Please can someone sensible explain to me why the American tariffs are a good idea?

It’s certainly an interesting and emotive debate.
I’m a simple soul, and it strikes me that the reason countries import goods is largely because of quality and cost. Germany/Japan make great cars, at an affordable price. I’d imagine labour rates and efficiency are a big factor here. Fender make nice guitars, but USA built ones are far more expensive and not significantly better than Korean built Fenders, so people of course buy the cheaper ones.
So, if the factories making American products aren’t selling nearly as many due to taxes on top of labour rate costs, what’s going to happen?
Additionally, with the reciprocal tariffs imposed on foreign goods, that’ll make the things that American people have enjoyed for generations far more expensive won’t it?
Assuming that the figures on trade are correct, (and who really knows), then how has an already wealthy country prospered so much? If the USA were to be a poor country I could understand this idea of “making things fair”, but we’re talking about the wealthiest economy in the world here aren’t we? Or is that wrong? I don’t know.

Perhaps my logic is flawed, and I don’t profess to being an expert economist, but I really can’t see how anyone is going to be better off here…

The US has a large trade imbalance with certain countries, and some think tariffs are the way to fix that.

Trump took a piece of paper, created a list of countries and for each country, he applied a simple formula:

country deficit with US divided by two and apply a percentage to it

And that's how much he figures they owe the US in tariffs.

Trump claims it's justified because this particular country is charging tariffs on US goods.

Which is a total lie.

Take South Korea for instance. 95 percent of goods from the United States are completely exempt from South Korean import tariffs, because we have a trade agreement with South Korea.

A percentage of the population chooses to believe the lie. And Trump presents himself as a crusader righting a wrong. Which creates a circle of ignorance.

Look at the responses here in support of tariffs. They all claim the same thing: they impose tariffs on us, we impose tariffs on them.

Mind you that Trump himself, sent all manufacturing related to the products he pushed to, you guessed it: China.

They also believe, driven by another Trump fat ass lie, that tariffs are paid by the exporter not the importers, because they don't know it's just another ft tax on the American people.

If Americans were playing football, and the EU team, (as an example), began every single game with an automatic 25 point handicap,in addition to refusing to allow the Americans to sell their hot dogs and hamburgers at the concession stands during the game, AND a biased referee, that would be equivalent to the 25% tariffs that the EU is now charging for American motor vehicles and many other items if they were to be sold in the EU.

WE were charging the EU and Japan 2% for the cars they imported to the States. THEY were charging us 25%. I think you can see the problem.

IF...and hopefully that is very soon...the people overseas who have been ripping us off for many, many years stop their hysterical screaming and reduce their tariffs on the United States, WE will quickly match those same tariffs. Tariffs will NOW be RECIPROCAL. If the EU charges us 25%, we will charge them 25%. If they charge us 2%, we will charge them 2%.

AND if any company now located overseas wants to build a factory inside the United States they will pay 0% tariffs. IN ADDITION, Trump will waive all their building costs on their first year of taxes!!!

It's extremely short sighted to think that this won't QUICKLY self adjust.

In 9 months, maximum, the people overseas who haven't been able to comprehend this simple math will go out of business.

Because the United States is the LARGEST and wealthiest market in the world.

The American people VOTED for this. We WANT this. We want the theft and disrespect to stop. We don't mind paying a little bit more for about 9 months till this whole thing levels off.

tariffs are more nuanced than people make them out to be...

Nor is it the first time we've used them to boost economy; FDR's Reciprocal Tariff Act in 1934 played a major role in getting us out of the great depression.

Treat others the way you want to be treated. Fair is fair.
We are finally doing the same thing every other nation has been doing for decades . I don’t see the problem in theory.

I don't know if I would go so far as calling them a great idea, but on the other hand a trade deficit approaching a trillion a year isn't a great idea either.

What's your solution?

External balance on goods and services (formerly resource balance) equals exports of goods and services minus imports of goods and services (previously nonfactor services). Data are in current U.S. dollars.
U.S. trade balance for 2022 was $-971.12B, a 13.15% increase from 2021.
U.S. trade balance for 2021 was $-858.24B, a 37.01% increase from 2020.
U.S. trade balance for 2020 was $-626.39B, a 8.28% increase from 2019.
U.S. trade balance for 2019 was $-578.50B, a 2.46% decline from 2018.

They are a good idea for America. With the previous inept, corrupt administration, American interests were the last thing they protected, as they spent wildly and stole from the treasury to the point that the country is facing bankruptcy. It had to stop, and the unfair trade margins from friend and foe alike can no longer be tolerated. Now, our trade partners can either remove their hands from our pockets and negotiate new, fair trade deals, or pay more. Tariffs are effective and were employed in the first Trump administration to foster a thriving economy.

Trump is motivated by personal spite and narcissism, not logic. Those that believe his lies really don’t think deep about these things.

Here is something I listened to recently:
https://www.npr.org/2025/04/03/nx-s1-5349574/are-trade-deficits-bad-no-economist-says

There’s differing opinions, but I found this a good explanation.

If tariffs are inherently bad .. why are you not questioning the rest of the world applying them to the US in an imbalanced manner the last >50 yrs??

How exactly is it only bad when we finally respond in kind??

Do you have any legitimate points on that ??

It is not about cost of goods to citizens of America, more or less, they will remain same for citizens. In most cases it will earn revenue to govt. of U.S. and in some scenarios it will give better opportunities to countries having low tariffs.

I said this in another post. This is not about Making A country great which was already great.

This is about forcing businesses and contries to bend a knee to Trump and grovel for relief in return for a pledge of loyalty to the king

don't ask for me, I didn't vote for him

Tariffs are the counterpoint to NAFTA but they are 32 years too late. NAFTA has already destroyed the middle class and trump will not resurrect it.

Tяump is making a mess of things. Global tariffs generally protect a few domestic industries. NOT like Tяump's tariffs

We're being tariffs on our exports

We can’t make sense of it either.

I'll let the source explain.

https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/china-retaliates-34-tariffs-us-imports

"We have been getting the short end of the stick for years and it's important that Americans understand this. These are reciprocal tariffs. We have been tariffed. Our goods are tariffed. We are always at an unfair disadvantage with these countries so it's going to be a little bumpy, they are going to cry, they are going to yell," he continued. "I spoke to the president personally yesterday, he was telling me that already, countries are coming to him saying ‘lets work this out, we can make a fair deal, we can do better.' We will. Everybody just hold on a little bit, be a little bit strong, Wall Street will come back. But this is also about Main Street, this is about making things in America."


As you can see, there are tariffs on our goods going out. And the Trump tariffs aren't nearly as high.

When the countries who are ripping us off decide to drop their tariffs, PRESIDENT TRUMP will drop ours.

The answer to your question is pretty much a basic, "No."

Trump is drunk on power. He's lost his mind. He has no one in his circle who will talk sense to him. He's created his own little echo chamber.

The orange freako has it all figured out 🤦🏻‍♀

Doesn't have to be logical when you're dealing with an illogical mind.

You know the dude has dementia...

lol

It’s almost like trump doesn’t understand how tariffs work.