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I Need to Vent

Oh my god. I can't stand some of the people I work with. I live in a very republican area so I have to deal with some of their views no matter what. That's okay, I guess.
But this one kid I work with is just over the top pro-Trump. "Yeah I'm worried about the impending trade war with China much more than getting into a war with North Korea."
Okay great. But then he goes on to say that he's not at all wirried about the economic consequences of a trade war because it will bring more jobs to the US.
Wait what? What the f is he even talking about?
CountScrofula · 41-45, M
Here's the logic.

"We have too much trade with China. Because we buy stuff from them cheap, it is cheaper to make stuff over there than it is to make it here. So they do work we should be doing. If we have a trade war, prices go up, and it will be cheaper to make it here."

The problem is that in order to actually compete with China you need to reduce salaries and labour conditions to the point where you just have the sweat shops on US soil.

Also it makes shit a LOT more expensive, and many people can barely afford to get by as is. It's not like wages are going to go up as a result of a trade war.

This is 'drunk idiot in a bar' politics. Reality is more complicated.
CountScrofula · 41-45, M
@boklenholley7 lol, well you probably know more than me ;) I was going off of the "What the f is he talking about?" because the ideas are so stupid I spent time trying to figure out the logic.
@CountScrofula oh sorry lol. No, I get the underlying economic principals behind what would actually happen. Even tried to explain it to him.
I think I told him that because Trump was going to put tariffs on Chinese goods, it would cost them more to sell it to us, so they'd jack up their prices. This would then cause the prices to nearly double for retailers in the usa making the customers here suffer since the retailers would have to keep making about the same profits. So customers would be paying about double to keep the retaiker in business.
But our wages aren't going to go up with the prices of these goods.. This is why everytime the usa has entered into a trade war we've also entered into recession.
People can't afford to buy as much so the retailers aren't making as much even after jacking up their prices, so they have to hire less help to sell these goods, etc etc. It trickles down into pretty much everything.
Sure, we could tax the shit out of chinese goods, but we went to china for a reason. Labor can be seen as any other raw material. We're not going to buy the bandaids that cost $10 when the same product costs $5 from a different brand. Same with labor.
As you said, our labor costs so much that if the goods that we get from china were made here, they'd cost way way more. Sure, having factories here would increase jobs, but that doesn't much matter when the people working in those factories wouldn't even be able to buy the product they were producing.
Economics is super interesting, sorry. Nobody wants to talk to me about it and I don't know that much.
CountScrofula · 41-45, M
@boklenholley7 Don't be sorry! It is super interesting stuff.

None of these guys care about the actual idea of labour and wages and buying power. IF all the goods are expensive and all the wages are suppressed because of the lack of unions you get a crisis of consumption - everyone makes goods they can't consume themselves and the economy falls apart.
GoodoldBob · 61-69, M
The theory is that tariffs will make imported Chinese crap more expensive which will American made stuff competitive in terms of price. The price of many things goes up but because it is being made here there will be more jobs. The only problem is that the overall higher prices that result mean that some things, luxury items like high tech phones and big screen T.V.s, become unaffordable to lower income people. And of course that would not be popular.
@GoodoldBob 🤔 don't think you could appeal any of the amendments in the bill or rights. It'd get smacked down in a hurry.
GoodoldBob · 61-69, M
According to some polls 20% of Americans are already in favor.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/27/opinion/john-paul-stevens-repeal-second-amendment.html
@GoodoldBob that's less than half of half.. of the people who took that poll. They can't even be sure those people were Americans. I'm not very trust worthy of polls of any news organizations, personally.
I could see the second amendant having a hard time with all the school shootings. But getting them to write an amendant to repeal it is one thing. Getting it to go through all the hoops and checks and valances to actually get repealled.. I don't think you have much to worry about.
plankter979 · 51-55, M
It's hard to reason with those folks...
@plankter979 he won't even let me try.. he doesn't want to talk just state his opinion and that he's right.
plankter979 · 51-55, M
if he heard it on Fox News, it must be so!
@plankter979 accurate. So fucking accurate.
TJNewton · M
Trump supporters are more delusional than dumbfuck himself
@TJNewton I agree.

 
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