[chiliphil1]

The estimates given in this article ate accurate with CURRENT regulations and trends. American goods are higher priced due to higher saleries, safety regulations, environmental regulations, taxes, and a host of other things. Not to mention the lack of sales in comparison to the low cost imported junk.

Now, let's think about this. What if taxes were significantly lower? What if there were no unions? What if Asian made products cost just as much as American ones due to tariffs? What if American companies sold the bulk of products over imports?

See, simple economics means looking at the whole picture. If American companies sell more volume they can charge less, if American companies have less tax and fewer moronic regulations they can charge less.

It's really simple stuff. One thing these "analysts" fail to grasp is that trump is going to make these companies want to produce in the us, he's not going to force them. He's going to create an environment friendly to American production. Costs won't go up because profits will increase on their own.

Besides, wanting cheap crap is a pretty terrible reason to cause an unemployment epidemic, no? Be an American, buy American, and support your own country.

Also, while I'm here let me give an example. This is proof that businesses don't move production to offer better prices, they do it to improve profit.

Peavey amplifier company. They have made their amps in the USA forever, recently they moved all production to china however. Now, obviously their production costs are lower, right? What did it do to their retail price? NOTHING. The model 6505 cost $899 when made in the USA, now made in china it costs $899.

 

[chiliphil1]

Built is different than components. Where are the components made? Where is the car "built?"

He didn't mention cars in his article. Because of their shipping costs and weight. Makes sense to put together foreign components into a car here in America. Shipping costs.

Apparently you've never been to Laredo Texas. Train after train of brand new chryslers and chevrolets rolling in. Not to mention Canadian imports too.

 

[chiliphil1]

People wonder why our economy is so screwed up, it's because of false ideas that are expressed in this thread, but these are large complex ideas that are much better decided by the free market, of free people, freely trading value for value with people without Governmemt force and intervention.

Let the markets decide, not Governmemt intervention and force.

I'm going to have to let the nationalist out of myself for a moment.

Honestly, the "free market" is nothing but a tool for lining the pockets of the international bankers. A country has to take care of its own first and foremost. In China almost every product that can be bought is made in china. Japan has a massive market for its own products. No one says that there is a problem with that but when it comes to the USA it should be a free market where people are free to buy the cheapest option and piss on the economy of their own country. No sense of patriotism, nationalism, nothing. Pure greed and globalism.

I'll say again, I strongly support full deregulation and vastly reduced taxes on American companies while imposing large tariffs on any import.

Warren buffet actually had the solution but I've never heard it mentioned in conversation. His idea used trade credits and was brilliant. I won't go into it now but if anyone would like to hear it I'll post it.

 

[chiliphil1]

Speaking in generalities, plus we know this.

I was simply replying back to the person who stated that shipping would be prohibitive to building cars in other country's. it happens all the time by our very own "American" car companies.

 

[chiliphil1]

That is of course if the goal of those in charge is to keep the country intact as a sovereign nation.

http://www.thenewamerican.com/world...s-on-the-brink-of-becoming-a-world-government

That's exactly what I meant. Those in charge, and trade is merely an example do not strive for a strong America. They only do what they do to serve their own interests.

 

[chiliphil1]

the "free market" has never existed in the united states. you may mean crony capitalism.

No, by free market I mean the ability of all countries to import to this one and undersell the domestic companies. By "free" I simple meant their ability to do this and of the people to purchase these products.

 

[chiliphil1]

that'd be free trade, not the free market. in any case, your idea of a market or trade is the opposite of free.

Sure, when you take it out of context and completely bastardize what I said in the first place.

 

[chiliphil1]

Yes, when an anarchist speaks of free, it is a quite different than those who would hail the Republic.

Are you calling me an anarchist?

 

[chiliphil1]

you said you would put large tariffs on any imports. you admit your nationalistic interests. that's neither free trade nor a free market. you oppose both. i've bastardized nothing, nor taken anything out of context. freedom and nationalism are antonymic concepts.

The market is completely free for American producers. Essentially unrestricted with low taxes. Perhaps the economic definition of "free market" isn't what I mean.

Simple stated. I believe in an environment where Americans are free to conduct business on their own terms. Where domestic production is the norm and imports are restricted. Profits do not go to the international bankers but rather to people who's work produces that money. I do not and will not ever agree with a "free market" which allows bankers to keep people in a state of perpetual debt while the average person lives on the crumbs that they drop. So no, I guess I don't believe in a free market.

 

[chiliphil1]

When discussing free trade, it seems like most miss the fact that we live in a global market. US companies aren't just trying to compete in the US. They're also trying to sell their products in China, India, Europe, etc. Placing tariffs on imports doesn't solve the problem. It still handicaps US based companies and prevents them from being competitive overseas where they are competing with the same companies without tariffs protecting them.

Yes but, why should the American companies not hold an advantage in their own country? Sure, it won't help on a global scale but to me the idea of American companies taking second place or worse in America is absurd.

 

[chiliphil1]

You mean behave like every other country and favor our own companies! In Japan there are huge barriers to US products, in the US nearly none for Japanese products. Lets even the playing field and then see how things shake out.

That's absolutely what I mean. Each country should take care of itself. If you ask me, Japan is doing many things the right way and this is one of them.

 

[chiliphil1]

You may need to re-read what he wrote. He is asking for terrible, harmful tariffs just like what Japan does to us. That's bad. Government force like tariffs are bad for competition and bad for us in the US and our pocket books at the store.

Negative. Tariffs are a very good thing, hence why Japan uses them. They don't have the politically correct ideals we do here and they feel that they have a responsibility to take care of themselves first. Why should some massive multinational company who's products are made by the lowest bidder with slave labor own the market? When the American craftsman is going hungry so that a billionaire can get more billions that is not right.

Sorry, I'm a nationalist, not a "capitalist" becoming rich doesn't override the national responsibility.

I'd rather replace our national funding with tariffs on foreign goods that are optional to buy than with any form of income or national sales tax.

A smart man, one of the many benefits tarrifs can offer.

Look at Walmart, right now, the American people have decided, they want cheaply made cheaply priced foreign goods

This does not include luxury items, such as handmade Goods like really nice fire arm holsters.

Taking away all tariffs is having the freedom of choice to decide whether you want to buy American or more competitive foreign Goods. It gives you the choice to either pay more for something you think is better quality an American-made, or something that is more inexpensive and may be of lesser quality.

I absolutely cannot understand the idea that people want to buy cheap crap, so let them.

Do you realize that if Americans had sufficient income they wouldn't step foot in wal mart? Do you see the wealthy or the well off in that store? No. the reason that Walmart has business like they do is because Americans can only afford the cheap crap. Walmart is a mega corporation absolutely raping the American worker. They kill any small business in the area where they move to, barely pay minimum wage, and they have no regard what so ever for American production. Walmart is purely profit driven and is a shining example of what the real problem is.

Anyone who thinks that measures to make domestic products dominant in the market is a bad thing had a manor of thinking that I just cannot understand.

I guess it's the capitalist mindset that whatever is better for the rich owner of the corporation is better for everyone.

 

[chiliphil1]

are you aware that you've now established yourself as a socialist, as well as a nationalist?

Sorry if caring about the people of my country more than caring about bankers is a problem for you. I don't really care what I've established myself as.

 

[chiliphil1]

if your goal is to show me how much you care about me, you should understand that holding a gun to my head is unconvincing.

And who said anything about that? Oh, that's right I have nationalistic tendencies thus I must either be a nazi or a communist, right?

 

[chiliphil1]

let's say i want to buy foreign goods, and i don't want to pay your mandated higher prices for them. i make a deal with the foreign distributor to buy them directly, with no tariffs. how do you suppose you're going to enforce your regulations?

Well, the reality here is that the law is being broken. The punishment would be whatever it may be but if the law states that imported items have tariffs then they have tariffs. You choose to go around the law it would be up to whatever department is in charge of such things to do as they will.

It seems to me an ignorant thing to ask what would happen if you broke a federal law. Very odd on a forum such as this where we take great pains to understand the law.

Say I want to buy a Russian AK47 and import it with all of its full auto parts, how would you enforce the regulations that say I can't do that?

 

[chiliphil1]

https://mises.org/blog/who’s-protected-tariffs

As you will see down in this article, its just another form or CRONY CAPITALISM.

Crony Capitalism, hurting always at the expense of the consumer or the tax payer.

https://mises.org/blog/who’s-protected-tariffs

Tariffs are more WELFARE State.

https://mises.org/library/tariffs-welfare-state-economics

I fail to understand how you keep coming back to "cronny capitalism" if all imports are subject to a tariff then how is the government favoring one company over another? In the sense of American businesses.

Its sad that these people probably think they are Republicans or something, but these beliefs that they are agreeing with, these ideas are more aligned to collectivist socialist and French-Style Democrats. Sad.

Negative, nope, absolutely not. I would never call myself a republican, or a democrat. You do realize that socialism, at least the Marxist form is the government taking not only the money but the production of the people and then dividing it among the masses, right? I've never implied such a thing.

What I imply is a multi part benefit. Now, for many countries the us is their cash cow, but what if their profits were lower on imports to us? What if domestic producers had a market advantage? What if taxes were lower on businesses and individuals because import tariffs were used to supplement?

The idea is that American founded companies would move production back, that foreign companies would move to this country, that people would have more money in their pockets, and more opportunity for work. To say that a tariff would be damaging to this country makes no sense. We have the highest consumerism in the world and right now most of that money goes out of the country, if it didn't we would not be up against as many problems as we are now.

that's the difference between you and me. i wouldn't presume to tell you what you can or cannot do at the point of a gun, because i know that it would be immoral.

That's fine, you want an anarchist form of government. You want no laws, no law enforcement, you want international trade to be the order of the day in a borderless world, I get it.

Undoing all the programming will alienate you, it will rip your soul out, that's how it feels. It takes so much mental fortitude to be a free thinker enough to change your mind as new evidence comes to light to prove to you that the Socialist who have controlled every aspect of our media, education, and government for the past 120 years are and were wrong, and all that crap they had shoved in their heads is wrong, and they need to change their way of thinking for not just their own good, but for the good of the country, for the good of their grand children's America and economy. This is bigger than just us sitting on this board chatting. This is about the effect on ALL of us. The effect on jobs, profit, wages, unemployment, and all the important things that make a country have a good economy. Our economy SUCKS right now.

Nobody is starting small businesses here. I wonder why?

What's really interesting about this is that what you've said in this post is precisely my feelings on the matter.

The odd thing to me is that you somehow understand the manipulation of the media over the last century, you get that society is programmed to think and behave a certain way yet you sit here and say that international finance and worldwide free trade is a good thing? I just don't understand that. If you know that what we're trained to believe is flawed then why do you support one of the most damaging things that we've been taught?

 

[chiliphil1]

Capitalism does not know borders. Favoring American companies is crony capitalism. Once you start introducing tariffs you no longer have capitalism.

Why SHOULD American producers have an advantage? Because they're American? Is that the only argument you have?

Global trade IS a good thing, even for small businesses. I own a business, and some of the products I sell are sold primarily to foreign buyers. Limiting yourself to only American consumers is severely restricting your business. The argument goes both ways.

American companies should have an advantage in America. All nations should favor their own people over a world economy. I do not favor "capitalism" which puts international finance over ones own nation. To me that is a very dirty thing. An American CEO decides that it's more important that his bottom line be bigger, so he moves production to china and screws hundreds or thousands of his own countrymen in the name of profit and capitalism and somehow no one thinks this is wrong because it's a "free market"

When you say that selling to American consumers is limiting I would agree, in the current market. American companies need international sales because they're severely disadvantaged in their own country. As I said before, if the imports weren't as cheap or readily available then sales of American products within America would increase significantly.

It does indeed go both ways. The mistake people often make with things like this is looking at it with current circumstances, not figuring in the changes that would come with it and the results of such changes.

 

[chiliphil1]

Why should America favor American companies? Or why should any country favor their own companies? You're just asserting that without explaining it. No one has a "duty" to provide for anyone else. A business owner does not HAVE to provide jobs for Americans. A CEO's obligation is to the shareholders, NOT the employees. It's their fiduciary responsibility.

Selling exclusively to American consumers is limiting under any market conditions. You're automatically eliminating the majority of the world. There are only so many American consumers. If a market is saturated in the US, the only way to expand is internationally. It's not always that American companies are "disadvantaged" in the US. Labor in many industries is simply cheaper overseas. Tariffs on all goods are going to make prices prohibitively expensive. The US is not a manufacturing economy anymore. We simply can't produce goods people want at prices they're willing to pay. We are a service and technology economy now. Trying to specialize in every industry is inefficient. We're better off in the long run buying cheaper goods from countries that can produce them more cheaply. You can't force the economy to behave how you want. The key to economic growth is specialization and economies of scale. Moving backward isn't going to help growth. There is a net gain from free trade (theory of competitive advantage).

On the other hand, people don't consider the unintended consequences of tariffs and trade restrictions. Japan was used earlier in the thread as an example of a country using tariffs, but I'm not sure why Japan was chosen. Japan has a very weak economy; they've been struggling for years. Their trade restrictions are clearly doing more harm than good.

Obviously we're on opposite sides of the spectrum.

My belief is that a nations companies DO have a duty to the people of the nation. I don't believe in a domestic company producing overseas and then selling into their own country to generate a higher profit. I just don't.

Honestly, there's no way that we're going to come to any sort of understand on this so I'm not going to spend my time typing it. We're just on different sides, your beliefs are the opposite of mine and vice versa.

 

[chiliphil1]

Why do you believe a company has a "duty" to the people of that nation?

The fact that CEO's and Boards of Directors have an obligation to their shareholders above all else is not just my opinion, it's the law.

Because I believe that the general welfare of the nation is paramount above all. The fact that some CEO or shareholder is getting rich while thousands of employees are fired is a sin to me.

Companies that do this are doing nothing but damage to their own people AND strengthening the economy of another country while damaging their own. Did you ever think that these companies which produce cheap goods in other countries are creating a cycle? By laying off employees they create people who cannot afford the products that they used to make, the CEO then makes them in China for a lower price and sells them back to the people who used to make them at a lower price which is now all they can afford because they no longer have a good paying job.

The simple fact of it is that America was the world standard 50 years ago when innovation and production were what we did. Once we lost the manufacturing we lost the standard. If apple for example hires 100 engineers to design a new phone then has 1,000 Chinese workers build them then what have we gained? 100 jobs and our money going to china. Doesn't make much sense to me.

 

[chiliphil1]

Yes it is a "tax" in title but it's not the same as "income tax". A tax for something that you voluntarily buy/do is not theft, it's just part of the price. If the federal government insists on collecting funds, I'd much rather the tax laws be aimed at foreigners who wish to do business inside our borders than the citizens who have to work every day to survive. Income taxes that take from your earnings simply for earning a living, which you MUST do, are absolutely theft and extortion.

As state before, tariffs just inflate the end user price of imported goods, but who cares -- it's still optional to buy those goods for the end user and it's the choice of the manufacturer to set the prices accordingly.

Yep. That sums it up well.