Trump now says he would rather have no trade deal than the deal he negotiated. 
Trump on USMCA
- Oct 10th 2024 – 2:03:32 PM EST: By the time I came into office after our victory in 2016, the Michigan auto industry was on its knees—I moved quickly and decisively to rescue the American Automobile from extinction… ✅Withdrew from the job-killing Trans-Pacific Partnership. ✅Ended the disaster known as NAFTA, the worst trade deal ever made. ✅Replaced it with the brand-new USMCA, the best trade deal ever made. ✅Created massive incentives to make cars in the United States…https://links.truthsocial.com/link/110542839430424765
- Sep 2nd 2024 – 12:00:13 PM EST ….In my First Term, we achieved Major Successes to protect American Workers by negotiating Free and Fair Trade Deals, passing the USMCA (U.S./Mexico/Canada), and giving Businesses and their Workers the tools to thrive.
- Dec 19th 2023 – 4:38:11 PM EST I got you First in the Nation, USMCA, All Things Ethanol, and 28 Billion Dollars from China (and much more!!!). Nobody else could have done what I did for IOWA!!!
- RT @GOP: “The experts tell us that the USMCA… could create up to 589,000 new jobs across this country.” -@Mike_Pence https://t.co/ffwHPKoPd8
- Jan 29, 2020: Jan 29th 2020 – 1:38:39 PM EST: USMCA is a cutting edge state of the art agreement that protects, defends and serves the great people of our Country. Promises Made, Promises Kept! https://t.co/PuiG1JPTTI
October 20 2024
The Wall Street Journal comments on Trump’s Trade Threat to Mexico
Donald Trump is a trade protectionist and proud of it. During a sit-down at the Journal’s offices on Thursday, he said he thinks “tariff” is “the most beautiful word in the dictionary . . . more beautiful than any word I can think of, other than ‘faith’ or ‘love.’ And it’s close.”
Mr. Trump describes taxes on U.S. imports as his go-to solution for almost any problem he might confront as president, including Chinese aggression against Taiwan. He likes the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, completed in 2020. It “has turned out to be a very good trade deal,” he said. But he quickly added: “Frankly, if I had my choice, I’d have no trade deal. I really think we’d do much better.”
Statements like that from the self-described “tariff man” keep investors up at night. A rules-based trade pact institutionalizes openness and provides legal certainty to those willing to commit capital. Continental free trade since 1994 has been a boon to all three countries, with an estimated $1.8 trillion in U.S. goods and services trade with its USMCA partners in 2022, according to the U.S. trade representative. Mexico is now the largest U.S. trading partner and Canada a close second.
The Mexican peso weakened last week as the former president rose in the polls, and that’s likely no coincidence. Mexico may in the end cooperate with the U.S. on China, but Mr. Trump’s antitrade ideology remains a deeper concern. It conflicts with what we know to be true: To boost the global competitiveness of U.S. firms, capital needs to be allocated to its highest use.
Less work in Mexico is less work for better-paid employees in the U.S. And nearshoring weakens China’s edge. All reasons to get closer to Mexico, not push it away.
Nothing is Better Than Something
Not only is nothing better than something, that something is a deal Trump himself called the best deal in history.
Now Trump says no deal at all is better than the deal he negotiated.
What a hoot.
Trump’s “Art of the Deal” is hypocritical bragging and cognitive dissonance. But it will make complete sense to all his true believers.
Trump Vow to Deport Millions of Immigrants
Also consider How Difficult Would it Be For Trump to Deport Millions of Immigrants?
Leaving aside the wisdom of doing what Trump says, how easy or hard would it be to fulfill his campaign promise?
Buy American Provisions
On October 5, I commented Buy American Provisions Cost $125,000 Per Job Created
“Buy America” sounds great. But it’s costly and about to rise steeply.
Trump Claims Tariffs Will Reduce the Trade Deficit
On September 26, I commented Trump Claims Tariffs Will Reduce the Trade Deficit. Let’s Fact Check.
Trump proposes 60 percent tariffs on China. Would that reduce the trade deficit? Where? How?
Trump’s trade policy is, in a single word, asinine. But some see it this way “tariff is a more beautiful word than love.”
What a pathetic choice this nation has in the election.
“ Trump’s trade policy is, in a single word, asinine.”
Has this changed your position on supporting him?
Something changed his TUNE, but his Mind is intact, sort of…he’s catching down to Biden.
Trump is a financial illiterate !
Despite the tariffs that Trump set in motion, the U.S. economy continued to thrive. The other nations of the world are more dependent on U.S. markets than the Americans are on theirs. The only problem is when ALL the nations of the world act in concert to set up a tangled web of trade barriers, as happened after the Great Depression in the last century. Then, the barriers only acted to deep the depression, choking off capital flows and stemming the prospects for recovery.
The Americans run an economy to make money for themselves. General prosperity is a side effect of this selfish greed, not a primary motivator. Things are generally cheap in the supermarkets and the retail outlets (compared to the world at large, even in an inflationary environment) because of this compelling, pushing greed. An American President said “the business of America is business.” Money comes ahead of religion, family, and friends in America. All else falls by the wayside. To read more of my writings, go to: dark.sport.blog … have a great day!
Women disavow Trump. He lied about USMCA. He is a liar/liar/liar/liar. Women’s vigana will decide the future of our country.
You can’t have high taxes and low tariffs. It’s a simple as that. The two policies must be set in conjunction with each other, or the capital will simply move to the lower tax regime, which is what’s been happening. (But I am not in favor of high tariffs, instead I would prefer lower taxes.)
But from a negotiating perspective, Trump is perhaps not out of line to try and scare the pants out of the Chinese, to bring them to the table in a mood to negotiate.
Let me borrow $2 trillion a year and watch the parties I can throw. Then I just ignore the debt. Only the bond vigilantes can save us now. Where the heck are they?
They reallocated their portfolio into high interest corporate, auto and credit card debt.
“To boost the global competitiveness of U.S. firms, capital needs to be allocated to its highest use.”
Which, specifically, NOT “rent.” Nor payouts to yahoos on “Wall Street” who produces nothing. Nor ambulance chasers ditto. Etc.,etc.
Trumps lunacies are no dount destructive; but their significance to the decimation of all and any US competitiveness, utterly pales in comparison with the above, direct consequences of debasement transfers and attendant financialization.
It is not, in any way, an exaggeration to state that the reason America does no longer have neither industry nor a middle class nor a future, is specifically because it has a bunch of people who have been led to believe they have “made money” from “their home”, their “investments” and from “tobacco lawsuits” and the like.
Either scarce resources can be retained by those who build and create them. OR they can be taken from those guys, and handed out to the above, non-producing, leeching class constituencies. You CAN NOT simultaneously have both. IF deadweights are going to be able to sit on the couch pretending their decaying house somehow “makes them money”, then productive people will NOT have the resources represented by that money available for productive use.
In America, the choice has been made. In favor of handing the scarce resources to deadweights. So that they can pretend sitting around on couches, or doing courtroom drama reenactments and picking random numbers to great fanfare, are somehow useful activities. Hence, In America, that’s where the scarce resources went. And hence, they DID NOT stay with those who originally produced them by building and creating and making stuff. And hence, those guys no longer have any. Hence, can no longer competitively build, create, produce, nor do anything else useful, competitively anymore.
NOT correcting that, guarantees that no matter what Trump, nor anyone else, comes up with in the way of self promotional, economically illiterate drivel; will make virtually no difference at all. American industry, and The American middle class did not, in any way, go extinct on account of some wetbacks. Nor some child slave laboring slanteyes from halfway around the world. Instead, what caused American industry, and the American middle class to go extinct, was simply other Americans “making money off their home.” Simple as that.
“ It is not, in any way, an exaggeration to state that the reason America does no longer have neither industry nor a middle class nor a future”
Nope. The US is still the #2 manufacturing economy in the world.
1. China: 5 Trillion US$
2. US: 2 T
3. Japan: 1 T
4. Germany: 0.75 T
5. India: 0.5T
The US is also the workd’s largest producer of both oil and natural gas.
“The US is still the #2 manufacturing economy in the world,”
And one way to become a millionaire, is to start off as a billionaire and squander 99.9%…..
Every large country has “some” “industry”. Lots of stuff is very local. Now: What share of that industry would remain competitive if moved to China? Vs the other way around? Then,compare that, with how ditto was, pre ’71….
Have you ever seriously looked into establishing any competitive manufacturing in the US? In China/Hong Kong?
It’s literally night and day, in almost every single field. Bleeding edge aerospace/defense, and oil/gas being perhaps the still remaining exceptions. For now.
It’s sad, since there are lots of US workers who could well be trained to do just as good a job as Chinese. But costs are so insanely much higher, that they’ll never get a chance. Instead being stuck flipping burgers or houses or whatever else it is people do in decaying dystopias.
Lol! Don’t care.
Just pointing out that you were indeed making an exaggeration. You said the US has NO industry left! Lol!
“ It is not, in any way, an exaggeration to state that the reason America does no longer have neither industry nor a middle class nor a future.”
Myths destroyed. However, we will never return to the labor intensive production of the 50’s and 60’s. I grew up in those times and every working man in our rust belt county, was somehow involved in manufacturing.
Trump is for tariffs because he sees that the U.S. is becoming a developing country as the result of a long period of being suckered by Europe and China. Mish, look at the modern history of trade barriers. They have always been used to protect industries and build an industrial economy.
You have detailed that U.S. industrial production has been stagnant for almost 20 years. The auto industry is on the brink of being devoured by China. That’s why Trump is endorsing tariffs. Free trade serves the winners, and Trump is saying that the U.S. is no longer winning, and must protect its industrial economy.
As Mish always says…..free trade serves everyone’s self-interest.
Not unions who always want a monopoly.
The auto industry is a great reason to oppose tariffs. The US auto industry has been run into the ground to make outsized profits for Wall Street. The industry has been put deeply into debt with the money simply transferred shareholders and debt holders. Prices on US vehicles have gone through the roof. China builds better cars at vastly better prices. Americans need Chinese cars to thrive. The American auto industry needs to go bankrupt, wipe away all of its debt, wipe out its shareholders and be reborn under new leadership excited to innovate an compete against China. If Trump were a conservative, not a pussy, that is exactly what he would be promising.
I pretty much agree. In the 70’s American cars were all we could buy, and they were junk. High quality imports changed that oligopoly and gave consumers a break.
Dummy: TARIFFS ARE A TAX ON US, the consumers. Next up, you will endorse higher taxes for the lower classes.
There are two storm clouds, no longer small and no longer on the horizon, that have the potential at some indeterminate future date to “wash” the U.S. $, and the foreign-E-$, “down the drain”. They go by the name of “foreign trade deficit” and “domestic federal deficit” (Twin Deficits Hypothesis).
These deficits have an insidious, if not an incestuous, relationship. Positive interest rate differentials are significantly responsible for the dollar’s exchange rate support (DXY Pivot ↑).
And an “overvalued” dollar in turn is the principal contributor to our burgeoning trade deficits (on-shore CNY Pivot ↓ and off-shore CNH Pivot ↓).
And as Professor Pettis puts it, “Excessive use of the U.S. dollar internationally actually forces up either American debt or American unemployment”. As: “many of the new cross-border investors were governments”…”foreign governments recycling the inflow of both foreign direct investment and current account surpluses.”
The U.S. can be more creative than selling its birthright for a mess of pottage (becoming a financial hostage to the Pacific Rim), indeed, its Western plantation (“the capital account reflects net change in ownership of national assets”).
To be effectively competitive in foreign markets, requires that we sell lower unit costs and higher quality products. This means concentrating on production, innovation, and product quality. It means giving workers a financial stake in increased productivity (share in profits, etc.).
The US dollar is the world’s trade currency. As trade increases, there must be more dollars in circulation. In order to get more dollars in circulation, there must be higher US budget deficits. In order to finance those deficits, there must be higher trade deficits so that US bond markets can reabsorb excess dollars. That’s the purpose of US tax cuts. We have to periodically cut taxes to drive up deficits to lubricate world trade. The question is who benefits the most from those cuts.
This is why I avoid politics as much as possible. When it comes to bragging and lying, Trump is the GOAT.
His economic numbers were just average; certainly not great. And he had a recession, just like like every Republican president that preceeded him in the last hundred years. Yes, all ten Republican presidents since 1920 had a recession. Two of them had two recessions. And one of them had 3.
In contrast, 3 Democrat presidents since 1920 had a recession. The last one was Carter in 1980. The Democrats have historically been the party with better economic numbers.
Though I never worry about recessions. They are just another opportunity to profit.
Off topic, but what would you say are the causes and what could be done to help Cuba with its electricity situation? The US has a lot of supposedly cheap natural gas. Could Buffett, Gates, Musk, etc. pitch in to get a natural gas power plant built there. How much would that cost? Im guessing theres no pipeline to Cuba. Would it be more economical to build a pipeline there or ship it compressed?
It’s a combination of many things.
1. Their grid is very outdated and in need of major upgrades. Which is difficult for them because they cannot afford the upgrades, and no one is willing to lend them money. They have no access to foreign currency which would be needed to purchase the materials they need. So they keep trying to hold their system together with string and bandaids.
2. US sanctions; Rather than attempting to assist Cuba, the US has had both an embargo and sanctions on Cuba since 1962. This relates to Cuba becoming communist and confiscating US assets. Which is another reason it is difficult to borrow money. Obama issued some executive orders to allow US travel to Cuba and a few minor improvements. But only congress can lift the embargo.
3. The embargo includes energy. The US is attempting to starve Cuba of energy rather than build a pipeline to supply them.
4. Rising demand for electricity; particularly during hot weather.
What a pathetic choice this nation has in the election. I’ll second the motion! There’s small choice in rotten apples.
William Shakespeare
Mish
I can agree with you that Trumps approach using tariffs is not a good. However, I can agree with Trump that our trade policy has been a disaster that needs to be addressed. It has hollowed out our industrial base and resulted in massive unsustainable trade deficits. What happens to the nearly $1 trillion difference between what we sell and what we buy? 1. Foreign entities loan it back to us putting us further and further in debt. 2. They use it to buy up our existing assets, e.g. companies, farmland, real estate, etc., and 3. a small fraction is invested in new productive capacity (for example foreign owned factories).
What is needed is to change the “free trade” rules to prohibit large persistent trade surplusses, or alternately impose capital transfer controls as Michael Pettis suggests.
There are other things that can be done to help, such as using a substantial value added tax as most of the world does, or something like the Border Adjustment Tax that has a similar effect to a VAT. Republicans were working on this and made significant progress until Trump insisted they use tariffs instead.
I have repeatedly stated that women (of reproductive age) would decide this election and that hasn’t changed. Early voting results show women at 53% v men at 45% and that instantly spells trouble for Trump.
https://www.l2-data.com/earlyreturn/
The early voting data shows Female Urban and Democrats voting in larger numbers early which means once the vote is cast it is set in stone.
And it turns out all that betting (polymarket) is a few large trades done overseas. It wouldn’t surprise me if we later find out Musk was betting big on Trump to skew the numbers.
correct. this election is in the bag for Harris. won’t be close this time. the dumpy grifter vaudeville raunchy show is gonna have to rework the act for the 2028 campaign in about 16 days…………it is comical to watch how a great grifter pivot into a cult leader. these times are wonderfully entertaining. idiocracy was a great documentary. the amerikans are morons. we’ll get much dumber yet, don’t give up hope girls. europeans got so dumb as roman empire collapsed they forgot to take baths in Bath England, where the Romans had built huge wonderful bath houses. they also got so stooooooopid they forgot the simple formula for concrete even though they were all walking on old concrete roads and sidewalks……..the romans had built in centuries past. i have faith in the amerikan public won’t be outdone being that stoooooopid. go look at trump cult rally or perhaps the jugaloo festivals in OHIO or MI……….
LOL I GUARANTEE you the percentage of ppl at a Trump rally who know how to work with cement is FAR higher than the ppl at a Harris rally.
They also forgot how to install central heating. Which the Romans had installed in their villas in Britain.
I don’t know who will win, but the women most exorcised about the slightest restriction on abortion couldn’t get a man to impregnate them if they paid them. They should focus on things that affect their lives more – like the cost of blue hair dye.
You telling them what they should focus or not focus on is exactly why trump will lose.
These ppl were already voting Team Ble no matter who.
Trump has not lost any supporters since 2020 and has gained significant support from blacks, Hispanics, and Arabs.
WRONG! And I can easily prove it mathematically. Who were the trump supporters? Mostly elderly people over the age of 65 (i.e. boomers). It’s been 1369 days since trump left office. Since 5000 boomers die each day that’s 6,845,000 people. Assume 60% (use whatever percentage you want but make it greater than 50) voted for trump and that’s 4,107,000 trump voters gone forever.
Did trump pick up 4m votes from Arabs and Hispanics? Ask yourself that question and try to be intellectually honest with yourself. I am sure he’s picked up a few votes but I doubt 4 million.
I will repeat this again because it is worth repeating: Millennials now outnumber boomers. THEY will decide this election and others moving forward and I don’t know too many young people that are clamoring for more trump, especially young women.
That’s the mathematical reality, plain and simple. Trump is already making claims of vote rigging again because he knows it’s going to be a blowout for the dems, popular vote wise at a minimum. We’ll find out in 15 days if this comes to pass.
The idea that Trump voters were mostly old ppl is assinine on its face. The man got 78 mil votes in 2020. How old do you think America is???
The data speaks for itself but you don’t want to believe it or understand it for some reason.
https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/quickfacts/stat_snapshot/
73m people on social security and over 100k+ added each month. Then add the 5000 that died each day.
Math and data will set your mind free.
55 mil in the 65+ group
Population of the U.S. by sex and age 2023 | Statista
You think only old ppl collect SS?
If you think that Trump’s 78 mil is the 65+ group then you are not a serious person
Are you kidding? His own former VP won’t support him.
A few assertions:
Saying a few good things for such a depression, French economist Thomas Piketty said that economic inequality was reduced.
And there was a up-bump in communist type sympathies, putting the well-being of each of us in our towns, cities and states higher in importance.
And the Greens seek such a sharp decrease in our standard of living and consumption of material.
So, what does this make trade, and with whom? And does this make seeking an economic depression good?
I don’t know. Why don’t you tell us? That WAS supposed to be the purpose of your post, yes?
The Republicans and Democrats and all their ignorant greedy corporate donors have saddled each American with $105,000 in debt, sowing depression and the reduction in our standard of living unless we face the music and end deficit spending and start paying down the debt and return interest rates to the free market. In the upcoming election, the party with the policy to get us out of this debt hole is Libertarian, and if any that are elected flip flop and start the debting ways, we should continuously vote them out until someone stays firm on doing whats right and necessary, no matter how much crisis propaganda the media puts out for the dollar debasers.
Fareed Zakaria speaks to Trump’s business acumen today in the video below:
Zakaria agitated for the Gulf Wat. He is an idiot.
What does that matter here? The arguments Zakaria makes in the video are sound.
And you call yourself “Sentient”?
Here is what I dont get (Im not an economist) Trump states that the economy was best in the entire history of the USA while he was president…ok Trump is re-elected does that mean the economy will be even better than his first term??
It wasn’t the best in history. Trump is a braggart that exaggerates everything.
Bidenomics isn’t good either.
This economy is in fact poor when you look at the stats of the masses. US household debt up savings down, multiple job holders up, home affordability worst in 40 years, food affordability worst in 30 years. Car loan delinquencies worst ever for low income people. 401K hardship withdrawals up. More living paycheck to paycheck.
There isn’t too much the White House can do.
trump lied? really? oh my. clutching. pearls get me a fainting couch.
It wasn’t lies, it was just … bullshit.
Yes.