Give him a few days, he'll either pause the tariffs or declare an exemption for 99% of the goods they sell us. And has the US government or port authorities actually collected any of Pig Boy's brainfart tariffs yet?
this post was submitted on 16 Apr 2025
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I mean at some point the number doesn't matter anymore as most trade will just stop.
Which is exactly what China said when they stopped at 125% and said they're done playing stupid chicken and we can knock ourselves out raising them to eleventy bazillion percent.
The Chinese government has their own sins, behaving like petulant children isn't one of them.
Make no mistake that China does act like a petulant child. Just not about this issue
Let's just call it what it is: An embargo. It's been an embargo for the last 200%.
China already said they wouldn't raise tariffs anymore since they're so high already it wouldn't matter. That means the next step might be dumping US bonds now, which is a nuclear option.
In response to that, Trump, who is incapable of thinking of anything else just does this moronic tariff raise.
I’m an Australian who’s terrified of Trump giving us an “them or us” ultimatum.
I’m starting to think it’s likely, and soon.
We have magnitudes more trade with China than the USA. We are one of the few countries that buy more USA stuff than we sell to them. The only reason to stick with the USA would be if we trust them for defence reasons. What’s happening in Ukraine means we can’t. So it would likely be an own goal for Trump as we’d have to choose China over USA. The libs would go nuts, due to racism. We’d be objectively worse off, as an unreliable defence partner is still a partner, but if we ditched trade with China, our economy would collapse overnight.
America desperately needs us as a base in the South Pacific.
America also desperately needs us to not side with China in terms of Iron and Coal should an actual war happen.
Trump’s willingness to abandon their allies in the face of foreign aggression means we should seriously think before siding with the US.
They are burning bridges worldwide. They may reduce their overseas bases as part of their policy as they move more isolationist. They need troops in Germany and Taiwan and Korea too, but they are burning those bridges.
America may want us to not trade our iron and coal with China, but if it comes to an ultimatum, we likely will. America has less cards to play as a reliable partner as they become less reliable.
For what it’s worth: choose the 3rd path; pick the EU and/or the commonwealth countries
The EU has neither the industrial capacity of China nor the immense finances of the US, so the EU itself will have to choose who to rely on. If Australia pivots to the EU, they will be pivoting towards whoever the EU pivots towards.
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Giving in to bullies just leads to more bullying.
At least you will finally be free from the US yoke.
Doesn’t seem to be a difficult choice. The US is preying on its closest allies, threatening to annex Canada, and Greenland. China is not.
Taiwan would like a word.
This week, China imposed more export controls on rare earths, which include materials used in high-tech products, aerospace manufacturing, and the defense sector.
And then Trump,
executive order signed by President Donald Trump that launched an investigation into the "national security risks posed by U.S. reliance on imported processed critical minerals and their derivative products."
"There is no winner in tariff wars and trade wars, and China does not want to fight, but it is by no means afraid to fight."
They are also selling things direct to consumer on Tiktok, and it's hilarious. They can't name prices or brands... But you can communicate via their WhatsApp they list and buy almost any luxury bag for $100 and Nikes for $10-$15. Laundry pods for a few cents a pod.
They are even giving directions for how to order from manufacturers and avoid tariffs with personal shopping services.
Well shit, anywhere other than tiktok this is being done?
Not that I am aware of, maybe they are also marketing on the English side of Rednote... But I doubt that's preferable lol.
It's just the marketing that's done on Tiktok, they have some websites that look like they were slapped together as fast as possible and WhatsApp and similar ways they conduct the actual orders.
I was, and am still a little bit skeptical. But some of these guys aren't new apparently as they have happy past customers, they just weren't selling stuff like Nike that would normally flow through the contracted distribution chain until recently.
They are also trying to link everyday Americans up with industry specific manufacturing markets. A lot of companies on these have also dropped their min qty thresolds as a way to allow everyday Americans to buy stuff directly, skipping all the middlemen, assuming they meet minimum purchase thresholds for shipping, or have a Chinese shopper.
If you want a list of marketplaces that don't have middlemen, I can compile that. If your trying to get a pair of Nikes or something for cheap I suggest you find one of the sellers on tiktok.
The Foreign Minister of China is tweeting Mao speeches regarding Chinese resistance towards the US, so it's safe to say they likely aren't going to capitulate anytime soon.
It's not "China faces 245% tariff."
It is, "America faces 245% tax increase."
Tariffs aren't paid by China. They are a tax on Americans.
Will probably see further movements from the PRC to sell off US treasury bonds and shifting more away from the dollar in general, along with tighter export restrictions on rare Earth. China already said they won’t keep increasing tariffs, but they seem dedicated to not backing down, and they have the Material means to actually resist US trade aggression.
What would be incredibly based is if the PRC starts paying off loans in Africa with its dollars, decoupling the Global South from the US even further. Gets rid of dollars and debt in the Global South, potentially freeing up new customers for goods produced in China and strengthening ties.
American politicians tend to ignore that China has been an empire for two millennia, so the century of humiliation may be an outlier.
What would be incredibly based is if the PRC starts paying off loans in Africa with its dollars, decoupling the Global South from the US even further. Gets rid of dollars and debt in the Global South, potentially freeing up new customers for goods produced in China and strengthening ties.
This is exactly what's going to happen.
I hadn't thought about this, but you're right, this is the 4D chess play here.
Yep, the reason China hasn't done it long ago is because it was biding time to build up BRICs and BRI so that it has alternative customers, and thus was more reliant on the US as a consumer. Trump's strategy likely would have worked in the 90s, but we aren't in the 90s anymore. Now that the US is destroying economic ties to the PRC, China can respond by severing the US's ties to Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and SEA. The EU will have to pick either China or the US.
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Please, please let China retaliate.
Why don't they just ban imports from China? Then China can ban imports from the U.S. Then the trade imbalance "problem" will be solved.
For the us; it would end the US economy overnight. There isn't a product manufactured in the US or service done in the US that does not involve something from china. Even at ridiculously high tariff prices there's simply no alternative infrastructure for replacing those imports. Even the trump regime are slaves to capital given that's the only thing backing the legitimacy of the US.
For china; the only thing imported from the US are luxury/private sector items. It genuinely does not affect the core industries (60% of Chinas gdp is in the public sector) of china, and with China's welfare system, private industries can fail without the employees ever becoming homeless or starving. There simply isn't a reason to go that far and needlessly escalate.
Tl;Dr nothing the US can do economically can realistically hurt china, just small parts of its private sector. China, however could cripple the US since the US allowed its companies to offload so much core industrial work to china. None of the actual adults in the US will allow trump to piss off china to the point of cutting off trade entirely, and china isn't petty.
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Master Negotiator at work, folks.
There is a lot of us investment in Chinese industrial manufacturing. Remember that China is a nominally communist country. I imagine that it would require a single signature to nationalize all of it.
Trump's and the Republicans are financial dumbasses and well American who voted for trump and didn't vote because of reasons, well have the day you voted for you bunch of dicks.
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