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PaperclipPerfector  7d ago (text post)   32224 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 31, 2025

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But what is it countries are supposed to do? It doesn't seem to be about tariffs themselves but trade deficits. Simply buying large amounts of American goods could be an option for them to get these numbers down but it's not in the power of most of the worst affected countries.

Offer access to your country's natural resources, like was proposed with Ukraine?

Make direct investments into American manufacturing like Taiwan?

I expect that the deals reached by each country will look different, with the outcomes being the result of some creative horse-trading.

Now, I'm also concerned that this will result in an overly complex patchwork of trade deals and potentially contradictory obligations between various countries, when the simplest outcome would just be everyone drops tariffs to some agreed-upon maximum and signs on to a treaty to keep them there.

But this is not some historically unprecedented diplomatic endeavor.

But neither of these deals actually change the trade deficit, which is about goods flow not investment. My point is that the new tariffs should be based on something countries can correct rather than something orthogonal to what the US's problem with them is.

Ya know, I'd actually agree it would be nice to have clarity as to how these countries can respond to quickly get the tariffs dropped, the attempt at opacity seems odd.

But I ascribe that to the mix of goals Trump is pursuing, which is to say he needs flexibility so tying himself to an algorithm means he can't maneuver much.

That's maybe the concerning part, aside from Trump's temperament. He is trying to optimize along a few different dimensions instead of merely seeking one blunt policy outcome.

They don't have the money to do that. About all they can do is stop exporting.

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