Yeah, kind of exposes the cherry picking doesn't it?
Yeah, kind of exposes the cherry picking doesn't it?
Right, so you're obviously not understanding what I'm saying. Did you read the chart I posted? Namely you had several periods of inconsistency, which would probably allow for a high growth quarter..... right after an abysmal one. This to a degree provides a false sense of real growth. Steady and consistent growth is the key. Now it may not make 4% this year for sure, but the economy is doing significantly better, even with the tariff headwinds. It seems you would like to go back to unfair trade practices? Or do you propose a viable solution?
Dennis posted a remark from economists about 4% GDP growth being unreachable.
Those economists would surely have known that there were 4 quarters during the Obama years with GDP growth of 4%.
It must be obvious they mean 4% for an entire year.
That's the point.
Right now Trump is listening to Peter Navaro.
Navaro is something of an economic quack who advocates building an economic wall around the US.
That's the long game.
Economic isolation.
I don’t see Trumps game as isolationism, but as creating free trade when the US has been left on the short end of the stick in the past. Sometimes by design to bring this country to its knees.
That's the concerning part. Navarro is far from a "conservative economist" and the long game remains to be seen. Art Laffer, creator of the Laffer Curve, and Stephen Moore of the Heritage Foundation are conservative economists and they disagree with Trump's direction.
As we've seen many times over, the result might take on a form that even the architects didn't envision. An economy our size, as intertwined with the global economy as it is, is hard to control, predict, and manipulate.
If Trump can use tariffs in the short term to rearrange deals, that's great. I truly hope it works. But if the vision is some artificial tariff and quota laden house of cards, I hope it fails miserably.
And yet you don't seem to be able to.
Here's some stuff from somebody with an actual education in economics, and he's certainly nobody's liberal:
https://townhall.com/columnists/walterewilliams/2018/07/11/shooting-ourselves-in-the-foot-n2498527
The Canadian government, lining the pockets of its dairy producers, imposes high tariffs on American dairy imports. That forces Canadians to pay higher prices for dairy products. For example, Canadians pay $5.24 for a 10.5-ounce block of cheddar. In Washington, D.C., that same amount of cheddar sells for $3.64. Canadians pay $3.99 for a 1-pound container of yogurt. In Washington, D.C., you can get nearly twice as much yogurt for a little over $4. It's clear that the Canadian government's tariffs screw its citizens by forcing them to pay higher prices for dairy products.
What should the U.S. response be to Canada's screwing its citizens? If you were in the Trump administration, you might propose imposing tariffs on soft wood products that Americans import from Canada -- in other words, retaliate against Canada by screwing American citizens. Canadian lumber -- such as that from pine, spruce and fir trees -- is used in U.S. homebuilding. Guess what tariffs on Canadian lumber do to home prices. If you answered that they raise the cost and American homebuyers are forced to pay higher prices, go to the head of the class.
This retaliation policy is both cruel and not very smart. It's as if you and I were in a rowboat out at sea and I shot a hole in my end of the boat. What should be your response? If you were Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross or Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin, you might advise retaliating by shooting a hole in your end of the boat. If I were president, I'd try to persuade officials of other countries not to serve special producer interests by forcing their citizens to pay higher prices. But if they insisted, I'd say, "Go ahead, but I'll be damned if I'll do the same to Americans!"
What should the U.S. response be to Canada's screwing its citizens? If you were in the Trump administration, you might propose imposing tariffs on soft wood products that Americans import from Canada -- in other words, retaliate against Canada by screwing American citizens. Canadian lumber -- such as that from pine, spruce and fir trees -- is used in U.S. homebuilding. Guess what tariffs on Canadian lumber do to home prices. If you answered that they raise the cost and American homebuyers are forced to pay higher prices, go to the head of the class.
This retaliation policy is both cruel and not very smart. It's as if you and I were in a rowboat out at sea and I shot a hole in my end of the boat. What should be your response? If you were Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross or Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin, you might advise retaliating by shooting a hole in your end of the boat. If I were president, I'd try to persuade officials of other countries not to serve special producer interests by forcing their citizens to pay higher prices. But if they insisted, I'd say, "Go ahead, but I'll be damned if I'll do the same to Americans!"
Read the whole thing, then proceed to https://townhall.com/columnists/wal...14/trumps-steel-and-aluminum-tariffs-n2459974:
There are a couple of important economic lessons that the American people should learn. I'm going to title one "the seen and unseen" and the other "narrow well-defined large benefits versus widely dispersed small costs." These lessons are applicable to a wide range of government behavior, but let's look at just two examples.
Last week, President Donald Trump enacted high tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum. Why in the world would the U.S. steel and aluminum industries press the president to levy heavy tariffs? The answer is simple. Reducing the amounts of steel and aluminum that hit our shores enables American producers to charge higher prices. Thus, U.S. steel and aluminum producers will earn higher profits, hire more workers and pay them higher wages. They are the visible beneficiaries of Trump's tariffs.
But when the government creates a benefit for one American, it is a virtual guarantee that it will come at the expense of another American -- an unseen victim. The victims of steel and aluminum tariffs are the companies that use steel and aluminum. Faced with higher input costs, they become less competitive on the world market. For example, companies such as John Deere may respond to higher steel prices by purchasing their parts in the international market rather than in the U.S. To become more competitive in the world market, some firms may move their production facilities to foreign countries that do not have tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum. Studies by both the Peterson Institute for International Economics and the Consuming Industries Trade Action Coalition show that steel-using industries -- such as the U.S. auto industry, its suppliers and manufacturers of heavy construction equipment -- were harmed by tariffs on steel enacted by George W. Bush.
Last week, President Donald Trump enacted high tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum. Why in the world would the U.S. steel and aluminum industries press the president to levy heavy tariffs? The answer is simple. Reducing the amounts of steel and aluminum that hit our shores enables American producers to charge higher prices. Thus, U.S. steel and aluminum producers will earn higher profits, hire more workers and pay them higher wages. They are the visible beneficiaries of Trump's tariffs.
But when the government creates a benefit for one American, it is a virtual guarantee that it will come at the expense of another American -- an unseen victim. The victims of steel and aluminum tariffs are the companies that use steel and aluminum. Faced with higher input costs, they become less competitive on the world market. For example, companies such as John Deere may respond to higher steel prices by purchasing their parts in the international market rather than in the U.S. To become more competitive in the world market, some firms may move their production facilities to foreign countries that do not have tariffs on foreign steel and aluminum. Studies by both the Peterson Institute for International Economics and the Consuming Industries Trade Action Coalition show that steel-using industries -- such as the U.S. auto industry, its suppliers and manufacturers of heavy construction equipment -- were harmed by tariffs on steel enacted by George W. Bush.
Again, read the whole thing.
The real miracle is that some people don't realize they're being conned--won't accept it, even when it's stated as plainly as the nose on their faces--because they identify so deeply, so personally, with "their guy" that they can't accept the idea that the person for whom they voted is wrong...probably because accepting that means they'd have to accept that they themselves might be wrong. Thus, they'll proclaim their own knowledge, their easy understanding, even above people who are true experts in the field, because it's "pretty easy to understand," and they'll refuse to even listen to (or read) things that disagree, let alone give them thoughtful consideration.
The other unseen victim in tariffs is segments of the U.S. economy that see their own sales, and profits, diminish because of the loss of American dollars in foreign economies. If we buy less foreign steel, the money that those foreign economies would have used to purchase other American goods dwindles. Our steel industry goes through a period of artificial growth but other segments, like pharmaceuticals, take a hit.
Comparative Advantage is at play in that equation. What are we better at producing? Are we better off protecting and promoting industries in which we don't have Comparative Advantage in, or promoting and exploiting the ones we do?
It's one of the "simple economic measures" highlighted in The Choice.
I see short term usefulness in tariffs. I see them being a instrument to promote negotiation, but not something to build your economy around. Any "economist" who would recommend that is not an economist, he's a statist.
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