It's really more complicated than this.
Onshoring manufacturing is something that has to be incentivized and that has positive externalities outside of dollars and cents.
But some tariffs were really dumb, like on bananas. We can't grow bananas here...
It should be more complicated but the way the Trump admin did this isn't complicated. Tariffs were used to punish countries that didn't bend the knee. When they did, the tariffs were removed. So no-one was ever going to build a factory in the US because of tariffs, everyone knew they might go away tomorrow.
This back and forth is the entire issue if you ask me. Whoever you ask in the administration on any given day is going to say the tariffs exist for different reasons. It’s on purpose though - it’s so whoever is arguing for the admin can curate the answer.
Don’t like the cost? It’s a negotiation tactic. Want manufacturing back? That’s what it’s doing actually, it’s definitely a longterm play to bring it back. Worried about the debt? The tariffs are going to be a huge, permanent revenue generator that gets back at countries that “cheated” us. It can't be all these as multiple elements contradict each other.
I’ll take my Fox News slot now please and thank you.
> We can’t grow bananas here…
We can’t? Are south Florida, southern California, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, are they not “here”? There is literally a banana variety called California Gold.
It’s not that complicated. People got mad that gay people existed and they had to press “2” for English and here we are.
> But some tariffs were really dumb, like on bananas. We can't grow bananas here...
Trump and his cabinet don't understand this.
Hey, Chiquita needs to start paying for its own wars now.
Tariffs aren't incentives, the whole thing is upsidedown.
>Onshoring manufacturing is something that has to be incentivized and that has positive externalities outside of dollars and cents.
That's what the CHIPS act did. Indeed, everyone talking about TSMC, Intel, etc -- that's all because of the CHIPS act.
Toddler tantrum tariffs, which in reality are a vehicle for massive level corruption (see how Vietnam got a "deal" by approving a Trump resort. Or how every business leader is stuck to Trump's anus lest they be targeted by his tyrant tantrums), are not an incentive. It has had the opposite effect, and new builds have basically dried up.