Trudeau announces 25 per cent retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods starting Tuesday
Trudeau announces 25 per cent retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods starting Tuesday
Trudeau decided to go ahead with retaliatory tariffs even though Trump’s order includes a mechanism to escalate the rates if Canada retaliates against the U.S.
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The Trump administration says it put the tariffs in place to force China, Mexico and Canada to stop the spread and manufacturing of fentanyl, in addition to pressuring Canada and Mexico to limit any illegal immigration into the United States.
Can anyone else see any actual logic to this? Do the Trump Republicans really believe this, or are they just saying it? What do they really want to achieve, apart from Trump being able to see himself as a tough guy?
There's no logic to it at all. It's absolutely not about that.
Almost no fentanyl is getting into the US from Canada. A vanishingly small amount of illegal immigration occurs through the Canadian border.
It's just fascism and imperialism.
The majority of fentanyl being smuggled into America is being smuggled in by American citizens. It's not like cocaine or cannabis. You can smuggle a huge amount of fentanyl in a tiny bottle. Why risk sending it with an undocumented person?
One would think there would be some talk about precursors... But nope just tax it 25 % that will be sure to get producers to stop. Pure idiocy
Saw a policy expert say it's a mixture of 3 things really:
- Trump likes to blame outsiders for problems and this is well received by his loyal base and gives off strongman vibes
- long term plan to switch from income tax (scales the more you earn) to consumption taxes (the poorer you are the more you pay for for consumption, relatively speaking) which benefits the rich at the expense of the poor. this wealth transfer is easier to sell when the populace is focused on outsiders
- Trump doesn't understand basic economics
Oh god why would you ever switch from income tax to consumption tax when you have fuck all social safety nets and so many people living paycheck to paycheck. Its actually so evil. I hope he gets beheaded.
Lol on the switch from income tax. I haven't heard a peep about that since before the election. Everything is just going to cost more now and I'm still going to be paying income taxes.
p 698 of project 2025 document:
The federal income tax system heavily taxes capital and corporate income and discourages work, savings, and investment. The public finance literature is clear that a consumption tax would minimize government’s distortion of private economic decisions and thus be the least economically harmful way to raise federal tax revenues.
more riches to capital and corporations, consumers will pay for it. it's all in there
They absolutely want to implement a national sales tax. They've been talking about it for a very long time and now they have the power to do it. And it's very much a "fuck the poor" policy.
Tarrifs get paid to the Treasury, the Treasury is getting controlled by Musk and Trump, they can take whatever they want from those funds. Whos going to stop them? The Supreme Court takes bribes which can come from the same pot.
He just needs to keep a bit of support until all angles are secured. So he just spreads lies and blames everything on people here illegally to keep people pitted against each other. The largest source of illegals in this country is from overstaying Visas, the thing they are expanding to higher numbers.... Aka more people to keep blaming shit on while putting on a show of deporting the ones that are already here.
Honestly doesn't look like they'll need much time to accomplish it.
Or they are just thinking of a quick cash grab ... gut the system and get as much wealth out of everything and everyone as fast and as much as possible ... let it all crash then abandon everything with all their money and let someone else fix everything.
I think in that scenario it's more likely that they would "buy the dip" then that they would up and leave. Some of the billionaires also want to found their own techno-fashist fiefdoms. This could be a good catalyst for that.
Won't someone think of the ultra wealthy?
I swear he wants to bring aristocracy to the US
Did you hear his inauguration speech? Where he lamented the poor downtrodden billionaires who were now homeless because of the fires in LA?
I swear he wants to bring aristocracy to the US
He wants to further entrench the oligarchy, I think. And it seems to be working.
They have to say this in order to get around the provisions in the free trade agreement HE signed last time he was in office.
Unfair... Trade deficits....
His words... About his own trade deal
A. Enact sales tax on poor people so that they can fund further corporate tax cuts
B. Ruin relationships with the closest American allies as that is a net benefit for geopolitical rivals like Russia, who Trump is demonstrably in bed with
C. Market value collapse let's all the rich cronies that have crawled up Trump's asshole buy out what's left of America's assets at fire sale prices. 10 richest men doubled their wealth during covid. They want that to happen again.How much lower can the taxes on them go? Warren Buffet already says he pays almost nothing.
You can always subsidize.
"Almost nothing" != "Nothing"
Besides, why stop at zero? Why shouldn't our benevolent job creators have a negative tax rate?
You owe them money!
I'mma let you in on a secret: Fentanyl basically is only a meaningful threat to addicts who don't know what they were taking. And if we actually cared about them, we would pump a fraction of a percent of our military budget into rehab and therapy to help them kick the habit and put narcan (sp?) in every emergency first aid kit right next to the defib. Beyond that, it is just an excuse for why a cop beat his wife or murdered a black kid.
As for what they ACTUALLY want to achieve? Saw an analyst hypothesize (on bluesky) that the real goal was the 10% tariffs. Put those on and drop them after vague claims of getting something in return (comparable to South America... fucking earlier this week?). It makes trump look "hard on China" while destabilizing relations between North America and later NATO. And it would result in basically every company jacking up their prices to pass that on to the consumer and then never lowering them because capitalism.
End result? increased profits for the oligarchs who jacked up their "made in America" products even more than the 10% they were now paying on materials and components.'
As for this? I don't like seeing my retirement funds go down the toilet (and am not optimistic they are ever coming back up this time) but fuckin' a. Burn it to the ground. It will hurt the little guy but it will hurt the 0.0000001%ers even more. The world is going to be on fire and have no water by the time I am eligible to take cash out of my 401k without penalties anyway.
That said? I assume he wants his base to believe the reason why groceries are still expensive is because Canada and Mexico just love fentanyl so much and they hate America. And his base will eat it up while the same useful idiots make sure the left is united against the Democrats (who do fucking suck but...).
These tariffs are a way for Trump to tax his population so he can fund whatever he pleases. And the majority of his population don't even understand this 25pct tax is going from their pocket straight into his.
It feels like he's trying to accomplish the kind of hostile take over you see in business. That doesn't really work with a country though....
Businesses cannot effectively function when the government is clowning around like this.
Canada would have to go back to adding items to that one particular list they made for us.
Trump is still butt hurt about world leaders, especially Justin Trudeau, laughing at him and making fun of him behind his back. The tarrifs are a way to generate funds to pay for tax breaks for the rich. It will also allow American companies to raise prices, and profits, without the cheaper Canadian products and with less supply so more demand. It's a bit of him being a bully, a bit of revenge, but mostly, like everything else he is doing, it's about allowing the wealthy to loot the country bankrupt while burning the thing to the ground and enriching himself.
Trump needs a fight, he cannot function without an enemy.
Did he just pick the only two other countries he could find on a map?
It's just a special operation to route out Nazis. It's 15 cases going down to 0. It'll be gone by Easter.
Getting a win even though it's for something that wasn't an issue in the first place.