Trump warned automakers not to raise prices after his tariffs and be happy how ‘great’ they are

Holy shit everyone was right and he doesn't understand how tariffs work

trump has had 6 companies go bankrupt he is not a good business man.
- No, no, no. Don’t you see, making 6 companies go bankrupt makes Trumpy a very a good business man. /s

Is he so stupid he doesn't understand how to fascism?
- Yes, and at this point it's the United States' only hope.
  
  Can't count on the people, better hope the regime kills itself.

So he's basically telling the other billionaires to eat the cost of the tariff themselves and NOT pass them on to the consumer.
Trump really is stupid enough to start biting the hands that gave him his current position, all because Musk tells him to.
- If it actually worked it's a funny way to say, let's tax corporations. It would never happen though because it makes line go down.
  
  it makes line go down.
  You often see the question asked online "What radicalized you?"
  For me, I was working for a telecommunications provider as a manager and was told that neither myself nor my staff would see any raises or bonuses that year because "the company didn't make any money."
  The kicker being that the company made 6 billion that year. But because the money counters had projected them to make 7 Billion, and they didn't hit it, giving out raises would make the stock price drop even more than it was already going to. Essentially, not enough profit, is the same as NO profit.
  But you better believe the CEO and executives got their bonus that year.
  it makes line go down.

How great would it be if he somehow accidentally killed car dealerships
- Fuckcars is delighted
- It will kill more than just dealerships. Imagine being any company operating in the US and the president threatening other companies for not paying the tariffs he is imposing. Imagine the investor confidence imploding and companies refusing to operate and close doors because they are not willing to pay for a stupid president destroying their profits. Companies have a fiscal responsibility to their shareholders, and this won't be tolerated.
  
  I thought China was paying the tariffs?
  /s
- Sneaky carbon tax lol

Ugh, I hate this timeline, where a whole lot of people, countries, and organizations are trying to avoid incurring the wrath of a complete dipshit and total baby named donvict.

I hope the car makers said ‘thank you’

At this point, I am surprised he hasn't ordered the treasury department to just mint more cash.
- That will come. He’ll also stop payments on Treasury Bonds. Not paying agreed upon obligations is his MO in business.
- I think that's what happened to Nazi Germany, so just wait a little while.
  Meanwhile, prepare to barter.

So basically government price fixing. Isn't USA supposed to be the pillar of libertarian capitalism?
- So basically government price fixing.
  Not even. He's not doing anything to prevent prices from going up. He's just whining at businesses for refusing to cut their margins to fund his government.
  Isn’t USA supposed to be the pillar of libertarian capitalism?
  It's funny. There's a couple of think thanks - the Fraiser Institute, the Hoover Institute, in collaboration with the CATO Institute - that are constantly putting out papers saying how America hasn't gone Libertarian Capitalist enough. Historically, the two places in the world they consider "Most Libertarian" have been Hong Kong and Singapore.
  However, over the last decade, they've been forced to delist both of these locations as Chinese business investment flooded in and American financial interests were shoved out. So now their new favorite spots are Switzerland, New Zealand, Luxembourger, and Ireland. Incidentally, these institutes are filling up with White Nationalists and other ultra-orthodox Christian Conservatives who refuse to acknowledge any country with brown people in it might have civil or economic liberties. The current issue of their annual newsletter blames a great deal of this shift on pandemic response and subsequent economic relief during the downturn. But there's plenty of ink spilled denouncing any country that's breaking away from the MAGA mindset, particularly Canada, China, and Mexico.
  As our relationships with the BRICS and the various Latin American, African, and Southeast Asian states have deteriorated, our ability to recognize them as free and liberal have decayed alongside them. And the criticisms internally ebb and flow with the state of domestic politics - Obama ushering in a low-watermark for American liberty, for instance.
  
  Funny story.
  A while back someone posed a question online. They wanted to know why all Socialist countries fail? I answered that they don't; look at Canada. They told me that I was a fool, because the Heritage Foundation had showed that Canada was freer than the USA. I asked why we shouldn't have Canadian style health care? They never got back to me.
  Reminded because of the folks you cited.
- Libertarian police
  I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief.
  “Bad news, detective. We got a situation.”
  “What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?”
  “Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.”
  The heroin needle practically fell out of my arm. “What kind of monster would do something like that? Bitcoins are the ultimate currency: virtual, anonymous, stateless. They represent true economic freedom, not subject to arbitrary manipulation by any government. Do we have any leads?”
  “Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.”
  “Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”
  He laughed. “That’s why you’re the best I got, Lisowski. Now you get out there and find those bitcoins.”
  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m on it.”
  I put a quarter in the siren. Ten minutes later, I was on the scene. It was a normal office building, strangled on all sides by public sidewalks. I hopped over them and went inside.
  “Home Depot™ Presents the Police!®” I said, flashing my badge and my gun and a small picture of Ron Paul. “Nobody move unless you want to!” They didn’t.
  “Now, which one of you punks is going to pay me to investigate this crime?” No one spoke up.
  “Come on,” I said. “Don’t you all understand that the protection of private property is the foundation of all personal liberty?”
  It didn’t seem like they did.
  “Seriously, guys. Without a strong economic motivator, I’m just going to stand here and not solve this case. Cash is fine, but I prefer being paid in gold bullion or autographed Penn Jillette posters.”
  Nothing. These people were stonewalling me. It almost seemed like they didn’t care that a fortune in computer money invented to buy drugs was missing.
  I figured I could wait them out. I lit several cigarettes indoors. A pregnant lady coughed, and I told her that secondhand smoke is a myth. Just then, a man in glasses made a break for it.
  “Subway™ Eat Fresh and Freeze, Scumbag!®” I yelled.
  Too late. He was already out the front door. I went after him.
  “Stop right there!” I yelled as I ran. He was faster than me because I always try to avoid stepping on public sidewalks. Our country needs a private-sidewalk voucher system, but, thanks to the incestuous interplay between our corrupt federal government and the public-sidewalk lobby, it will never happen.
  I was losing him. “Listen, I’ll pay you to stop!” I yelled. “What would you consider an appropriate price point for stopping? I’ll offer you a thirteenth of an ounce of gold and a gently worn ‘Bob Barr ‘08’ extra-large long-sleeved men’s T-shirt!”
  He turned. In his hand was a revolver that the Constitution said he had every right to own. He fired at me and missed. I pulled my own gun, put a quarter in it, and fired back. The bullet lodged in a U.S.P.S. mailbox less than a foot from his head. I shot the mailbox again, on purpose.
  “All right, all right!” the man yelled, throwing down his weapon. “I give up, cop! I confess: I took the bitcoins.”
  “Why’d you do it?” I asked, as I slapped a pair of Oikos™ Greek Yogurt Presents Handcuffs® on the guy.
  “Because I was afraid.”
  “Afraid?”
  “Afraid of an economic future free from the pernicious meddling of central bankers,” he said. “I’m a central banker.”
  I wanted to coldcock the guy. Years ago, a central banker killed my partner. Instead, I shook my head.
  “Let this be a message to all your central-banker friends out on the street,” I said. “No matter how many bitcoins you steal, you’ll never take away the dream of an open society based on the principles of personal and economic freedom.”
  He nodded, because he knew I was right. Then he swiped his credit card to pay me.
  
  Still one of the absolutely best things I've ever read; always reread in full.
- Trading through coercion.
  
  Aka the mafia .... backed by muscle and violence
  Do as we say ... or you're going to have some trouble with your knees ... you don't want trouble with your knees do you? .... wouldn't want to have an accident with your knees
  
  Extortion.
- It never has been. US capitalism has always been the kind that actually exists in the wild: corrupt, subsidy-consuming, protected by regulatory capture, and inextricably entangled with the workings of the government.
  Libertarians' ideas of what capitlalism is fail to reflect any historical situation anywhere, since their simplistic models fail to consider second-order effects, non-linearities and human nature. But coupling with other systems is inevitable, and there is no economics that exists independently of politics. Karl Marx got a lot of things wrong, but he knew that key fact.

If nothing else, I look forward to the history books and a tragicomedy documentary about...everything, really.
- History is written by the victors, and the outcome is looking grim right now.
  
  Idk man, the west still have records of the Tiananmen Square Massacre.
  Similary, non-US countries will have records of the US's fascism spiral.
  
  That works much less in an interconnected world (part of why they hate globalism). There are other countries keeping tabs as well. It's also why we know of the many atrocities committed by the US worldwide. They can try and hide what they can, but it's much harder these days.
  
  I am certain that Dogey America will lose. Whether any good parts of the USA survive the chemotherapy is the question.
- I want to be there when the students ask “”why didn’t the ones with the guns to protect against tyranny use them”.

Let's do some overly simplistic bad economics just for fun. Let's suppose that the American car companies are not hurt by the tariffs because those only target foreign car companies. Now all the foreign cars are 25% more expensive. This raises the demand for domestic cars. If the domestic car companies are trying to make money, they will jack up their prices 24%. And what are we told? Something about how they have duty to their shareholders? ... Donald is having fun living in his dream world.
- are they even able to produce the parts domestically?
  
  Not for a few years at least, if ever. And building this capacity costs money they will want to recoup.
- Yup that's literarily what happened last time he did this shit with washing machines.
  Now washing machines are more expensive across the board.
  Trump is a moron, and his voters are even bigger morons.

I'm starting to think that this guy might not understand how economies work.
- The guy owned casinos that went bankrupt. It takes a special kind of person to do that
- But he had the best bankruptcies, beautiful bankruptcies, everbody said say, many woman said "no more bankruptcies, they are too great", believe me!
- He doesn't have to. The goal of Trump is simple: exert power. He doesn't care who gets hurt in the process so long as his base sees him as their God (intentionally using the capital G here).
  
  And if his decrees don’t have the expected results, it’s someone else’s fault.
- Who was the ex member of his team that said he was in the room when people tried to explain tariffs to Trump and he clearly didn't understand them, he just likes them based on his misunderstanding of them...
  I'm sure he believes that other countries are paying the tariffs and it's money going to the US federal coffers...
  
  He seems to consider them in a vacuum.
  "Prices rise, but that's only a temporary problem for plebs refusing to buy American. Once US manufacturing catches up, they will buy American and all is well."
  That is of course incomplete and ignores the very real problem of manufacturing PARTS and raw resources also being affected. If not by Trumps tariffs, then by retaliatory ones from other countries. It also squashes your own export market. All of that together will leave prospective American factory bosses with a choice: Will they build a factory in the US and deal with higher prices and less customers, or will they build a factory in India, where they can export to every country on this planet (except the US but who cares) and have quick and cheap access to Chinese and Russian raw resources and a cheap labor pool?
- Yeah and the worst part? People will probably still will vote overwhelmingly republican. If you're gonna be dumb you gotta be tough i guess....

I cannot wait for that fat bastard to die. Plenty of much better, useful, kinder, loved, younger people die every day. Why can't we have some fucking justice?
- Im worried that at this point, for all the destruction and permanent damage hes done, that we may just need him to stick around and break more things.
  If he kicks off tomorrow, we could have this happen again. It all gets washed under the rug and hes replaced with more subtle powers. It only took 4 years for the majority of the usa to forget the first round of damage he caused, after all.
  But then again, if he lasts too long, we risk never recovering.
  There is a sick, nihilistic balance to all this now imo. I want a guarantee that we dont slip down this road again. And unfortunately more pain may be the only way to guarantee it for the next few generations.
  I feel dirty even saying it. But in my gut, i believe it.
  
  That's the sam brownback concept, but even though he was so terrible Kansas switched to a democratic governor they still voted Republican federally. So it's not like the real maga people will ever be contrite, they'll just blame people who hindered trump no matter what.
  
  I think that's a form of accelerationism, but I am less sceptical of that position than I used to be. Trump has shown what the system is capable of once the mask is stripped off. Many of the horrors of Trump's misrule are matters of degree, not of kind. Under the veneer of gentility, noeliberal capitalism was just as rapacious as it is now, inequality was growing rapidly, and US imperialist interference with other countries, including giving support to genocide, was carried out even without Trump's foul presence.
  Is ot worse now? Yes, in every way. But will restoring status quo ante be sufficient to stop the rot? No, which is one explanation for the popular revulsion not only at MAGA, but alos at the mainstream Democratic Party's gormless money-grubbing lip service.
  
  No.
  My fear during the first Trump was that he would be followed by someone who learned his lessons but wasn't an infinite man-child.
  That partly happened, his handlers are far more efficient now.
  This train ain't got no stops mow.
- Only problem is if he does before the next US election JD Vance will take over and that could be just as bad
  
  It would be worse but JD doesn't have the cult of personality behind him. More repubs would speak out against JD pulling this. It wouldn't be as effective.

Trump: worship me
Auto makers: you literally fucked us all over.
Trump: and I expect you to thank me for it.
- At least they’re wearing suits, am I right?

Can you say "economic collapse".
- The trump regime was designed to TANK the US economy so that stocks, businesses, and industries can be bought by billionaires at rock bottom prices.
  All is going according to plan.
  
  100% agree, this is a coordinated attack on the US by bad faith actors willing to sell a society into bondage for personal gain. They want to make themselves techno-pharoes, in my opinion.
  
  This is something people forget a lot because everyone gets consumed by latest bullshit drama pop political news.
- yup he is helping russia make US go bankrupt. Trump has talent in bankrupting his companies.

Is that.. is that a portrait of Reagan on the wall behind him? The man has no concept of irony..
- It feels so gross upvoting a picture and quote from Reagan.
  
  I felt pretty gross posting it, so, ya know, fair enough.
  
  Agreed. But this is a stopped clock situation, and the sentiment is not wrong.
  
  Truth is truth, no matter the source.
  
  you're upvoting an even worse than Reagan meme
- May Reagan burn in hell.
  Especially because that quote was to counter pressure to say that trade relations were invalid if one party wasn't protecting the environment and human rights (for example, by imposing slave-labor conditions on factory workers).
  
  Oh 100% agreed, Reagan was a piece of shit, I just find it hilarious that Trump reveres a man who spoke openly against exactly what he's doing.
- It's not just irony he has no knowledge of history. He know that Reagan said that. All he knows is that Reagan has an R beside his name and maybe possibly the words trickle down economics.
  
  He know that Reagan said that.
  Since we're talking about Trump I am 100% confident you are wrong on that.
  He doesn't care about R, just ego.
  Reagan also never used the words trickle down economics. Nor would pretty.much anyone Trump talks to. He wouldn't associate Reagan with that either.

Absolute clown administration
- Absolute clown country
- administration
  Regime*
  
  Youre right mb

He's such an abysmally bad politician. Bungler. He's ruining the country.
- He was put in to sabotage the US both internally and globally. That doesn't require him to be a good politician, just a relentless, brutal wrecker.
  
  Donald Trump represents a symptom of a deeper, systemic issue within the United States: The nation is grappling with severe internal fractures.
  The most important division is the extreme concentration of wealth in the hands of very few. The rich are virtually untaxed. Many of these wealthy individuals and corporations have offshored their operations, amassing revenues that surpass those of entire nations.
  This economic imbalance has enabled the powerful to dominate both traditional media and social media platforms. They are effectively manipulating public opinion. By exploiting the vulnerabilities of an under-educated populace, this influence has undermined democratic processes.
  
  I fully agree. The next step that hopefully doesn't come to pass is causing so much frustration and hate that it leads to riots or other forms of attack. When that happens, he is going to call marshall law and take control as a dictator. Scary time to live in America.
- I find the small insight we are getting about him as a businessman equally interesting.
- He's supposed to be a businessman. How can he not understand that business doesn't work like that?
  
  He is a businessman, but there was always debate about whether he was a good businessman. Judging by his casinos going bankrupt, I would consider him bad. Also see trump steaks, or trump university.
  
  He was never a good businessman, though.
  If he hadn't started with inherited wealth, he would never have been able to get to where he is.
  
  Is he really tho:
  Why Donald Trump's Companies Went Bankrupt
  "Details About the 6 Trump Corporate Bankruptcies"

This, again, shows the enormous reaches of stupidity that Trump fills.

Why’s he so utterly obsessed with tariffs? Like he thinks they just fix everything. It’s so stupid.
- Usually, it takes Congress to agree on something to raise taxes on the working class. With tariffs, he can do it by himself like a real dictator would.
  
  Keep in mind that Congress delegated that power to the President, and (if they were ever to become vertebrates) they could rescind that power too.
- Trump is not nearly as smart as people seem to think he is.
  I 100% guarantee you that someone in his inner circle has convinced him that tariffs fix everything and it’s now the entirety of his economic playbook.
  It also hurts America and alienates us from our allies, which is what his puppet master wants, so two birds/one stone.
  
  I mean he's essentially just following project 2025. They clearly didn't want him to think too much this time around.
  
  I don't know, I feel like if he was dumber than most people thought he would be vegetative.
  
  The list of allies is not that long at the moment.
  
  He had to learn that even a president doesn't have absolute power to rule. And he's intellectually incapable of drafting and passing proper laws. Therefore, he uses decrees and tariffs, tools that even a teenager could use. His actions reveal that he does not really understand the complexity of society or the economy.
- The government takes the increase at import from the importer. He’s the government. He’s telling them he’s keeping the money that he inserted himself into the supply chain.
  Like it’s probably going to his personal bank account.
- Like he thinks they just fix everything.
  Like those who pull his strings know that tariffs are an effective means of economic sabotage.
- Isn't the narrative that he's jacking up Tariffs to remove the income tax? Like how it used to be 100 years ago or some shit.
  
  He’s using the money to pay for the impending wars he’s trying to start.
- In addition to what others have said, he also enjoys the direct power it gives him over corporate leaders. He wants to coerce them into subservience so they have to kiss his ass and be nice to him. Tariffs give him something to hold over their heads.

Don't worry guys, he "saved them" by eliminating subsidies for EVs. That fad is clearly going away, and by gutting the American auto industry's ability to grow their EV market share, we'll clearly be poised for global dominance. Obviously the rest of the world LOVES smog and HATES silent/emissions free vehicles and will FLOCK to ICE cars that are priced the same as Chinese EVs.
- The silent part is a bit of an issue though. For safety reasons.
  
  Trivially solvable with regulation
  
  Are you going to force bicycle riders to also put playing cards in their spokes so we can hear them too? Will pedestrians be forced to sing while in public? Or will people instead learn to actually look? Anyway, even a silent car emits lots of tyre noise, and every EV I've run across also makes some sci-fi-like noise whenever the motor is running.
  
  From outside the main thing you hear from a car is the noise it makes through rolling. You still hear that with EV. The silent part is when you're sitting inside since good cars are dampening the roll (and wind) noise

Don’t raise prices ! Just sell at a loss ! How hard could it be ?
- Not sure what we should expect when the advice is coming from a "businessman" who's art of the deal has been to bankrupt 6 or 7 businesses...
  
  And what, two or three of those were casinos? Anyone who's worked in one can tell you how hard it is to do that. They absolutely PRINT money. It would be impressive, if he wasn't running the country in the same way.
- Yeah, you can make it up in volume!

Yeah... that's not how that works. He's shitting on us and blaming everyone else for it

unions support the move as a job creator
... until manufacturers go bankrupt
- unions
  Article only says the UAW, which has more retired members than it does active, and a pathetically small percentage of the active automotive workforce.
  I’m not super well versed in “healthy union demographics”, but a quick wikipedia perusal says the three largest US unions (National education association, service employee international union, and the american federation of state, county, and municipal employees) have between 2-15% retirees.
  Something tells me the UAW is just led by chuds but what do I know?
  
  I thought that couldn't be true, but yeah, you're right. Over 400,000 active members and more than 580,000 retired members. Odd.
  
  UAW also represents DoD workers, which has a lot of (retired) veterans on it's roster. I don't know if that's skewing the numbers but something to consider.
  
  It seemed odd to me to that Shawn Fain would throw support behind tariffs, but it does make sense in this way: "free-trade" agreements allowed US mftr companies to move manufacturing outside the US, where they could pay employees way less while still charging huge markups while selling inside the us, and the c-suite pockets the surplus. The new tariffs ''supposedly' should encourage companies to bring manufacturing jobs back to the states, which is in line with the goals of the UAW - improve working conditions and encourage job growth in the auto sector in the US. So even if the real end result of the tariffs is that companies just continue to overcharge and screw people over and find ways to avoid paying fair wages (which is clearly whats going to happen), the alleged goals of the tariffs are in line with UAW goals...but its still bad optics for Shawn Fain to agree with Trump on anything for a siginificant amount of UAW members, especially since UAW now includes a lot of college/university/education/science sector members as well
- Tariffs for Canada and Mexico would only be beneficial for automotive manufactures if A) American manufacturers were not heavily invested in and leveraging factories in Canada and Mexico and B) Canada and/or Mexico had any major auto manufacturers of their own competing with American brands. Neither of those is true. They MAY divest from Canadian or Mexican factories as a result and reinvest in domestic factories. BUT they are going to take big losses for that divesture AND be paying tariffs every time their parts ship between their factories across the borders right now. Their costs are going to go up and Americans will have to pay for the difference there.
- You drank some neolib koolaid if you think manufacturers are going bankrupt from this. Auto manufacturing is one of the sectors where jobs have been continually exported to Mexico for lowering labor costs and increasing profit margins. It's also a sector where there still is a significant manufacturing base in the US and it can be expanded if needed. The real issue is with auto tariffs is parts since those have more diverse sources across borders.
  This isn't the chips manufacturing sector that doesn't exist in any significant capacity in the US, where increasing tariffs would just increase prices / lower margins without any chance of recourse in the short term.
  
  The real issue is with auto tariffs is parts since those have more diverse sources across borders.
  That doesn't convey just how insanely complex car-manufacturing supply chains actually are. And the transition to just-in-time manufacturing has meant that stock on hand is kept to a bare minimum, so the impact of disruptions is even greater than it would have been a generation ago.
  
  Thanks for this detailed analysis.
  As for my comment, it was from an extremely simplistic reasoning (that you could call borderline dumb but probably not neoliberal 🤣).
  My reasoning was that, if their costs goes up (because of tariffs) and they have to sell at the same price, so, making a loss on every sell, eventually, they would go bankrupt.

While the United Auto Workers union support the move as a job creator
Yeah, I bet the Canadian members of the UAW will be stoked to hear this
The United Auto Workers(UAW), […] that represents workers in the United States (including Puerto Rico) and southern Ontario, Canada

So America is great again right? Right?
- It's so great right now, and it's only becoming even more great. It's incredible how great it is.

There’s no way for carmakers to absorb tariffs AND increase jobs with the reduced revenue.
- The best they can do is probably close their Canadian/Mexican plants if the losses are too great, which would increase unemployment in those areas for not only the automotive factories, but also the ones for the automotive suppliers. Even if a Chinese company swoops in to buy the factories, it'd take time to set things up.
- They can, they'll just go out of business. Puts them at a huge competitive disadvantage relative to asian and European car makers.

Capitalism at work, shithead. Get fucked

This is #mafia #fascism tactics. I hope #us economy leaders will realize how crazy #trump is and the will go against him.
- I'm gonna have to confiscate these: ####.
  
  Seriously, what can possibly make that worth adding?
- And that will come, but unfortunately not before he turned the country into a fascist state with no more balance of power. At that time, oligarchs will have their useful idiot removed and replaced by a real puppet that will be granted absolute power.

Yeah, good luck with that. He has lost what little business sense he had
- He's a dementia riddled old man who shits in diapers. What do you expect?

Keep this up and we might even get to see America starting a state-run car company. This'll be great to watch. 🍿
- Yeah, but instead of getting Volkswagen or Lada, we'll get
  Tesla, or more likely Trump Cars (shudders)
  
  A cyber truck with a bad blonde toupee?

Be sure not to offset the costs by eliminating executive raises and bonuses, or by trimming their ridiculously large salaries! Those are sacrosanct!

"The price is the same as last year's but today's model comes with x, y, z optionals that make the price go that high"
- Options include: wheels, seats, and paint
  
  No it’ll probably be “options” like a hood paint protection film, premium floor mats, door trim protectors and other dealer installed “options” that are in no way optional and get added to every car with a 800% markup.

So, now when the automotive manufacturers inevitably raise their prices, he can point and whine “but I told them not to, see it’s their fault”. And the foaming masses will blindly follow the pied piper off the cliff, further into fascism. I hate how fucking predictable this is becoming. It’s like a terrible abc sitcom. Only it’s scary real life.

claiming the tariffs would be “great” and benefit U.S. manufacturing
would be wild to get his elevator pitch in this. lol. without saying "trade war" and bigly fear mongering.

The man simply does not know what a tariff is, and is doing this because otherwise Putin releases the tapes. Its simple
- If I were him I'd just let Putin release the damn tapes, since it seems impossible that anything could actually damage his image with his rabid followers anyway.
  But that'd require one functioning brain cell, and if he had that we probably wouldn't be in this position now to begin with.
  
  If the tapes existed they wouldn't phase him, he has already weathered more shameful charges/realizations against him with no loss in the mania driving his sycophants. He was promised to be given enough wealth to finally prove himself to his dead father.

Okay so puts on American auto makers????
Lmao
I'll wait for them to miss the ring.

I know at least Subaru has already sent out emails to dealerships to expect prices to increase in April. If you're currently looking into purchasing a new car, better do it sooner rather than later.
- Alternatively, you may wait for things to come crashing down (both interest rates and prices) once we hit the inevitable recession and Trump is forced to face the reality of his moronic policies.
  
  That would imply he’s capable of seeing the error of his ways. He’s not.

I know he's dumb, but god. Wow.

Question here, anyone know if Tesla is produced entirely domestic? The Detroit brands all at least have parts and for some models entire production facilities in Canada/Mexico.
Not that he would use government power to so explicitly help his playmate there, just curious...
- Tesla benefits the most from the tariffs. There was an article about it a day or two ago.
- Tesla does source some parts from outside the US, so they will be impacted. However, they are definitely the MOST US-based and will be hurt the least. Other US brands and foreign brands that have mfg in the states source a ton of parts from around the world. Those parts will all be more expensive, so prices will go up by some percentage.
- Yes, tesla is domestically made. Probably a big reason for these particular tariffs.
- It depends on the model and parts. Overall Tesla is hurt the least. I think their LFP batteries are PRC-made for example. For the Big Three, the parts situation is the most complicated. There are plenty US-made vehicles, e.g. F-150, but various parts could come from anywhere in North America.

Someone make this make sense to me. If imported parts and cars are subject to a tariff. How does that increase the cost of American goods outside of corporate greed?
- Prices increase in response to increase in costs- this is so basic it's covered in introductory econ courses and applies to all businesses. Adding costs to production has to be reflected in the final price. Tariffs pretty much never help consumers- they prop up inefficient industries that can't compete with global trade. In general, global trade with low tariffs is better because of specialization
  
  The problem here isn't the increased price of goods, it's the fact that Trump knows increasing the price of non-US built cars via tarrif gives US car companies an advantage that could be used to sell more cars for less money, but will really just give US car companies the opportunity to raise prices any amount they choose, as long as it's slightly less than the tarrif, thereby making more money and enjoying the advantage of not paying the tariffs. People will still buy cars, and they might buy American cars because they're now a little cheaper than non-US.... But if they do this, the tariffs will pretty much only result in higher priced cars across the board instead of affordable IS cars vs expensive foreign ones.
  Basically someone explained to Trump one of the many ways the tariffs will be backfiring, and he's ineffectually asking companies not to do that.
  
  Well, it doesn't HAVE to be,.depending on the margins, the increase, how responsive consumers are to price increases in that good, and whether or not it's strategically beneficial to eat the slimmer margin for some reason.
  Practically a public 25% tariff is fantastic cover for a 30% price increase these days.
- There was a good graphic earlier I saw somewhere on Lemmy. Metal gets made in America and shipped to Canada to be made into rods which gets shipped to America (2 lots of tariffs) then to Mexico for cutting into piston pieces and back to America to be used in car making. So 1 small piece taxed from tariffs 4 times.
  Might be slightly wrong on the exacts, but you get the idea. The manufacturing system has been set up for free trade in north America, you can't just magic a new factory on US soil without spending a fortune and you can't know if these tariffs are just going to go away soon, in which case you're huge upfront investment was a waste.
  So costs of making have gone up, possibly a lot more than 25% in some cases.
- Because we can't build a lot of car parts in the US for the same price. If we tariff imports / move all manufacturing back to the US then prices must rise. The problem is that this sucks up money that would otherwise be spent on other things, so the economy on the whole suffers. One way that advanced countries adapt to this is by pivoting to high-tech manufacturing.. which requires highly skilled labor and can't be easily replicated in other countries. In other words let someone else make a cheap widget, then use that to build a jet engine that increases the added value of the widget dramatically.
- I’m not sure I get you…but either using components that are imported, and having to pay tax on that, or “they’ve increased their prices so I am”.
  If I’ve totally got this wrong I apologise.

Libertarian police