Discussion about this post

User's avatar
EggManMitch's avatar

Im already over this hot mess of a topic. I opined about the salmon getting flown 10000 miles from Alaska, then China, the US grocers, frozen and thawed many times. The collapse of pacific northwest lumber in the 90s and now not even income from weed growing. Theres a hundred examples of "free trade" fucking us.

But at the same time, I was supposed to be in Alaska already. For sablefish, latest data from '22 indicates 60% or so is exported, and mostly to Asia. So tarriffs are affecting the low-end fish positively (will have to be processed here), and the high-end fish negatively (market just got smaller for roe, sea cucumber, sushi-grade, etc.)

I imagine this scene is playing out across industries.

To summarize, I wish the implementation wasn't so messy, but the old way was fucking us pretty bad, ya know? Six countries of origin on a pack of mixed nuts is not sustainable.

Expand full comment
George Wilson's avatar

Ya, there isn't a coherent strategy. There are the concepts of a strategy, but it's mostly just chaos.

One thing I'll draw attention to are the businesses that chose to build in the US to avoid tariffs - although there were probably much better ways of doing that and it remains to be seen how much of a positive that will be - but it does push further the narrative that there was a point.

For any of the benefits, mostly it's just economic suicide, which our adversaries could only dream of. The economy was our biggest asset besides our military technical advantages and we are torching the economy and basically screwing over the military who will also have to deal with the 2nd and 3rd order effects of tariffs, even if they get exempted (not clear to me that they will be)

No matter how you look at it, we are screwing ourselves over for at best the potential of a future where there will be different winners than there are under the previous scheme.

This is why I think it's important to take the concerns of their constituents seriously because they feel like they'll become the new winners and to them, winning may not necessarily mean that any of the rest of us do well.

They very much could be wanting to burn it down out of spite so they can watch their opponents be in pain.

When a person or a group of people are hurting, it helps to meet them with compassion and validating their suffering and offering real solutions to their issues.

I think Blue states in many ways ought be more concerned with what's happening in Red states than in their own states because this issue doesn't just go away because one side or the other loses an election

If a man has nothing to lose, burning down the global economy doesn't seem all that bad relative to the life he was living anyways (or so they may think).

As a general matter though, supporting the admin in finding a coherent strategy might have redounded to our benefit for credibility with our allies and salvaging this wreckage as much as possible

If everyone believes there's no plan, including the allies we are ostensibly negotiating with, then economic calamity likely increases insofar as we are unwilling to actually change who is doing the negotiating.

One of my hopes was that they'd figure out some strategy and stick to it, even though it was always a horrendously bad idea to begin with (as executed)

Another possibility is that this results in them declaring martial law and we go further down into the authoritarian Hell hole. Then it's still bad for the rest of the world but then we also have to contend with the loss of our democracy in the process, and that's up there with worst outcomes.

Worst possible outcome is a nuclear war, which is much more probable with tariffs than without tariffs. Luckily the leaders of these nuclear nations seem to have a healthy fear of nuclear weapons, but when you unleash chaos upon the world, things outside the Overton Window become much more possible - which has been true since the election to the joy and dismay of many

The tariffs will likely have ruined us. At this point it's just a matter of degree.

We could pull together and salvage this situation, possibly, maybe. It's unlikely though without a unifying force. I think it is paramount to find a unifying force to defend against the worst outcomes

Because at this point the die has been cast and we will have to deal with the outcome regardless

Decent summation though

Expand full comment

No posts