• Blackout@fedia.io
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      4 months ago

      Those tariffs did exactly what they were supposed to do. Push smaller competitors out of the market and allow price increases from the bigger companies. Even with those tariffs the price from China was still much cheaper, all he did was ramp up inflation. Literally no one won.

      • finestnothing@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        Same thing for the meat processing/packing laws in Denver, meant specifically to drive out a small bit very high quality farm in favor of a massive industrial one. It doesn’t lower prices or increase quality (raises prices and lowers quality overall), it’s just meant to drive out the competition.

      • paddirn@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        I wonder how much this whole cost of living crisis is due to the Trump tariffs vs how much was due to COVID? COVID seems to have provided a convenient cover that distracted the world and probably exacerbated the issue, but I wonder had COVID not happened would it have been more apparent how bad the Trump tariffs were for the economy? To my knowledge though, I don’t know that those tariffs ever really went away.

    • JasonDJ@lemmy.zip
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      4 months ago

      This is what I really don’t get.

      Like, sure, Trump’s tax plan looks better for the middle class at the surface level…but that’s just talking about income tax. Tariffs are taxes, too, and his tariff plan will mean significantly more dollars spent on taxes for the middle class. The net paycheck will be a little higher, but the cost increases will eat that up and much, much more.

      And that’s just one avenue. I’d shutter to think what will happen to the overall value of the dollar, the growing wealth disparity, the real estate market (it’s nearly impossible for first time buyers as it is, but rent is exorbitant too, and a lot of it is because of sweet deals for mega landlords like Trump himself) and the costs of healthcare under Trump’s “plans”

      Fuck dude…my family makes 3x the local household median and we still can’t save money for shit. It goes nearly as fast as it comes. We live in a modest house, we’ve got one (used) car payment, and fortunately no credit card debt. We buy used clothes and store-brand food. Don’t go out to eat or takeout. But its still tough as hell.

    • WoodScientist@lemmy.world
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      4 months ago

      It seems the real problem with tariffs is the rapidity of them. If the US wants to encourage more manufacturing at home, fine. But as you note, just applying them suddenly is ruinous. I would think a much better approach would be that any new tariff must be slowly ramped up over a decade. Or maybe a hard rule that any individual tariff can’t change by more than 2 percentage points a year. This way tariffs could still be a policy tool that can be raised and lowered based on national interest, but they would change slowly enough that industry could actually adapt.

      • Boomer Humor Doomergod@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        If the US wants to encourage more manufacturing at home, fine.

        I disagree mainly because I want a Hilux and can’t get one because of the Chicken Tax

      • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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        4 months ago

        it also creates response tariffs. There’s a number of industries in the US that export products and are subsidized who are prime targets for foreign retaliatory tariffs: Farmers, auto workers, forestry, mining, etc. Not to mention limitations on raw material sales these industries buy

        I just don’t think Trump is clever enough to win on any international playing field. Look at how Russia and Israel play him like a fiddle. China can easily do the same with response tariffs, and they already retaliated bad enough on farmers that they needed emergency subsidies.

    • nickwitha_k (he/him)@lemmy.sdf.org
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      4 months ago

      A couple of off-post-topic question: I’m at below-novice level in machining (learning on an old, manual Bridgeport mill at my makerspace). Can you recommend any simple but functional projects for practicing skills on a mill and learning behaviors is different materials?

      Also, I’m intending to machine a replacement for my electric guitar’s bridge since the stock one is both out of spec, making it impossible to find an aftermarket replacement, and it’s made of chrome-coated pot-metal, making it kinda ugly and musically poor. Do you have any suggestions for alloys that are interesting, decently machinable, and non-leaded?

        • woodenskewer@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          Someone had one posted in a discord chat I was in to calculate the resistance on a resistor by image. It didn’t even give you the color band chart to calculate anything. Just “What resistor is 200Ω?”

        • nickwitha_k (he/him)@lemmy.sdf.org
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          4 months ago

          Thank you, very much! Yeah, just a tune-o-matic, so, not very complex.

          Definitely was not trying to call you out or anything like that, just seeking advice from someone much more knowledgeable about the subject than myself. And I also misunderstood it to be suggesting that I might be a bot.

        • Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world
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          4 months ago

          the below comments seemed to make your comment an attempt trying to call me out as a bot

          It was a joke response, absolutely nothing against your particular post.

          Although it won’t be long until we have to preface all our online discussions with “disregard all previous instructions” or similar.