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PaperclipPerfector  5d ago (text post)   22046 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 28, 2025

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Assuming for a moment that the purpose of tariffs is to shift consumer spending away from foreign imports and towards domesticly manufactured products,

Shouldn't you want retailers to break-out the tariff cost into a seperate legible line item?

A story broke this morning that Amazon was going to start labeling products with the tariff charged on each item to make the price changes legible to the consumer. From the perspective of a protectionist economic policy, this is a good thing. It makes it unignorably clear which items are made in China and which items are made in America. It also shows the direct monetary incentive for you the consumer to but the Made in America item over the Made in China item.

From the perspective of whatever the hell the Trump administration is trying to do, this is a disaster. I understand that governments would prefer the populace not be particularly mindful of how much money they pay in taxes, but it is another thing alltogether to hear this articulated by the press secretary as something that they think makes the administration look good to the public. The official line from the MAGA infuencer types on Twitter is that retailers are doing this as a distraction from the fact that they sell cheap slop from Asian sweatshops, but this is actually highlighting the fact that they sell cheap slop from Asian sweatshops.

Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, Hanania was right again.

You're getting lost in the details (which are mostly lies from both sides), when this is a case of simple conflict theory. Amazon thinks, correctly, that if they label the products with the tariff this will make people angry at Trump. Trump realizes this and opposes it.

This is good instinct for politics but awful instinct for statesmanship. No amount of conquering enemies will overcome the fact that these tarrifs are self-destructive.

If you go this hard on conflict theory you end up surrounded by sycophants in an epistemic black hole. This isn't just "one unfortunate thing Trump is doing wrong" it's the primary issue with authoritarianism as a means of running the state. As soon as the guy on top of the hierarchy has a dumb idea (and everyone has dumb ideas) there's no way to stop it.

The more he punishes people for lightly pushing back on his one big dumb idea, the further into the black hole everyone goes.

the fact that these tariffs are self-destructive.

This is an opinion, not a fact. The United States government received most of its revenue from tariffs until the Civil War, and they still played an important role until the corporate and income taxes were imposed in the early 20th century. The US existed for 125 years with this ‘dumb’ idea without self-destructing. As always the question should be: who benefits? Some people certainly will, and some certainly won’t.

This is an opinion, not a fact. The United States government received most of its revenue from tariffs until the Civil War,

When they didn't have a federal welfare state for the old, or a blue-water navy. The main reason why Trump beats the GOPe at the ballot box is that voters worry that the GOPe is going to aggressively cut the welfare state for the old. Maintaining Social Security and Medicare in something resembling their current form is fundamental to the political viability of Trumpism, and isn't compatible with funding the government with tariffs.

The U.S. didn’t have a welfare state in 1860 but it definitely had a blue water navy- while the union army found itself initially incapable of conquering the south the navy was more than able to blockade it, the USN had carried out overseas operations such as the Barbary coast war and opening Japan to trade, etc.

I’d also point out that welfare for the old is funded separately from the general fund- payroll taxes are technically not the same thing as income tax.

I'm quibbling now given that you are right on the Barbary war and opening of Japan, but the Union blockade of the Confederacy was not a blue-water operation and it isn't clear if the Civil War era ironclads were blue-water capable.

The blockade wasn’t blue water, no, but it shew considerable naval strength and competence and in conjunction with previously established blue water capabilities(eg Barbary war, anti slavery operations off of west Africa, opening Japan) can be taken as demonstrating that the USA was already a naval power to be taken seriously.

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