Summary
Trump recently shared a provocative column on Truth Social titled “Shut Up About Egg Prices — Trump Is Saving Consumers Millions,” written by conservative activist Charlie Kirk.
This comes despite Trump’s campaign promises to reduce grocery costs “immediately” and “on Day 1.” Egg prices have soared to record highs, averaging $4.95/dozen in January and exceeding $10/dozen in some regions, leading to purchase limits and shortages.
While bird flu has significantly impacted prices by killing millions of chickens since 2022, Trump has shifted from his campaign stance, recently telling Fox News “Inflation is back” but claiming “I had nothing to do with it” after just weeks in office.
Normally I would agree that the president had little effect on prices since that is largely the job of the Fed. But Trump being wishy washy on tariffs is really fucking things up. It is extremely hard for businesses to plan for shit when massive tariffs are planned, then delayed, then implemented for three fucking days before being held off again for a month. How the fuck are businesses suppose to do any sort of inventory planning when they don’t know how much something is going to cost them if they hold off for a day to buy things. Or they bought in bulk under the assumption that they would have to pay significantly more later are now stuck with a ton of inventory they may not have room for.
So yes, in this case Trump is having a large effect on prices. If it was just tariffs, inflation would temporarily go up and the Fed would increase interest rates and the recession it causes would slow inflation. But the Fed can’t plan for the dipshit president going back and forth in tariffs.
Broadly speaking it’s nearly impossible for a US president to directly fix the economy, but they can easily break it.
rando firings that effect government entities that stabilize farm prices and respond to things like bird flu can have somewhat of an effect to.
Yes to the first one, not as much immediately to the second one. The second one would likely have more medium term effects.
What I find interesting about this is that we had a similar situation in the UK with Liz Truss. We had a PM who announced a surprise budget of tax cuts, which ok, were a little bit stronger than ones the Tories had done previously. This caused a shock to the bond markets, cost quite a lot of money and she was immediately removed from office by her own party and her budget cancelled.
Trump has caused chaos and cost the US billions with his tariff talk, alienated most western allies, damaged the US MIC enormously and caused deaths in Ukraine by cutting support. The damage done is incalculable, it is not in the same universe as the damage caused by Liz Truss. The only thing that makes sense is that Republican party want America ruined and they aren’t going to stop unless they are forced to. I think what Trump has already done should qualify as treason on the basis of undermining the USA and supporting its enemies.
Precisely, it IS treason. At the very least he should be removed from any position of power over others.
All this tariff talk is just deliberate manipulation of the markets. Trump talks tariffs, the stock market tanks, creating buying opportunities for Sociopathic Oligarchs. Then he backs off the tariff talks, and the stock market rises again, and he brings up tariffs again in 4-6 weeks, and starts the cycle over again.
Normally I would agree with you if it was a one time thing. But the market stops listening to the boy who cried wolf. All the markets are down despite Trump rebonding the tariff and delaying it. There has to be something else at play. The guy is certainly not an economic genius but he generally at least pushes through with his idiotic shit.