling idiots sitting behind big, shiny red “Tariff +” buttons), Trump increased the tariffs imposed on imports from China to 125%, “effective immediately.”
*heavy spiritual Negro sigh*
So-called world leaders are really out here playing “Big Tariff take Little Tariff” while the entire world looks on and wonders if intergalactic travel visas exist because—my God, it’s time to just throw the whole planet away.
From CNBC:
President Donald Trump on Wednesday dropped tariffs under his new trade plan to 10% on imports from most countries, as he announced a 90-day pause for higher, so-called reciprocal tariffs that took effect on many countries this week.
Trump’s credited his decision to pause the full effect of tariffs on the fact that “more than 75 Countries” have contacted U.S. officials to negotiate trade imbalance issues. Those negotiations will continue during the pause.
Trump also said in a social media post that he was raising the tariffs imposed on imports from China to 125% “effective immediately” due to the “lack of respect that China has shown to the World’s Markets.”
Trump accused China of “ripping off the U.S.A.,” which is generally what he has claimed of every country he has unilaterally faced off against, including our two closest trade partners, Canada and Mexico, in his bid to reframe his idiotic tariff tyranny as a push for reciprocity from those nations. Meanwhile, the president who was supposed to lower the price of goods has done nothing but cause economic uncertainty while grocery prices continue to stress the hell out of all of our wallets.
Sad.
