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PaperclipPerfector  21d ago (text post)   33287 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 31, 2025

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Responding to myself: I've found the source of the $5,000 claim I've seen floating around: The average tariff burden is estimated by dividing the total expected tariff revenue per year, $600 billion, by the total number of U.S. households in 2024, 132 million

I'm assuming, as has been said elsewhere, that this sort of math is not done with sales/corporate taxes or any other sort of tax increase. At least not by the same people.

That estimate shows zero understanding of economics. The actual tariff burden will be the deadweight loss caused by relative price changes as imported goods become more expensive. Relative price changes and imports becoming more expensive are driven by the elasticity of consumer demand for imports and the price pressure that US companies (such as Walmart) can put on their global suppliers, respectively.

The 600 billion is only tangentially related to the actual tariff burden, and, being government revenue, is actually a benefit to US households (the money can be returned to US households via tax breaks, spending, or debt servicing).

I suppose the assumption is that companies will raise prices on imported goods dollar-for-dollar with the tariff increases.

That's amazing, thanks for doing the research

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