5 hours ago
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A warning to President Donald Trump: Everyone, including your friends, is starting to get a brutal case of tariff burnout.
That’s something to keep in mind even when you have an excellent policy case, as with Friday’s double-barreled blast.
Barrel No. 1: The prez threatened a 50% duty on goods coming out of the European Union to begin next month, raging that trade discussions “are going nowhere,” and that the EU “was formed for the primary purpose of taking advantage of the United States on TRADE.”
It’s absolutely true that the EU’s architects aimed to build a rival economic power, though the resulting bloc is now economically stagnant, crushed by the de facto rule of self-regarding bureaucrats who’ve made startups a rarity and the continent a tech backwater, even as they unfairly ice out and punish US firms.
Barrel No. 2 blasted away at Apple: Trump warned the company that failing to move its manufacturing back home would prompt a tariff of “at least 25%.”
Again, he’s got a basic point: An iPhone’s list price is far above the cost of raw materials, and labor even in higher-wage America can only add so much; moving production from China to India may protect the company’s huge markup, but was never going to satisfy a president who wants leading American companies to make their products here.
In response, the Dow dropped 256 points in a volatile day (the latest spin in the rollercoaster the market has been on since Trump’s trade wars began), while luxury automaker Volvo warned that prices on cars are going to spike.
None of that is fatal: It’s the longer-term stock trend that matters, and actual price changes for most consumers, not high-end hysteria.
But it’s more whiplash for those following closely: He keeps announcing prohibitive levies, then backing off and even brandishing landmark deals, only to seemingly go on the warpath again.
It may make sense to him, and his specific targets may get the message he’s sending their way — but everyone else is trying to read what it means for themselves.
Who feels confident they fully understand the strategy behind the tactics, and does so enough to have a clear sense of where things will stand in six months?
Import- and export-sensitive businesses, especially mom-and-pop places with tiny margins (many of whom are Trump’s own supporters), can’t plan or take risks when they don’t know what’s coming down the pike, which chokes entrepreneurship.
And casual observers wind up fearing that he has no strategy, that he just pushes the tariff button when he’s bored.
It’s one thing for your enemies to find you unpredictable, another for your friends to worry that you’re acting on pure whim.
All this uncertainty exacts a cost of its own, angst that builds with every surprise twist.
Every day, folks are nervous: With the end of the 90-day pause on Trump’s “Liberation Day” deadline looming, retailers like Walmart have made it clear that they can’t (or won’t) eat the cost of higher import prices, which means customers will have to.
Fine: These are all ongoing negotiations, and it’s Trump’s duty to bargain hard, but Americans are really tired of tariffs: 57% say that they’re hurting the economy; 26% think they’re the biggest mistake of Trump’s second term.
Even fans of the president’s theater can get sick of endless drama.
Trump clearly sees tariffs as a wonderful hammer, but not everything is a nail.
Maybe he could make a point of loudly or visibly using some other tools are he works to get better deals for our country.
English (US)