So, with the state of the world, and Trump's batcrap insane trade war, let's talk tariffs, economic nationalism, and whether "MAGA" is a worthy goal or not.
For this, I'm going to start from 2016 and move forward, so we can build somewhat of an understanding here about it, where I'm somewhat sympathetic, and where I'm not.
2012-2016 and my evolving views on the subject
Even when I was conservative, I remember being a bit economically protectionist. This is because I never actually trusted corporations to do right by America. In retrospect, my economic conservatism was always relatively moderate, I always had a pro labor streak to my politics, I was just confused and brainwashed.
As I became liberal, I did develop a bit of a nationalist streak in my politics. I was protectionist. This is because I believe the nation state of the unit of governance and corporations try to outsource to avoid taxes, labor, and environmental regulations, leading to a race to the bottom. I live in Pennsylvania after all. I've seen industries that used to be this state's lifeblood just disappear and go overseas, leaving economic destruction in its wake. I do believe in that "giant sucking sound" as ross perot put it that comes from labor going overseas. And while I do believe jobs replace the old jobs, I do believe that 1) the new jobs aren't as good, as they're not subject to the same unionization and labor standards of the old ones, 2) in the american economy the new jobs are service jobs which are often looked down upon by people as "jobs for teenagers and losers with no skills", and 3) people don't always have the skills for the new higher skill jobs. Like, we used to have an actual MIDDLE class, now we're going in the direction of being 80/20 lower/upper class, where some are becoming more upper class, and others are being left behind. The economy is changing, and honestly, we should be skeptical that this is a good thing. While globalization means we get cheaper goods, that doesn't mean that people are necessarily able to afford to live in the modern economy, given how unequal it's getting.
I do believe that tariffs against third world countries with lax regulations and taxes could be beneficial. However, to be blunt, I would've NEVER put tariffs in canada and Europe like fricking Trump is doing now. That's INSANE. They're allies. They're relative equals. If you wanna tariff mexico, or china, or bangladesh, I'm somewhat sympathetic to it, but again, with me, I'd be targetted, and primarily to slow the bleeding of wealth leaving the country and going overseas.
After all, if we want wealth to go to people here, we do need to regulate things like wages, we need unions. We need taxes for social services like healthcare and UBI. I mean, at the end of the day, we have this system where we have the wealth all in the hands of the top, and then it trickles down. But then we ensure that businesses have no real obligation to let it trickle down, and then we basically let them leave the country to avoid making it trickle down. I mean what are we supposed to do? Just let the rich have all the money? We need to ensure that the wealth trickles down to people. It doesnt happen on its own. I dont believe in trickle down economics via laissez faire, i believe in pinata economics. You need to hit the rich with a stick (metaphorically) a few times to make the candy come out. My support for tariffs is selective. It's basically focused on ensuring that businesses can't avoid taxes and regulations. if anything, I support free trade agreements if, in them, we can ensure basic labor standards, taxation levels, etc. And I believe in trying to wrestle the world into trade terms that are at least not UNfavorable to American workers. I mean, they don't have to be crazy. I just wanna ensure that people cant just go overseas to avoid paying taxes and exploit people in sweatshop conditions for pennies an hour. You know?
With all of that said, was I sympathetic to MAGA in 2016? Eh...kind of. I mean, Trumpism was ALWAYS just, reaganism with a protectionist bend, but there was a split in american politics where in a sense, trump and sanders were on the same page, while the center was this weird neoliberal uniparty on the issue. Either way, it wasn't a huge part of my politics.
As I saw it, in 2016, people were still hurting from the recession. The recovery had been slow, many of us hadn't been feeling it, and something had to be done. I wouldnt have went full on into protectionism. Like, I'm not a full on protectionist. But I do understand that people were hurting and we had to do SOMETHING. And given clinton really didn't connect to people economically, I kinda see why people went trump.
Of course, let's be clear, even in 2016, I was a yang styled human centered capitalist. I believed that stuff before Yang adopted those views. I already deduced that the war on normal people was happening to some extent. I mean, I saw it in my own community. I live in a city in PA that used to be prosperous in the great new deal golden era but that suffered through the reagan years onward and by the 2010s was a burnt out husk with no real jobs. Poverty rate was like 40%, and income levels corresponded roughly with the minimum wage. I also understood there was no way job creation would work in areas like this. I was supporting UBI back then, understanding it was necessary.
As such, my efforts would have been on a combination of improving the jobs we have via updated labor regulations, and above all, going full on into UBI and universal healthcare in order to supplement income from jobs, and to improve labor standards by giving people more freedom.
I mean, let's face it, Trump's OBSESSION with economic nationalism is cut from a different ideological cloth than mine. For him, he can't be the dude who is for safety nets or regulations because he's a republican. And republicans are fundamentally AGAINST such things. So he HAS to lean into bringing back jobs, because the right is fundamentally obsessed with work, and of course, they blame immigrants for everything. So this is basically what happens when the right tries to be populist.
As such, trump ALWAYS overemphasized these things as the issues. Don't get me wrong, employers sending jobs overseas to avoid regulations and taxes IS an issue, but it's not the only issue, or the big issue, and trump was never going to bring in this golden utopia that solves all problems.
2024
Trump's fixation on these issues is far more psychotic in his second term. I mean, you gotta keep in mind that a lot has happened since 2016. We had a global pandemic, a so called "labor shortage", and Trump functionally inherited a good economy with "full employment" where inflation is the big issue.
As such, the issues of the modern economy are different. We no longer need more jobs. Even if you're sympathetic to such ends (I'm not), Trump's ideas are, at most, just gonna add to inflation. Tariffs make goods more expensive, they contribute to inflation. Having more jobs here is of no real benefit to us. We need to focus on improving the jobs we already have. Again, the fundamental issues are different now. We're on the other side of the phillips curve. Ironically all trump has to do to win is govern like a sane conservative. There's a reason i was cautious in advancing UBI and my normal set of solutions. Because trump, if smart, could just beat us over the head with inflation accusations. But...trump is very stupid, so he's going ahead tariffing canada, Europe, china, mexico, EVERYONE. He thinks this is "winning". I dont see what we're winning here. He's provoking trade wars with allies. And it's ironically also leading to a recession. Trump admittedly inherited a time bomb, but he's intent on setting it off. Like, again, in 2025's environment, his policies make NO sense. They're not productive at all. Just as UBI is a risky policy to push right now, so is tariffs. Because we dont need more jobs. If anything, we just had too many back in 2021 and had to pull it back a bit. But trump is just pathologically obsessed with this idea. And he doesnt care if it "brings on the pain". His people are sympathetic to it and they're pushing the narrative that we gotta "bring on the pain" to accomplish whatever ideological goals that he has in mind. But do these ideas actually make americans better off? No. Not on paper, not in reality. It's making things more expensive while driving us into a recession. We're literally getting stagflation from his policies in the current environment.
Even more so, we gotta really reconsider trump's nationalism here. Again, he's off the rails. He keeps going on about how we're "losing" and stuff. How? He seems to have this weird idea that the trade deficit is bad. It's not, really. We have this massive service economy and while some trade deficit lowers our GDP a little, it's not like we're not a power house that can sustain it. If anything, a trade deficit is seen in some terms as a good thing. Why? because it means we're getting more than we're producing. If looked at through an imperialist lens, we're taking all of these resources out of the third world practically for free and getting all of these products. We're actually getting the good end of the equation here.
Trump has this weird idea of autarky where we are 100% self sufficient, we dont even do trade, and that's good. he wants everything produced here. That's insane and ignores comparative advantage. He is completely economically illiterate. And okay, i see from a jobs perspective why that might seem like a good idea. I mean, we get all the jobs, they pay better (in theory, in reality we know trump is for the rich and he just has the same old trickle down economics the tight has always been for), but in reality...do we NEED this in 2025? NO! We had a full employment economy, all the jobs we needed. They just didnt pay well or had good labor conditions because right wing policies suck, and we needed left wing policies to improve them. And if anything inflation was the concern. DAE remember inflation and how bad the "biden economy" was because eggs were like $3-4 a dozen or something? Now they're like $10+ because of bird flu (not his fault, btw, but he was pathologically obsessed with this campaigning so I'm ripping on him for not producing the magical solution he said he would), and he's making everything else more expensive by tariffing everything.
How does this help us? The reason the biden economy sucked was because our idea of a conventional economy sucks. Biden had the best conventional economy we could hope for. Low unemployment, getting inflation under control. it's the best things had been since 1968. And yeah inflation sucks, dont get me wrong, I'm not saying it's perfect, but remember how I'm the human centered capitalist guy who obviously thinks we need to rethink the economy in larger terms to shift away from productivity and GDP and toward UBI and better labor conditions and more leisure?
Biden's core problem, from my end, was he wasn't left enough. He governed like a moderate republican and people dont want that in these populist times. We do need more economic interventionism.
HOWEVER, trump's interventions arent the right ones. They kinda sorta made sense in 2016, but even then they werent great, and now they're just...the exact opposite of what we need.
Again, it's ironic. All the republicans had to do here was beat democrats over the head with INFLATION INFLATION INFLATION and then govern sanely and basically inherit biden's economy and DO NOTHING, and for the more conservative americans, that would've been enough. But trump is just so ideologically married to this idea of MAGA via tariffs that he's actually imploding the economy and his presidency. These ideas help no one, they're making the world worse for everyone. And then on top of everything doge is floating social security cuts now.
Like, trump is just such a terrible president that he's literally speedrunning imploding everything. If we werent at risk at falling into a dictatorship right now, I'd just be laughing at this guy. He's SO DUMB. And he's screwing up SO BAD. Seriously, by the time he's done, by 2028, we should be getting FDR numbers. If the realignment isn't fascism + a weak democratic party unwilling to do anything, the next realignment should be in 2028 as the left comes back and just sweeps EVERYTHING. Because by the time trump is done with the country everyone is gonna be pissed and he's gonna be that once in a generation herbert hoover or jimmy carter style fall guy who ends the previous alignment and allows the next guy to come in and fix everything.
Speaking of which, you wanna know who was really big on tariffs? Herbert Hoover. Why was he hated so much? Because his smoot hawley act did the same thing trump is doing RIGHT NOW and it made the great depression worse. Trump is driving us into a recession. Just like herbert hoover took the great depression and then imploded things worse.
Really. We're at a moment of American history where either Trump is gonna cause us to descend into a fascist dark age, or the american people are gonna push back against the hard times that he's creating and we're gonna get a generational shift causing people to abandon the GOP. If we can make it through the next 4 years, happy times will be here again, but we gotta make it through this cursed administration first.
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