Five Republican Senators unite with Democrats against Trump’s tariffs.
I am pleased to report Some Republican Senators Show Some Tariff Sanity.
The 51-48 vote to approve the measure took place just hours after Trump imposed a 10% baseline tariff on all imports to the U.S., and higher rates for some nations. It marked a significant rebuke of the president’s expansive effort to overhaul U.S. trade policy with friends and foes alike.
The resolution, led by Sen. Tim Kaine (D., Va.), would end an emergency declaration Trump used to impose tariffs on Canadian goods—the first time, along with a similar move on goods from Mexico, that a president had ever used the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to impose tariffs.
Under federal law, Congress has the power to cancel national emergencies declared by the president. But the current proposal has been blocked in the GOP-led House, and Trump could veto any measure that makes it to his desk, making Wednesday’s vote largely symbolic.
Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky joined with all Democrats in backing the resolution. Paul, who is a co-sponsor of the bill, has argued that tariffs are a tax and that only Congress—not the president—can impose taxes under the Constitution.
“This is a tax, plain and simple, on the American people,” Paul said. “You can’t simply declare an emergency and say, ‘Well, the constitutional republic was great, but gosh, we’ve got an emergency and times are dire.’ ”
Paul clapped after the vote tally was final, as a beaming McConnell—the former party leader who has long had a bumpy relationship with Paul—stood next to him.
Ahead of the vote, Trump took to his social-media platform to attack Republicans who had been reported to be siding with Democrats, saying that they have “been extremely difficult to deal with” and “unbelievably disloyal” to Thune and the Republican Party.
Collins said tariffs would inflict harm on Maine, which she said imports home-heating oil and gasoline from Canada, as well as potash, a fertilizer for potato growers. In turn, Maine sends its blueberries and lobsters to Canada for processing.
“The fact is, that if we impose these tariffs on Canadian processing, it’s going to be our Maine lobstermen who will bear the cost. It’s going to be consumers who bear the cost,” Collins said. She said that Canadian tourists have already begun canceling vacation trips to her state.
Senator Grassley Introduces a Separate Measure
Today, Grassley Pushes for Congressional Approval of President’s Tariffs
Republican U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley introduced a bill on Thursday that would require congressional approval for new tariffs, the day after President Donald Trump unveiled sweeping new taxes on a vast array of imported goods.
Grassley, whose home state of Iowa relies heavily on the global agricultural trade, joined Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington for the “Trade Review Act of 2025” which would require Congress to sign off on new tariffs within 60 days of their imposition or automatically block their enforcement.
The move, made the day after four other Senate Republicans voted for a measure that would lift Trump’s tariffs on Canadian goods, was the latest sign of dissent among Republicans as Trump’s aggressive moves fanned recessionary fears and sparked Wall Street’s worst day since 2022.
Symbolic Actions
These are symbolic measures because they the totality of House Republicans are too fearful of opposing Trump.
But even if it passed, Trump would veto it.
This is the problem of ceding constitutional rights to the President.
Stocks Suffer Biggest One-Day Wipeout in Value Since March 2020
I was on the road and missed the close. It was ugly. The Wall Street Journal reports Stocks Suffer Biggest One-Day Wipeout in Value Since March 2020
Major stock indexes dropped as much as 6% on Thursday. Stocks lost roughly $3.1 trillion in market value, their largest one-day decline since March 2020. Stock-index futures continued to drift lower Thursday evening.
The Dow industrials dropped 1679 points, or 4%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq, which powered the market higher for years, was down 6%, pulled lower by big declines in Nvidia, Apple and Amazon.com. The S&P 500, which fell 4.8%, and the other benchmarks suffered their sharpest declines since the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The dollar meanwhile tumbled, with the WSJ Dollar Index suffering its sharpest decline since 2023. The 1.3% fall brought the greenback to its lowest level since October, a sign of unease over the growth outlook and fears that the flow of funds into the country will be sharply curtailed. The dollar sank more than 1% against the euro, Japanese yen and Swiss franc.
Some of America’s allies came out swinging after the details of the U.S. president’s tariff plans were disclosed late Wednesday. French President Emmanuel Macron said Europe is weighing retaliation against U.S. tech firms, while Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said his country will match President Trump’s auto tariffs with 25% tariffs of its own.
Trump took the selloff in stride. “I think it’s going very well,” Trump said in response to a question about his tariffs Thursday afternoon. “The markets are going to boom.” Later Thursday, he left the door open to making deals to lower tariffs, while also promising new ones on pharmaceuticals and semiconductors.
Dozens of household-name stocks posted double-digit declines, including HP, Nike and Target. Stellantis also fell sharply. The Jeep maker said it is temporarily halting production at its auto assembly factories in Mexico and Canada.
The turmoil spread beyond stocks, with oil prices dropping more than 6% and investors selling gold after its sharp run over the past year to fresh records. Inflation expectations rose, but so did fears that the tariffs will tip the economy toward recession, sending investors to the safety of Treasurys.
Hoot of the Day
“I think it’s going very well,” said Trump.
This is how well.
- DOW: -3.98 Percent
- Nasdaq: -5.97 Percent
- S&P 500: -4.84 Percent
- Russell 2000 Index: -6.59 Percent
Trump Signals He’s Willing to Make Deals to Lower Tariffs
“Tariffs give us great power to negotiate.”
Question: Who can possibly believe Trump would honor any deal he makes?
Countries should let the US stew.
Also see Reflections on the Day Trump’s Tariffs Shook Wall Street and Corporate America
Losing battle. Constitution gives tariff authority to office of the President.
No… Article 1, Section 8. But maybe you are being facetious.
I do not expect Congressional Republicans to continue to stand by and watch the markets fall, the economy move toward a recession, and a trade war to rage. Congress can stop this tariff insanity and the major self-inflicted disaster.
40 years of economic mismanagement (starting with Reagan) is all going to unwind over one long hot summer. Best to be prepared now.
The comments by Sen. Collins says it all. She is OK with Maine blueberrys and Maine lobsters being processed in Canada. Shouldn’t she be concerned as to why these processing activities aren’t taking place in Maine? She also complains about Canadian tourists cancelling vacation reservations. Apparently she is OK with the US becoming a tourist museum like Europe. I’m not in favor of these tariffs, but the anti-tariff crowd isn’t making a credible argument against them including this blog. I’m sure there is a better way to increase manufacturing in the US but I haven’t heard it on this blog.
This all started in the Mid 90’s when tariffs were removed via NAFTA.
Then a few yrs later, Sep 2000, China was granted Permanent Normal Trade Relations, removing the annual renewal vote in congress for the low/no tariffs on products made in China.
Once the tariff removal was permanent the outsourcing kicked into overdrive.
I appreciate you being open to other solutions but I dont see how we undo the damage of tariff removal w/o reinstituting tariffs.
Then you haven’t been listening or reading on this blog much.
The credible argument against tariffs is for people (both domestic and foreign) to be able to buy from and sell to wherever they personally choose. Yes, Sen. Collins is OK with Maine blueberries and lobsters being sold (abroad) to Canada. Maine producers make profits that way, and Maine citizens have jobs producing berries and lobsters. Why would she not support those constituents?
I don’t remember seeing ‘buy or sell wherever’ in the Bill of Rights. The sucking of US jobs overseas and the destruction of our manufacturing and industrial base would seem like all you need to know to realize that we are long overdue for a change of strategy.
=trump is good, reps are fighting for little people, and dems are bad!
to my fellow Americans!
just check out stats how many years since Clinton / NAFTA REPS CONTROLLED
house of representatives AND -OR senate. more than DEMS.
and AND THEY DID NOTHING!!!!!!!!!
=====
I am Russian, so not much care about reps /or dems.
this division good reps/ bad dems is mind boggling for anyone who is watching from aside, or 12 hours time zone distance.
It’s just political rhetoric.
Commodity prices have dropped a lot the past two days. So have interest rates. This is good for the lower 50% how do not own or own very little stocks.
They don’t care if stocks drop. I know. I have some relatives who do not own stocks or a 401k.
But lower gas, food, and interest rates on their credit cards will make their life easier.
I am not sure how it all plays out but the big drop in stocks does not effect the bottom 50% much.
Another economic illiterate. The US does seem to churn these out,
Of course it matters, if your stocks collapse as mine are this side of the pond then there is less disposable income for goods and services, both essential and non essential. Essential services soon become non essential as your income collapses.
Back to school for you my friend.
Your mixing and matching. Luckily, U.S. schools are better.
BTW….Stocks are not disposable income. You should know that. Neither are retirement funds.
Also, many people are diversified and own bonds which are going up in value. MF funds are at an all time high.
Anyway….Limy…..I don’t think you know what talking about. Go look at any consumer spending charts. During the dot.com stock market crash the Nasdaq lost 77% and SPY lost 24% but guess what. Consumer “Personal Consumption Expenditures” did not drop at all. Not one bit. Why, because not that many people where effected by the stock market because they did not own stocks.
During the housing bubble, SPY lost 56% and consumer spending dropped 3.8%.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PCE/
you cant turn around thing that was since Clinton/ NAFTA
USA used to stuff done by 500$ per month people (china, Vietnam, etc)
do you even understand you wont hire decent hard working man for less than
60,000 per year in USA? (aka 5000*6000 per month)
You will if you can force the standard of living down to Vietnam standards.
… for the poor, of course.
how?
USA is rich country, 60+ pct have houses. 2 cars per 3 people!
lots of savings.
you can force only by FORCE (pun unintended), aka revolution. who is going to do that?
USA in 2025 is not Russia in 1917, or French before comm. revolution and napoleon
This morning the Dow Jones Transportation Index hit a nonlinear 30 month gapped lower low …. likely a solid leading indicator for a global recession …
“These are symbolic measures because they the totality of House Republicans are too fearful of opposing Trump.”
House republicans are afraid of touching the third rail, entitlement programs. Every politician wants to keep their job. Thus the current out of control deficits and national debt, are not going to be addressed, until the math goes tilt.
After all this noise and bother, watch the deficit set records for the next 4 years.
This isn’t a rescue. It’s a heist.
SPX might move up after closing Aug 7/8 2025 gap, or after breaching Aug 5 low. The trip to Mar/ Apr waterfall might be over. 5,500 and above is next. Fu^k China.
DOGE them then primary them.
Then use tariffs to incentivize companies NOT to build factories in their states.
Good to see someone looking out for his fellow Americans, most likely from a red state that takes more federal money than it pays in taxes.
Could you explain why its ok for a country to charge 60% tariffs on our stuff and they have no tariffs on there stuff? I don’t know not an economist . What if the tariffs work? May just be Trumps way of making a deal, ask for the stars and settle for the moon. I like the option of buying cheap Chinese stuff if I want to. Maybe thats called free trade .
Your numbers are Trump’s bullshit numbers not reality. You have been brainwashed.
Start here.
https://mishtalk.com/economics/cheese-was-a-key-achievement-of-trumps-usmca-trade-agreement/
NEW YORK/HOUSTON: US oil producers are grappling with geological limits to production growth as the country’s top oilfield ages and produces more water and gas and less oil – and may be nearing peak output.
Read more on: https://www.omanobserver.om/article/1168280/business/energy/us-oil-producers-face-new-challenges-as-top-oilfield-flags
“This is a tax, plain and simple, on the American people,” Paul said.
Shuttering factories and sending them to China, was a tax on the manufacturing workers who lost their jobs and never recovered the loss in income.
Let’s tell both sides of the story.
Rand knows about Washington and Hamilton and The Whiskey Rebellion.
Manufacturers who moved their plants to China were also moving middle class U.S. wealth to China.
Manufacturers moved their plants to China and then the CEO and shareholders pocketed what used to be middle class wages of their workers. The Chinese got paid peanuts but were able to steal intellectual property to make their own knockoff versions.
I agree but I would say both. Yes, the Chinese got paid peanuts but those peanuts were 2x or 3x more than they are getting from the farming jobs and moved them up into the Chines middle class by their standards.
“Stocks Suffer Biggest One-Day Wipeout in Value Since March 2020”
What has the market parabolic looked like since then? It’s become extremely over valued. An illusion based on massive debt. I haven’t trusted the stock market since 1987. 2000 and 2007 resulted in 50 and 57 percent crashes in the S&P 500. 50% would take the DOW back to what, 22,000 or so? 1,200 in a day pales compared to a 22,000 total drop due to a parabolic run.
You’ll lose many these days by invoking 3rd grade arithmetic.
This is only day 2. We’ll get there.
First I’ve heard about this “tariff thing”. Are you sure this is really happening, I’m sure if Trade Tariffs were being considered we’d hear something on the news about it…
The Senate move doeasn’t mean a thing, unfortunately. Congress will get voted out in 2 years-at least the Republicans will. But by then it will be too late. Maybe Jamie Dimon could step up and speak some sense but would Trump listen? Doubt it. There will be thousands of small businesses lose out on this because they don;t have the flexibility to adapt to these tariffs. Trucking is going to hurt because less goods will be moved in an out of ports.
“There will be thousands of small businesses lose out on this because they don’t have the flexibility to adapt [fill in the blank].”
Welcome to Kayfabe!! Trump is the troll/heel doing a live promo for His adoring fans who suspend disbelief while he “pushes on a String.” Tariffs and the new Multipolar world order make sense when you throw in the towel, trade in your “golden whistle” and “a bag of loot” for a half-dead NATO soldier with a broken left foot. The BRICS ruse entertains after Western countries confiscate Foreign Reserves.. all of this a form of energy triage to mitigate the tragic decline of surplus energy as globalism, debt-based economics, CBs, technological solutions and increasing complexity are no longer able to contain the beat. Another incremental step ie. feathering for the Degrowth Agenda. Neoliberalism, Digital transformation, the GFC, X-axis political ideologies and Covid era policies create a culture of dependency, tear apart the social fabric and destroy thousands of lives, livelihoods and small businesses. The great simplification or a greater reset seems to be one of the few ways to resist the Technate. Form Land trusts and coop networks with legal campgrounds, regenerative agriculture, alternative currencies and protective associations teaching time-tested skills and know-how for people who lose everything for non-compliance.
jamie dimon? are you kidding ? too funny.
it obviouly cannot bring manufacturing back. think about it:
this will take a decade we have elections in 2 years and 4 years. the pan needed to get there is not sometning we can bear and anyone wit IQ above 80 knows this.
at best, this will result in some global tariff renegotiation, which won’t undo the harm to the US which has become a toxic brand. EU. Asia, no one will be buying anything American unless they have no choice.
And there will still be a chaos discount on capital expenditures, the market, and business overall.
Funny how we were able to train tens of thousands of women to be welder, electricians, and factory workers in a short amoungt of time during WWII, at a time when women were mostly homemakers.
and we were able to build ships in a week, Liberty Ships. It is not that we cannot do these things, it is that the WILL to do these things is not allowed.
The politicians (and the bankers who own them) want us inside trade cages,Trade Prisons, controlled by treaties that benefit those who control the trade. A closed system benefits whoever controls the system.
AI Overview
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At least 22 countries supply parts for fighter jets, with the United States leading in the number of imported components, followed by Japan, Switzerland, Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Taiwan, and the Netherlands.
US can also build ships with other 50 countries.
AI is a weapon disguised as a tool. everytime you use it, it learns about you, to replace you.
try thinking for yourself, while you still can.
this is a myth. women have always worked in factories. in fact the industrial revolution was sparked by textile factories staffed largely by women. This concept that mothers were stay at home moms only ever applied to middle class salried jobs. working class women have always worked to suppliment household income.
Laughable.
Yes, women worked in the garment industry but they were not working on assembly lines building machines in any appreciable numbers.
But in a short time women were building planes and tanks and jeeps while the men were at war in Europe and the Pacific.
Admiral Yamamoto would have really caught FDR by surprise if it had been the Brooklyn Shipyards.
Japanese wwII planes couldn’t cross the USA or the Atlantic ocean.
FDR knew they were going to hit Hawaii, the brits wanted US in the war. they couldn’t handle Hitler alone, we couldn’t either, thank Russia for grinding them down.
We don’t use ww2 technology today. Job skills are quite different, the skill level is much higher.
Again, laughable.
If anything technology has made these jobs less physically demanding.
This isn’t rocket science, it’s factory work. And the training and learning curve is not a decade steep.
Manufacturing added only 1k jobs.
Rest of economy was better then expected.
Tariffs will be addressing a weak manufacturing sector.
long overdue.
Europe retires from 60 to 70.
Americans after working their whole life still have to work to make ends meet after they have retired.
Plenty of other countries who will gladly replace whatever China has to offer.
Fed does not have to cut as rates are coming down by themselves. Which means they do not have to stimulate.
Energy continues to weaken which will knock stuffings out of inflation expectations.
Jobs market stays resilient outside of manufacturing which takes away another reason market pundits say Fed will cut.
Fed has disavowed they will be doing the Fed Put routine again.
Powell prepared statement in summation. We have no idea what impact of Trump economic policies will be but think Tariff will be inflationary.
Which large economy gets most unaffected by the changes coming? USA
Five
RepublicanRINO Senators Break Ranks With Trump Over His Tariff Madness.PLEASE!!! The only thing these Senators are going to vote with Trump on are tax cuts.
Given the norm among Republicans, being a RINO is a compliment.
yup. total kabucki theatre. they all agree on never ending warfare and MIC spending and debt to the moon and tax cuts. uniparty flim flam artists. if you are over 14 years old and still believe in the blue v red team pro wrestling act, i can only LOL in your face. too stoooooopid.
China retaliates with 34% tariffs, cutting off 7 rare earths and booting 11 american companies.
“Cry havoc! and let loose the tariffs of trade war!”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/04/business/china-trump-tariffs-retaliation.html
Oh and the 10 year is below 4% and Dow Futures down ANOTHER 1000.
Winning! /s
And this has been decades long brewing.
The shadow of Henry Kissinger, and Bill Clinton falls over this entire trade system.
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
LOL
The stock market, (even by Trump in the past) view as a keybjndicator of health?
Funny.
We all know that the stock market is a measure of emotion, not performance?
Well, the market was well over valued
, up until the November 2024 election. Bringing g the values down? To today’s lows? Is perhaps a reality check? Stocks at x40 earnings use to be considered over valued, AI stock at x100 earnings. Is an indication of over speculation, too much optimism or perhaps not enough diversity in our stock portfolios?
Again.
Funny.
…..waiting for the real stuff to hit the fan.
Chipping away at our freedoms one tax at a time.
I find more peace viewing it as if it’s just people, investors, markets and traders doing the same things over and over. It doesn’t matter how smart you are, it’s gonna happen. Don’t be too stubborn as an investor or trader. What happens, happens, just invest and trade; hating or loving people or even policies won’t improve your investing or trading results. It’s more about unemotional money management, I think. Everybody is trying to demand their own way, but Trump is in power, so unemotionally plan and invest; hating doesn’t improve results, imo. I’m not rich, so maybe trading with hatred works better, just not for me.
Spot on.
Reference to the Dow, or Nasdaq and even S and P, is mere a measure of emotion, not so much rhe general economic performance.
How many here forgot, less than 6 months ago, investors believed the stock market was over valued. Where did those critics go?
I suspect, all of a sudden, everyone including Mish, has accepted those earni fs ratios over 40x earnings to be true? Or of credible value? What ever happened to stocks valued at x40 earnings? Will we return to those days of realistic valuations?
We will see, in coming days or months?
Also, I contend, Trump is appealing to young workers (laborers). If the primary result is young people have more opportunity for good jobs, I’m ok with it. They are young and want to buy in to the markets at low value while they save money, too. Also, they probably don’t have much invested. Possible ideal environment for labor to prosper, but stocks and/or rising prices may suffer, a trade off. I’m an old man, but I want our young to thrive! It’s just too political to work, I think, but I’m not against the goal.
Zillow “valuations” 2007
trading is simple once you master the simple truth. it’s 100% gambling. earnings……are meaningless. unless you plan to hold for 15 or 20 years and perhaps be lucky. just use gaming theory. sell your losers fast, hold your winners. when winners start to go down. sell them. gambling 101. read ed seykota. the best trader of all time.
HP HQ is in Palo Alto. They used to make stuff here in the US, but today they make it in China and India, all over the place Tariffs war might make HP computers unviable. It will force HP to make them here, in a hub, instead of shipping hardware pcs from one dot to the next and from one country to the next, before shipping them to HP distribution centers in the US to be sold by HP online, Amazon and Walmart. Perhaps they will make better computers that don’t shutdown twice a day.
HP died in 2000, its just a marketing machine, no engineering, no inventing.
Their biggest breakthrough in the last 25 years, was forcing users to buy HP toner and INK by dodgey firmware upgrades and software.
not exactly Nobel Prize stuff.
Even if these tariffs work as intended, it’s crazy to let a president just put them in on a whim without a vote in Congress.
it’s a cult.
Somebody forgot to tell him about the Constitution and separation of powers and the fact that he is president and not king.
Maybe you should check out what the function of Administrative branch does in its Constitutional role.
After four years without a President people do not understand what Leadership means.
The president buys the ice cream and falls off the bicycle and his doggy bites the secret service. it is said thus so in the constitution according Reddit.
Over the years, Congress has given the executive branch most of their constitutional powers. Name any past, future or current President that will voluntarily give these powers back? Congress has became only a rubber stamp for spending via CR.
Michelle Obama, Jr, 87th president, gave congress back the power to ratify certain treaties with her permission, Jan 17th 2184. see the quantum future Wikipedia pages at Cern. Its next to the portal they opened into the dark dimensions in 2028.
Canada, more of a ruse than hard and fast. You all can whinge and moan as much as you want. Western Canada also has a huge money laundering problem with the Chinese. Meanwhile, CCP China along with Vietnam as a conduit has dumped $600bn in exports, subsidized by artificial cost of capital production, into the US over the last year. Now the CCP says its being bullied. Play time is over Chairman Mao. Tech transfers, dual ownership of FDI, yeah no. Fair, lol. The US must reshore production. As to jobs, difficult to say how this evolves because automation in manufacturing is more not less. Jobs will exist to service the automation / robotics lines etc. AI, more a tool for logistics and military applications as well as biological (here we go again, military) applications due to its vast computational powers, is going to be difficult with jobs as it is. My advice would be to stop sucking your thumbs, look up and see that globalization in its neo liberal form is fully cooked, and move on. Lots of opportunities, bumpy rides.
ZION DON’S GREAT LEAP FORWARD
You are seriously TDS. Get outside more and step away from media.
i am currently in the psychiatric wing of the prison. the yard is outdoors. my TDS makes me rage even more outdoors. you are in a cult cutie pie. like a manson family acid head.
Trump’s ordered DOJ not to enfrce the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Plus his personal ethical history doesn’t align with stamping out laundering or any corruption.
Opposition by any Republican Senator/congress person is important to demonstrate to our allies a potential to return to normalcy. The post WW2 Golden age when many American households had a manufacturer single wage earner buying a house and supporting a household can’t be replicated today with competition by AI and robotic manufacturing and foreign low wage competition. Federal policies limiting the financial industry acquisition of residential real estate, requiring 90% of corporate profits to be reinvested in new American industry vice corporate buy backs (> 10 trillion over the last 20 years), continued federa support of essential industries to maintain America’s military wherewithal, a return to pre Reagan personal income tax rates would help control deficit spending to 3% of GDP. Likewise, a national referendum to disallow any member of congress to run for reelection if annual deficit-GDP spending (except in recessions) exceeded 3% seems appropriate. (Warren Buffet’s idea)
Post WWII, the other industrial economies were bombed to ruin and their manpower was decimated in the trenches. The US, on the other hand, had an intact industrial base and thousands of GI engineers fresh out of college. Nowadays, there are new competitive industrial economies and there are more STEM graduates in China than in the next dozen countries put together. In other words, nothing will change without heavy investment in STEM education and only in a decade’s time, too long for any politician to care.
Concur …
The madness happened 30 yrs ago when we gutted American manufacturing and sacrificed millions of American jobs and so many American cities and towns to outsourcing.
Then we engaged in more madness by pretending that we could replace the creation of real wealth with the fake wealth called Financialization and all the bubbles that followed the financialization of our economy.
And now we criticize those voters and politicians who realize that this mistake has to be undone, even if it means enduring a period of hardship in order to focus more on Main Street and less on Wall Street.
Free trade didn’t gut American manufacturing. American manufacturing is actually doing quite well. It is American manufacturing employment that has declined. For sectoral comparison, American used to produce a lot of agricultural products and employed a large percentage of the American populace in doing so. Now, America produces even more agricultural output but it does so with a much, much smaller labor force. In other words, increases in industrial and agricultural output in the United States have been accompanied by decreases in labor inputs due to capital replacement such as farm equipment like tractors and combine harvesters and robotics and advanced manufacturing.
If manufacturing has taken a hit from any source it has been due to regulation. Reduce and remove regulations that hamper industrial expansion and there will be more jobs in manufacturing. Not the hundreds of thousands irresponsibly promised by protectionists, but perhaps tens of thousands. That’s not a bad thing and has more lasting impact than skewing an economy towards employing people in uncompetitive firms which is what tariff protectionism does.
As to financialization, that also has nothing to do with free trade. Free trade doesn’t rely on reserve bank economic interference through fiat money creation. Financialization of assets is entirely a creature of the modern monetary system set up after Nixon famously closed the gold window. Fiat money expansion by reserve banks and the conjoined expansion in government spending has generated the rush to financialization and managed to generate more asset pricing bubbles.
Are you saying that an enormous trade deficit is not important and therefore it is not necessary to reduce it?
it’s not important, and having a lower trade deficit isn’t beneficial if it comes about by cutting international competition.
we have a trade deficit because we are a rich country with lots of people. of course we have a trade deficit with Canada, we have 9 times as many people! Mexico is smaller and poorer.
Trade deficit with Canada is due to oil imports. Larger, smaller, what are your talking about?
You’re rich cos you own world central bank issuing USD, reserve currency which has exorbitant privilege. And you spent like drunken sailor for decades and now in debt of over 36 trillions which cannot be paid back.
This is the curse of reserve currency. Whatever you do it is late or even too late. No painless option and not going back to exorbitant privilege status.
So all rich countries have trade deficits? That is new to me.
Purchase decisions are made by individuals, not countries. If someone wants to purchase a product or service from abroad (adding to the trade deficit), are you saying it’s necessary for you and Trump to make/change those decisions for those individuals?
Yes. It is called Trade Policy.
THERE is no such thing as a trade deficit.
The fact is a closed factory employs no one, and we closed thousands and threw millions of Americans out of work.
The fact is those jobs went overseas, mostly China. We’re still using the Stuff that those factories made in the USA, except now they’re made in China. That means when you buy that Something, instead of some of that $$$ going to Indiana or Ohio and paying for roads, schools, and emergency services in Indiana or Ohio, it instead goes to China and pays for roads, schools, etc in China.
That fact is a few yrs after we started outsourcing in the mid-90’s we started being a Bubble Economy. First was the Nasdaq Bubble in the late 90’s, immediately followed by the Housing Bubble up until 2008, and then the Govt Debt Bubble (the biggest bubble of them all!)
We replaced the creation of Stuff (aka Real Wealth) with the creation of money/debt.
So now we have to at least attempt to undo that collossal screw up.
100% correct. If Wall Street takes hit because the middlemen lose the ability to make $ off of the slave wages in other countries that just too bad for them. Maybe they can get of their asses and produce real things.
The US will become the world’s high cost producer
Exports will plunge
Only the few with union jobs benefits
Others get hit by inflation
So it’s idiotic
So without offshore slave labor and autocratic regimes and corruption which of course bleeds back in here, the US cannot produce low cost items? That seems dogmatic and backwards looking. Maybe. We’ll see.
Slave labor is forced labor, not voluntary employment. Think the draft for slave labor.
And the products will be too expensive and low quality for the people, whose standard of living will fall.
As someone who grew up in the rust belt, I know this to be true. You had to have connections for high paying factory jobs. I worked at Republic steel as a summer worker but was not allowed to stay, full time was for the connected. I also paid union dues with no union protection. The mill I worked in was built around 1900 while the Europeans and Koreans were making steel in modern plants.
i know men who worked in ford plant with 3rd grade education. black men from the deep south who worked in fields at age 8 and came north and got job the same day in detroit in the 50s at age 16. where i grew up getting a union card for NYC construction job in 1970s was easy street. half my friends and family did it.
stop the world wide war mongering empire building. we would only need perhaps 20% of amerikans to actually be productive. the rest can just relax and hit the beach or play sportsball. it’s all so stupid. smoot trump is the dumbest move in 200 years. i think fort sumter bombing might have been on the same par. i used to live in charleston for decade………..long ago. that was really dumb move by the hot heads. trump and his cult as dumb. isolate the usa and punch our neighbors in the mouth.
you’re ignoring decades of tech dominance and innovation, as if that didnt’ create millions of jobs and massive wealth, and not only for the founders. And it also destroyed a lot. I used to work at a company with a huge mailroom to deliver mail internally and mail it out etc… email, digitized documents killed those jobs. And created new ones, to handle IT.
the world changes. you can’t turn back time. it’s like if buggy drivers, and manufacturers wanted to maintain their jobs after cars. It wasn’t possible.
Fact is the issue you are discussing is called capitalism: you’re complaining about labor competition. And your solution is straight out of Communism 101: impose high tariffs to protect your labor market and manufacturing from competition.
The fact is, unlike buggies, we’re still using a lot of the stuff that left: ie washing machines, clothing, footwear, toasters, refrigerators, and so many other items.
Dont believe me? Go to your nearest big box store and see for yourself all the items that are for sale. Many of those items used to be made in the USA before we slit our throats with outsourcing.
This isn’t the Danny Devito Buggy Whip story that you want it to be.
ZION DON’S FIVE YEAR PLAN WILL WORK. I PROMISE. AFTER THAT IT’S ON TO THE GREAT LEAP FORWARD.
we manufacture more than we ever did, we export more than we ever did. the factories do it with fewer people, and this will only get worse not better with innovation in AI and robotics.
even if the factories come back, making anything requires fewer people.
This is all irrelevant anyway. Are you actually listening to what Trump says? because he is always saying 2 contradictory things:
2 is about 1,000,000 times more likely and will happen within weeks or months–before any new factory is built. He will make deals that his base will cheer as a massive victory, just like his last trade deal which he said was the best ever and which he is crapping on now as pillaging the US.
So all this stuf about a new tariff age bringing back manufacturing to the US in nonsense because the tariff age will last a couple of weeks.
Well said!
There once were jobs and industries because there were workers and engineers and the rest of the industrialized economies were boomed to ruin. As soon as they were rebuilt and other industrial economies came about, there had been much more competition and, as the particular case of the Japanese auto makers, the US industrial output was found wanting in competitiveness. Tariffs won’t change that. Education would, but the results would only come about after several presidential terms, so it’ll be ignored in favor of more financial and fiscal malarkey.
The demise of high-cost manufacturing happened way before 1995, more like 1970. I grew up in the rust belt and worked summers in filthy steel mills and auto factories. Not only were these plants high cost and inefficient, but they were also filthy and environmentally unacceptable. I imagine you are referencing NAFTA. NAFTA helped the country and produced a myriad of jobs that were clean and modern. It’s not 1950 anymore.
Can we at least get the correct total of Republicans that voted against Trump? If we use their designation it was 4. SJ 37 Vote official record. Marshall R-KS did not vote.
To use the Tom Cruise’s Reacher version of the count:
It’s 1. Once I count the true Republican, that’s Paul. I’ll have one enthusiastic wingman-McConnell. The other 2–Collins and Murkowski–they always vote with the Dems.
Too many posts on Tariffs.
NOTHING will happen in Congress as they don’t have enough votes to override a veto.
start your own blog
AAPl pays low income taxes in Ireland, while most of its economic activities are done elsewhere in the world. AAPL entities around the world are paying its HQ in Ireland large intellectual properties fees, taxable in Ireland, thus depriving the US from collecting taxes from AAPL. AAPL, McDonalds and pharma co are dodging US taxes. Ireland unlawfully subsidize AAPL and other US co. 7 trillions dollars will be invested in the US. In order to produce high tech products in the US every co will need the Mag 7 now, not within 10y/15y and the banks to finance these projects.
If the Nasdaq will rise it will drag SPX with it. The WSJ attacks what is good for the US economy. WSJ sent the Mag 7 down in order for wall street to buy them at wholesale prices
Trump madness indeed! He destroyed $ trillions of stock market valuation to collect a mere $500 billion in tariffs. The entire world is shaking their heads at trump “the buffoon” as he single handedly crashes the world economy.
It is a good sign that 5 republicans are dissenting from Trumps narrow and misguided view if the world. Fire Trump!
When you drain the Swamp swamp creatures start to crawl out and reveal themselves. The problem is what to do with them.
Remove them if possible, Jail them if necessary, pull all credentials and ways for them to gather information (their friends on the other side will fill them in, I know, but they can continue to operate in a silo by themselves, being overly destructive). There are lots we can do, but have to have the spine to do so!
Roast and eat them!
– The entire world is shaking their heads at trump.
> Indeed they are, and do you truly know what they are wondering? WTF took America so F’in Long to find a Smart, Sophisticated, Worldly, and Very Knowledgeable Leader to handle their World Affairs for themselves. WTF are we going to do now? We can’t plunder the fools they typically place in power, as this Guy can’t be Bought and Paid for!! No more Incompetent Fools in the W.H. and No way to get Him to “Pay to Play” like most of the others were quick to do for us, for a few shillings of course…
We did get to Expose The 5 Frauds within our mist however. We knew McConnell was and has been for decades now, but a few other surprises in there.
Look at these 5 republicans and see where they are getting their bread buttered. I am sure if you dig for just a little bit, you will unearth all sorts of savory happenings for ALL 5!!!
NQ breached March 2024 high. From Mar 26 2025 high NQ did an A-B-C down to Apr 4 low. Next week the market will do what it wants to do. If NQ will rise above March 26 high the puke media music will die.
I’m sure most of the Pub Senators that voted with the Dems first had a side conversation with Trump and explained that they had to vote against him but it didn’t matter, since there wa sno way that 2/3 of Congress would ever vote to override any veto that Trump would definitely issue.
This allows them to tell their voters that they tried to stand-up for truth, justice and apple pie but lost. [shrug] so sorry, don’t blame me..
yup. the folks here seem like babes in the woods when it comes to DC and when it comes to who owns the FED. the latter is owned 100percent by nyc bankers. the rest is eyewash. DC is about imperial warmongering. the rest is eyewash. uniparty agrees. the people here who think politics didn’t matter, were too naive to understand that politics will care about them. and fleece them, if needed.
Iowa’s biggest Ag markets by far are Canada and Mexico. Progress on those two would cause Grassley to rethink his position. US agricultural products that Iowa produces are almost all not allowed in the EU.
From a McKinsey report in late 2024, 30% of European companies have plans to invest in the US by 2026. These plans have been advanced and upped in capex. Companies do not care about speeches on European sovereignty and all that. They care about margins. These tariffs are causing a wave of direct investment and there is nothing the EU governments can do about it. EU company heads even say this openly and publicly.
As Polonius said to the king about Hamlet “Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t”.
Yesterday Pete Hegseth and Laura Loomer fired gen Timothy Haugh NSA boss, his second in command Wendy Noble, bc they were slow to remove Woke and DEI. In Feb they sacked gen Charles Brown Jr chairman of the joint chief of staff, admiral Lisa Franchetti chief naval op and coast guard commander admiral Linda Fagan. Trump drained the swamp.
Keep it going, the swamp is deeper than most can even imagine. The money swirling around is hard to say “No” to, but that’s their problem, if we catch the rotten bastards! Until we do however, it’s unfortunately the price we pay for these losers to screw their own Country and ALL its Citizens over as well. Too bad they can’t be incarcerated for some of these dastardly deeds. I guess there is no jail sentence for incompetence, and for the voters who clamor for them to represent themselves against America.
Of course we have the troubling issue of how does a Congressperson get elected with few assets and a few years later has many millions of Dollars? If they continue for longer they are worth $100 million or more? I can understand why they like a good stock market because they are so personally invested in that they think high stock prices are a sign that they voted for good economic policies when the reality is that the stock prices are high because of the sheer amount of borrowed money the government injected into the economy under Biden. This has warped their understanding of what is good for the country into what is good for them personally.
Just like high real estate prices are good if you own some but using it as as measure of the health of the country will lead you to continue policies that keep those prices artificially high to the detriment of those people who have none and can’t afford to buy any.
If Trump’s efforts to eliminate the twin deficits result in a deep bear market I say go for it.
The madness has been happening. This is the solution.
Sometimes you’ve just got to rip the bandaid off.
Just be sure to “Clean Up” what’s underneath the bandaid, or they will just toss another one over it!
Capitalists don’t have a solution for the problems they created. The two-party system is bankrupt, they try to push everything onto the backs of working people—unemployment, inflation, a reduced social wage and retirement, “woke” social engineering. And they try to distract us with scapegoats, while they lose their minds.
It’s our currency, but your problem.
As you’ have said Mish, there is no other option. So the dollar will not go to zero.
Trump is 50 years too late, and in the world of instant gratification, he will lose. The oligarchs will put a stop to this tarrif nonsense.
The rich will indeed win the day. They must, and will be served at the lowest possible cost.
Suffocating debt for our future generations is baked in. With or without tarrifs.
But wait, all that matters is the Mag 7 stock prices in 2025.
No way out.
5 out of 53 Republican senators suggest they are able to use their brains. If that’s the progress we can get, I take it.
pure posturing. they know it’s meaningless. mitch will go down in history as a loser. he could have convicted trump many years ago and be done with the demagogue cult leader of nit wits. mitch and collins are vile humans. cradle to grave. this is all BS
Republican senators all have stock holdings (even Tuberville knows the inside track when it comes to selling). Many of them feel like they got pickpocketed by Trump.
dumpy insiders for sure shorted as they knew what idiocracy move he was gonna do. worse than the world expected. he’s a moron cult leader. his cult is dumber than charlie manson acid head chics.
Up or down for Nancy yesterday?
Sad because they actually were pickpockets of America for their own greed. I guess they forgot what their “Actual Job” was that they got voted into.
“Serve & Protect” America and All its Citizens.
They have no basic knowledge. They know only when they suffer.
“Tariffs give us great power to negotiate.”
Except negotiations mean nothing when trump can renege on the deal that he himself crafts so why bother?
That’s the main thing people that keep posting comments that say “trump is negotiating” but his negotiations are literally worthless since he can’t be trusted to honor any deal.
The few GOP senators breaking with Trump is not a good sign for repubs on the mid-terms. I am sure those five senators got an earful from their constituents and that’s why they broke. This is the first step in Congress stripping the Presidency of power as I said would happen a few posts ago.
not a leader in the world, political or business or military would trust anything coming out of trump’s mouth or signature. his cult reminds me of charlie manson acid head chics. they are delusional. includes his cabinet and Rs in house and most in senate.
Trump is trusted person. He can negotiate with stock market.
NO DOUBT. he is our ubermensch. might even be the messiah. i live in a hood in brooklyn where the hasidim have plastered all over the place, that the messiah is here. head of lubovich. 770 eastern parkway for those that know. they are like my personal petting zoo of kook cult. maga has nothing on them. maga cult is like manson acid head chics. they will croak out in a generation. my petting zoo has been around centuries.
Trump’s Love for Tariffs Began in Japan’s ’80s Boomhttps://web.archive.org/web/20220910074940/https://web.archive.org/web/20190516122306/https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/15/us/politics/china-trade-donald-trump.html
I think I don’t agree with the “hoot” part of “hoot of the day.”
I suppose we all (All) just need to check back in in about a year from now.
Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the Repub senators will realize this is history they dont want to be part of, and they will slowly peel it back. Trump will go full dictator, and they will be compelled to convict and remove. And maybe Johnson will get some divine change ….
“Trump will go full dictator,”
Lemme guess…
Trump is going to go after a 3rd term, too?
Dictators dont care about inflation, protests, humans or anything except their own skin .. and they sure dont care about “terms.”
I hope Hillary stocked up on her Chairman Mao outfits.
Trump can try to go full dictator but it won’t work. We aren’t living in North Korea or Iran where the population is unarmed and docile harmless. There were already two attempts on Trump’s life and the secret service admitted that they can’t keep him safe all the time and we’re in relative peacetime internally.
Remember George Floyd and how cities burned? Heck, Seattle police had to run from their police station as it was over run by armed protestors.
You live in a country where if you cut someone off on the highway, you’ll likely to get shot. You live in a country of mass shooting practically every week. You live in a country with armed nazis, skin heads, biker gangs, drug cartels, MS13, human traffickers, gang bangers and your regular soccer mom.
The idea trump will unleash brown shirts or gestapo is absurd because there will be house by house, block by block gunfire trying to contain everyone. Trump can try but he’ll fail just like he’s failed at everything else.
you are missing the part where half the nation is part of his cult. dictators have taken over many lands where people are armed, with swords in centuries long ago, guns today. don’t kid yourself. you live among idiots who are also violent. shall we use the nazis as an example. trump is a cult demogogue. his followers will round up their own neighbors for trump. read some history. amerika ain’t immune from evil stuff.
hell, every house in iraq had an ak47 and saddam ruled with an iron fist. guns also require brains and balls. most of the heartland of amerika seems to lack the latter. we have not won a war since 1945 unless you count grenada. our boys are wimps. easily prey to a demogogue like trump. they will round up the old lady on their block for the ubermensch and his side kick nazi bastard maker extraordinaire.
The US won the 1st Iraq war handily.
The US also won all the other wars militarily and very easily. What they failed at was nation building. But don’t question the militarys ability to win conflicts.
YOU are confusing battles with wars. kuwait won the war. amerika got shafted. some military guys made bank. MIC made bank. amerika treasury and people lost.
Nam and afganistan totally lost. outspending the enemy 500,000 to one. literally. if that is winning then sure. we won.
Don’t rule out The Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes.
We’ve not lived in a country with dictators … ever. But given how plentiful autocrats are these days (Russia, China, Hungary, Venezuela, Turkey …), and considering how fat and lazy Americans now are, we are almost begging for a change in government, and a lot of people are going to get hurt and killed trying to get the Republic back.
“TARIFF, n. A scale of taxes on imports, designed to protect the domestic producer against the greed of his consumer.”
― Ambrose Bierce, The Devils Dictionary