Will tariffs make America great?

turingtest said:
That would certainly be my question. Trump claims that other countries are "ripping us off" because...America can afford to buy more stuff from other individual nations than those other individual nations can afford to buy from us? I mean, ok, that's a deficit, but it seems more like a natural consequence of being The Richest Country On Earth than a problem that needs fixing.
Click to expand...
it's a natural consequence on forcing the world to use $ for commodity trading.
 
A trade deficit is normally detrimental to the value of a currency; not so in the case of a reserve currency, such as the dollar, as demand for it goes beyond US purchasing and extends to all players using it for transactions and as a store of value, serving to smooth the impact of fluctuations in the value of their own currency. Owning the world's reserve currency is a huge advantage because it allows the US to run large deficits, and an advantage to the world in terms of providing reliable liquidity.

Once the good faith management of a reserve currency is lost, trade can shift. The only advantage the US has right now is that the only alternatives are the yuan, also under questionable management, especially in terms of transparency, and the euro, which is less reliable because it is subject to wider swings in potential governance. Thus, gold, for now.

But the US can see its ability to sustain the dollar as sole reserve is eroding rapidly, especially now that trade itself is re-routing to become more multilateral and less weighted toward the US. Once that goes far enough, you can have rapid dollar depreciation if the deficit remains high, and there is insufficient dollar demand. That leads to inflation and a vicious feedback loop.

Good reason why Japan's threat to dump its $1Trillion in US bonds is so powerful.

If the inevitable happens, ie, the corrupt US system in cahoots with oligarchs turns to bitcoin and other such tulips as a store of value, the manure will hit the wind farm.
 
Last edited:
and really the downside of loss of currency value, inflation, is countered by expanding your economy. as long as your growth is roughly the same as inflation it’s basically a wash.
 
Garrison said:
There is also the question of what about films shooting on location? Just look at the forthcoming Mission Impossible movie, or any of the previous ones. It's an American film but big chunks where filmed overseas with foreign crews and foreign actors, would Trump's tariff apply to those.
Click to expand...

Or anything in the legendary city of Seacouver.
(Vancouver is frequently used as a stand-in for Seattle or other Pacific Northwest cities.)
 
strandjunker
Allow me to address the elephant in the room: The decades-long outsourcing of domestic manufacturing to China was not an insidious Chinese conspiracy for dominance but the greedy strategy of the American ruling class to explode its profit margins by exploiting global inequality.

It's OK for America to make riding lawn mowers and bigger things. If you can ship a ton of the item in a shipping container, it would have happened to most things.

www.threads.com

Tero Jarvi (@tero55jarvi) on Threads

If they did not move those manufacturing jobs (like Apple), others would have started factories in China and made competing products. Anyone with money (Europe, Asia). So it would have happened anyway. Americans would just have been stuck at the retail end of those goods.
www.threads.com www.threads.com
 
Nothing will make the USA great, except in the narrow thoughts of MAGArats who are confusing being a bully with greatness. The USA is a failing democracy, is proving to be an unreliable ally and partner, and is steadily losing influence in the rest of the world. Most countries are seeking out alternatives for things they had previously relied on the USA for.
 
Darat said:
Of course it can - you place it on the value of the reels of films...
Click to expand...

Movies shot on digital - the currently overwhelming dominant format - do not require physical media to transport.

Also, the reel of film wouldn't be imported goods requiring customs clearance. They can be transported in personal luggage.

The Don said:
You're absolutely right that there's nothing currently in place to do this but I'm sure Elon could have something up and running in a matter of minutes.

The tariff process could be a part of the film certification process. If you don't prove you're US produced or you haven't paid the tariff then you don't get a certificate.
Click to expand...

Again, you're not describing a tariff.

And again, you can't just wish a certification process and an agency to enforce it into existence. The Trump administration has gotten away with most of what they're doing so far by using and manipulating existing government infrastructure. There is no existing government infrastructure in place for what you're describing, and certainly no laws that would give it any teeth. And it would be incredibly difficult and complex to manage. These clowns are struggling to keep planes in the air.

It would go something like this:

Trump administration: You are required to certify that your movies are made in the U.S. or pay a fine.

Multi-billion dollar media conglomerate with an army of lawyers: No, we're not.

Trump administration: ...
 
johnny karate said:
Movies shot on digital - the currently overwhelming dominant format - do not require physical media to transport.

Also, the reel of film wouldn't be imported goods requiring customs clearance. They can be transported in personal luggage.



Again, you're not describing a tariff.

And again, you can't just wish a certification process and an agency to enforce it into existence. The Trump administration has gotten away with most of what they're doing so far by using and manipulating existing government infrastructure. There is no existing government infrastructure in place for what you're describing, and certainly no laws that would give it any teeth. And it would be incredibly difficult and complex to manage. These clowns are struggling to keep planes in the air.

It would go something like this:

Trump administration: You are required to certify that your movies are made in the U.S. or pay a fine.

Multi-billion dollar media conglomerate with an army of lawyers: No, we're not.

Trump administration: ...
Click to expand...
Trump: We are going to invade your country if you don't! AND put eleventy billion tariffs on you!

Movie moguls: WTAF are you talking about??!
 
johnny karate said:
Movies shot on digital - the currently overwhelming dominant format - do not require physical media to transport.

Also, the reel of film wouldn't be imported goods requiring customs clearance. They can be transported in personal luggage.



Again, you're not describing a tariff.

And again, you can't just wish a certification process and an agency to enforce it into existence. The Trump administration has gotten away with most of what they're doing so far by using and manipulating existing government infrastructure. There is no existing government infrastructure in place for what you're describing, and certainly no laws that would give it any teeth. And it would be incredibly difficult and complex to manage. These clowns are struggling to keep planes in the air.

It would go something like this:

Trump administration: You are required to certify that your movies are made in the U.S. or pay a fine.

Multi-billion dollar media conglomerate with an army of lawyers: No, we're not.

Trump administration: ...
Click to expand...
Does the US not already have a film certification process ?

The UK does and a film cannot be put on general release without one. Of course there are ways to see films which haven't been through the process but they won't be in your local cinema or mainstream streaming service.
 
The Don said:
Does the US not already have a film certification process ?

The UK does and a film cannot be put on general release without one. Of course there are ways to see films which haven't been through the process but they won't be in your local cinema or mainstream streaming service.
Click to expand...

The U.S. has no government entity involved in certifying films. The MPAA which rates films is a voluntary trade organization.
 
johnny karate said:
The U.S. has no government entity involved in certifying films. The MPAA which rates films is a voluntary trade organization.
Click to expand...
Well there you go, make it a government entity by decree and you have your basic mechanism, if you actually wanted to do it - which we agree isn't Trump's objective, his objective is to look like a big man and to generate headlines.

It would also have the added bonus of allowing the government a way of removing "woke" and other undesirable content. They may not actually ban a movie which has a sympathetic gay, trans, or liberal character or which promotes an "unacceptable" message but they can give it an NC-17 certificate which will prevent it "damaging" children.
 
I presumed the thing that would be tariffed would be the fee for the rights to show the movie.

Whether that's a distributor for cinema chains or a TV channel or Netflix. If the fee is paid to a non-US company then you pay an additional 100% tax to Trump.
 
The Don said:
Well there you go, make it a government entity by decree and you have your basic mechanism, if you actually wanted to do it - which we agree isn't Trump's objective, his objective is to look like a big man and to generate headlines.

It would also have the added bonus of allowing the government a way of removing "woke" and other undesirable content. They may not actually ban a movie which has a sympathetic gay, trans, or liberal character or which promotes an "unacceptable" message but they can give it an NC-17 certificate which will prevent it "damaging" children.
Click to expand...

Even if it were possible for the Trump administration to somehow turn a voluntary organization within the film industry into a government agency with authority over the film industry, the “basic mechanism” for what you’re describing is most certainly not in place.

The MPAA doesn’t not perform any kind of oversight. They merely screen a movie and tell the filmmakers the rating. The filmmakers remain completely free to make any kind of movie with any kind of content that they want.

And then you still have the problem of lack of force of law (“by decree” does not grant that to the government) that the high-powered film industry attorneys will definitely push back against with great enthusiasm and legal standing.
 
Jack by the hedge said:
I presumed the thing that would be tariffed would be the fee for the rights to show the movie.

Whether that's a distributor for cinema chains or a TV channel or Netflix. If the fee is paid to a non-US company then you pay an additional 100% tax to Trump.
Click to expand...
You, I, and anyone who has thought about this for more than a nanosecond and who has actually considered how tariffs might be levied and collected have already done orders of magnitude more work on this than the Trump administration who have done nothing apart from announcing their intention to apply tariffs to foreign produced films.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom