Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread
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wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:01 last edited by xenon
I dunno - I haven’t heard specific businesses complain yet. They might be afraid of the political ramifications from being the first to speak up.
I know from first hand experience right now that this is making business planning impossible.
If it’s like anything else in politics, government won’t react until the problem has gotten really bad.
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wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:12 last edited by Renauda
@Copper said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
You didn't attend a lot of Trump rallies, did you?
If you want to contribute something to this thread then write something that gives the rest of us at least a slight impression that there is something other than shit between your ears.
You have nothing to say other than your usual trite snark so STFU.
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He sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:15 last edited by@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
He sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
Pretty good summary.
@xenon about businesses complaining, I think the big businesses are a bit hesitant to criticize yet, but it'll come once their financial statements start to kill their stock price. And small businesses are ABSOLUTELY getting hosed (to use a Canadian term) right now since many rely on imported goods to support their product offerings.
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That’s the most charitable interpretation.
He could be doing this just because he wants to see others cave (even if we end up at the same or worse spot relative to where we started).
Or he’s a true believer.
I think it’s 2 or 3… but don’t really know.
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:18 last edited by@xenon said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
He could be doing this just because he wants to see others cave (even if we end up at the same or worse spot relative to where we started).
My prediction (note I have a losing track record lately) is that he's doing this to distract from the other land expansion idea (Greenland) where he's making bold statements and massive distractions with secretly the end goal of allowing Greenland to vote for its own independence and/or eventually become an unincorporated territory of the United States, similar to Puerto Rico. That would give the USA certain rights over the land, including natural resources and defense, while not needing to modify how many stars are on the American flag.
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He sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:22 last edited by RenaudaCreate a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
That is question I have been wrestling with the past week or so. Sooner or later Trump will have to take on the unions to drive down the cost of labour. And not by any small margin either. He seems oblivious to the fact that manufacturing moved elsewhere owing to the high cost of US labour. We struggle with the same issue here in Canada but to a much lesser extent in part because of higher personal income taxes. Also industry here is not burdened with having to administer costly employee benefit packages such as private health care insurance or even pension funds.
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wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:43 last edited by
The simplest explanation is that he thinks trade deficits are a per se bad thing and tariffs are a per se good thing.
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He says today he’s not gonna bend, subsidizing Canada for $200B a year and the only way Canada works is as a state.
At what point do you (can you) pull the plug on this guy
Link to videowrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:44 last edited by@xenon said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
He says today he’s not gonna bend, subsidizing Canada for $200B a year and the only way Canada works is as a state.
The more he goes on about the more we are viewing it as a destabilising threat:
"Is [Trump] trying to change political views in this country? If so, that's foreign interference," said Dick Fadden, who also headed CSIS and served as national security adviser to former prime minister Stephen Harper.
"It's no more acceptable from the United States than it is from China or Russia or anybody else."
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wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:48 last edited by
Despite being such an amazing communicator, he seems to have zero empathy. As in I really don’t think he can conceptualize how this is landing with Canadians.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say he’s autistic, but others have mentioned it:
Link to video -
The simplest explanation is that he thinks trade deficits are a per se bad thing and tariffs are a per se good thing.
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:57 last edited by Renauda@jon-nyc said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
The simplest explanation is that he thinks trade deficits are a per se bad thing and tariffs are a per se good thing.
Ostensibly yes, but if you subtract the oil and gas imports from Alberta into the US, the US is actually running a trade surplus with Canada which, for the most part, is in value added products and services. Take aluminum for beer cans. We ship rolled aluminium into the US and the US sells it back to Canadian brewers as beer can blanks.
Arguably even the discounted oil which we send to the US gets blended with US product or as in case of natural gas, it is liquified and exported to third markets.
Tell me then who is subsidizing who?
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He sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 20:58 last edited by@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
Link to videoHe sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
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@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
Link to videoHe sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 21:22 last edited by@Jolly said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
Link to videoHe sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
O'Leary presents a best case scenario of unknown (to me) plausibility, about how this tariff war could result in a zero-tariff free market between the US and Canada. Then Lutnick presents a strange case scenario where tariffs are used to fund an eradication of income tax for anybody making less than 150k. The Trump whisperers aren't cohering with each other.
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wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 21:33 last edited by xenon
Canada’s value weighted tariffs on American goods is 1.4%, American’s on Canada’s goods are about 1.7%.
Getting to zero is…. Not a big deal.
Everyone knows better.
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He says today he’s not gonna bend, subsidizing Canada for $200B a year and the only way Canada works is as a state.
At what point do you (can you) pull the plug on this guy
Link to videowrote on 13 Mar 2025, 21:39 last edited by@xenon said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
At what point do you (can you) pull the plug on this guy
It's called "impeachment"; so far zero for two against this guy.
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wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 21:44 last edited by
Actually 2 for 2. It’s the convictions that are elusive.
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@jon-nyc said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
The simplest explanation is that he thinks trade deficits are a per se bad thing and tariffs are a per se good thing.
Ostensibly yes, but if you subtract the oil and gas imports from Alberta into the US, the US is actually running a trade surplus with Canada which, for the most part, is in value added products and services. Take aluminum for beer cans. We ship rolled aluminium into the US and the US sells it back to Canadian brewers as beer can blanks.
Arguably even the discounted oil which we send to the US gets blended with US product or as in case of natural gas, it is liquified and exported to third markets.
Tell me then who is subsidizing who?
wrote on 13 Mar 2025, 21:45 last edited by jon-nyc@Renauda said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
@jon-nyc said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
The simplest explanation is that he thinks trade deficits are a per se bad thing and tariffs are a per se good thing.
Ostensibly yes, but if you subtract the oil and gas imports from Alberta into the US, the US is actually running a trade surplus with Canada which for the most part is in value added products and services. Take aluminum for beer cans. We ship rolled aluminium into the US and the US sells it back to Canadian brewers as beer can blanks.
Arguably even the discounted oil which we send to the US gets blended with US product or as in case of natural gas, it is liquified and exported to third markets.
Tell me then who is subsidizing who?
I agree with all you say here but that’s a bit too detailed for Trump’s attention span. He sees the top line number and decides we’re being ‘ripped off’.
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@Renauda said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
@jon-nyc said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
The simplest explanation is that he thinks trade deficits are a per se bad thing and tariffs are a per se good thing.
Ostensibly yes, but if you subtract the oil and gas imports from Alberta into the US, the US is actually running a trade surplus with Canada which for the most part is in value added products and services. Take aluminum for beer cans. We ship rolled aluminium into the US and the US sells it back to Canadian brewers as beer can blanks.
Arguably even the discounted oil which we send to the US gets blended with US product or as in case of natural gas, it is liquified and exported to third markets.
Tell me then who is subsidizing who?
I agree with all you say here but that’s a bit too detailed for Trump’s attention span. He sees the top line number and decides we’re being ‘ripped off’.
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wrote on 14 Mar 2025, 00:13 last edited by
Anybody here know anybody who has "buyer remorse" from the election?
I am guess it is still too early for that to happen. Maybe best to come back to this question end June.
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wrote on 14 Mar 2025, 00:19 last edited by
I don’t understand why we needed this guy as the Republican nominee… too late to think about that now.
On the one hand, I love that the dems got burned down to the ground. On the other hand, Kamala would have been way better than this. Hell, Biden would have been better.
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@Jolly said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
Link to videoHe sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
O'Leary presents a best case scenario of unknown (to me) plausibility, about how this tariff war could result in a zero-tariff free market between the US and Canada. Then Lutnick presents a strange case scenario where tariffs are used to fund an eradication of income tax for anybody making less than 150k. The Trump whisperers aren't cohering with each other.
wrote on 14 Mar 2025, 00:23 last edited by Jolly@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
@Jolly said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
@Horace said in Canadian Tariff situation gets its own thread:
Link to videoHe sure is pushing a lot of America's chips to the center of the table in this ploy to, what, save a few 10s of billions in some trade agreements that he hopes Canada is motivated to amend? Create a bunch of manufacturing jobs where the workers will be paid so much more than their global counterparts that their products will have no value on the global market?
O'Leary presents a best case scenario of unknown (to me) plausibility, about how this tariff war could result in a zero-tariff free market between the US and Canada. Then Lutnick presents a strange case scenario where tariffs are used to fund an eradication of income tax for anybody making less than 150k. The Trump whisperers aren't cohering with each other.
Ever watch some of the Trump interviews from decades ago? Trump didn't just jump on the tariff bandwagon. He believes they are essential to protect middle class jobs and that they are strategic.
Having said that, when you consider Trump, always approach everything as a deal. While I think Trump will dig his heels in on some tariffs, some tariffs he has proposed or enacted are simply gambits in a game.
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wrote on 14 Mar 2025, 00:29 last edited by xenon
Yeah - he’s been really clear and consistent. There is no indication that these are just a negotiation tool. How much damage are we willing to bear while we grasp that straw.
This seems like a sincerely held belief. Why don’t we just listen to what he saying. He doesn’t want any specific concession, except for Canada to be its 51st state.
