this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2025
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Today I Learned

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cross-posted from: https://lemmit.online/post/5566633

This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/todayilearned by /u/MechCADdie on 2025-04-04 08:19:11+00:00.

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[–] givesomefucks@lemmy.world 142 points 1 week ago (11 children)

We can't afford to waste this chance....

There is zero reason to settle for "not trump" we need to use Republican Inaptitude to get a decent progressive in power , there's zero reason to compromise with Republicans after this shit.

[–] Omgboom@lemmy.zip 45 points 1 week ago (12 children)

They are already trying to setup Kamala for 2028. I have zero faith that the Democrats are going to learn anything from their failure

[–] PixelatedSaturn@lemmy.world 34 points 1 week ago (1 children)

They don't want to win. At least not with someone who would bring change. Why would they, they are all multimillionaires.

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[–] Frozengyro@lemmy.world 24 points 1 week ago

That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. So I'm sure they will do it.

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[–] d00phy@lemmy.world 113 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Someone has either never seen “Ferris Buller’s Day Off,” can’t remember it very well, or didn’t pay attention. This was covered in class!

[–] disguy_ovahea@lemmy.world 95 points 1 week ago (19 children)

In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the... Anyone? Anyone?... the Great Depression, passed the... Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered?... raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression. Today we have a similar debate over this. Anyone know what this is? Class? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone seen this before? The Laffer Curve. Anyone know what this says? It says that at this point on the revenue curve, you will get exactly the same amount of revenue as at this point. This is very controversial. Does anyone know what Vice President Bush called this in 1980? Anyone? Something-d-o-o economics. Voodoo economics.

[–] VitoRobles 50 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I watched this movie 3-4 times and even when reading this, I'm still spaced out.

Ben Stein just has a voice that makes me tune him out.

Such a great voice for comedy. Shame he's anti-abortion, pretty racist, pro-Regan and Trump, weirdly against evolution... So many awful perspectives.

[–] merc@sh.itjust.works 1 points 5 days ago

What's interesting is that this boring speech isn't just an actor reading something boring. Stein is a second-generation economist. He has a BA in economics from Columbia University. His father had a PhD in economics and chaired the Council of Economic Advisors under Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.

His father was apparently well respected by both parties, but the son has gone full MAGA, which is unfortunate.

[–] echodot@feddit.uk 34 points 1 week ago (2 children)

weirdly against evolution

You can see his point. Look where it got us, we should have stayed in the sea.

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[–] Flocklesscrow@lemm.ee 70 points 1 week ago (7 children)

Proof yet again that "business leaders" typically don't know shit about shit.

[–] Vanilla_PuddinFudge@infosec.pub 28 points 1 week ago

It is all 1000% on purpose.

They intend to ride it out and profit from all of this, and we'll let them due to cowardice and division.

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[–] jlh@lemmy.jlh.name 66 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (19 children)

There is some nuance here. Smoot-Hawley didn't cause the great depression, and there a lot of economists who say it didn't have that much of an effect at all.

Tarriffs can have some useful effects when used for protectionism, diplomatic coercion, or trade barrier reduction coercion. However, Trump's tariffs are way dumber than anything that came before, because he's trying to do all three of these at once. All of these have conflicting effects on each other, and it is literally impossible to design a tariff strategy that can accomplish all three, since raising a tariff for one purpose means that you need to lower tariffs for other purposes. All he's doing by raising across the board is causing instability in the economy and convincing all partners to ditch the US.

[–] Goodmorningsunshine@lemmy.world 54 points 1 week ago

All he's doing is exactly what Putin wants. Systematically isolating and weakening America while weakening the West at large and any other competing countries to his power and new accumulation of wealth.

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[–] clever_ideas_sometimes@sh.itjust.works 65 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (8 children)

Fun fact! - this is what Ben Stein is teaching in Ferris Bueller's day off.

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[–] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 56 points 1 week ago (13 children)

Every day of my life is an economic crisis.

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[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 56 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The largest Senate loss in history yet

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[–] kandoh@reddthat.com 55 points 1 week ago

The thing about Smoot-Hawley is that when it happened everyone else also put up equal tariffs among one another.

this time the EU, Japan, South Korea, Canada are only putting tariffs on the US. Not amongst themselves.

[–] IDKWhatUsernametoPutHereLolol@lemmy.dbzer0.com 52 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (38 children)

We got a Progressive Era out of it, maybe we'll get another one?

Edit: To clarify, I'm talking about the New Deal and New Deal v2 Progressive Eras (and the era of Progressive Democratic supermajorities that dominated congress)

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[–] humanspiral@lemmy.ca 50 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Great depression, and 2/3rds drop in global trade resulted.

I present also 1828 dementia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariff_of_Abominations which started southern secessionist movements.

Unjustifiable trade attacks like all wars are bad for unity. If California or Texas has to pay $10k more per car so metal and auto workers elsewhere get high pay, national unity fractures. Everything being super expensive with no jobs because of global trade retaliations, means that Mexicans stop being a unifying problem, and those white Michigan and Pennsylvania blue collar workers cheering for Trump are the problem. Better cars elsewhere in the world become a bigger national unity factor the more protection $ is spent on inferior cars.

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[–] bingBingBongBong@lemm.ee 46 points 1 week ago

Well they had elections afterwards. Trump's nazis will just throw dissenters into KZs and invade their neighbours.

There will be no free elections anymore

[–] roofuskit@lemmy.world 42 points 1 week ago (7 children)

Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.

[–] snekerpimp@lemmy.world 35 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I have a feeling they learned, and then said “what a great idea to crash the economy. It’s so easy, let’s do it.”

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[–] samus12345@lemm.ee 35 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Smoot-Hawley 2: Electric Boogaloo

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[–] Sam_Bass@lemmy.world 30 points 1 week ago (10 children)

Tarrifs are billionaire cash grabs, nothing more. Nobody likes those. Except billionaires of course.

[–] humanspiral@lemmy.ca 2 points 6 days ago

Tarrifs are billionaire cash grabs

Not really. It is possible that Musk envisioned breaking NA auto pact to USMCA agreements on autos for purposes of destroying big 3 auto competition, which has been releasing competitive EVs prior to this aggression. Most billionaires like the status quo with existing protections of their business.

A depression does permit billionaires to swoop in later to buy assets. Complete chaos, uncertainty, and yo yo policies does allow for people to make huge short term leveraged returns if they know when the chaos is to be reversed and applied.

In this case, its just a cult leader doing stupid cult actions, though chaos profit angle can easily be there.

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[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 26 points 1 week ago (4 children)

They also didn't have fox news at that time :/

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[–] RymrgandsDaughter@lemmy.world 24 points 1 week ago

If we don't get these paid actors out of Congress we're going to lose in ways most people really don't want to believe

[–] SocialMediaRefugee@lemmy.world 23 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (4 children)

A hero of the right, Ronald Reagan, actually gave a speech condemning tariffs. Yup, I'm actually on Reagan's side here.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Mj6N-WBPrVw

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