Comment by pesus
8 days ago
To give further evidence that they don't know what they're doing, it's easy to generate this tariff plan using a fairly simple LLM prompt that gives back that same ratio:
https://bsky.app/profile/amyhoy.bsky.social/post/3lluo7jmsss...
If anyone needed any more evidence that they don't know what they're doing, what I find interesting is that the various French overseas territories that are part of the EU are tariffed at different rates than the rest of the EU (treating those as separate countries is traditional for any US company, which is sometimes a headache when you want to order something).
Réunion is at 37%, which isn't a problem because any company in Reunion could just use an address on mainland France, but there's more: Guadeloupe, Martinique and French Guiana are tariffed at 10%.
Does that make an easy loophole for any EU company wishing to export things to the US at a 10% tariff?
If these published rates actually going to be enforced this way, it seems like the whole EU has a very easy way to use the 10% rate.
French Guiana is part of the EU, sounds like mailboxes there will soon become good business.
If exploitation of the "loophole" got to the point where it starts affecting trade balance then presumably the rate would be revised fairly quiclly.
Are those part of the EU? The whole membership of EU (or more precisely European institutions) is a mess and I really only know EEA, Schengen and Eurozone by heart. But there definitely are territories which are part of e.g. France, but not part of the EU
They are part of the EU and are part of the EU customs area, there is no practical difference with other EU territories regarding trade.
They are not part of Schengen (but EU citizens don't need any visa, it's mostly intended to curb illegal immigration from South America via Guiana) and have the ability to use different VAT rates from mainland France, but that's all.
I found it interesting that when the UK was part of the EU, the Isle of Man was not, but because they held British Passports, the people of the Isle of Man were EU citizens.
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I think all French territories are part of the EU, but some other countries work differently. The prime example is St. Martin, where the French part is in the EU, but the Dutch isn't (yes that technically puts a EU border through the middle of the island, although there were no pass controls when I was last there.).
Sure they are, 2 seconds of googling compared to a minute writing your post:
> The European Union (EU) has nine 'outermost regions' (ORs): Guadeloupe, French Guiana, Martinique, Mayotte, Réunion and Saint Martin (France), the Canary Islands (Spain) and the Azores and Madeira (Portugal). The ORs are an integral part of the EU and must apply its laws and obligations.
Yes, but Martinique is not considered a territory, and is considered part of the EU.
French Guiana is in the EU.
Let’s not assume they actually want a growing economy, I don’t think GOP voters want a growing economy.
That might explain this then:
> Trump Tariffs Hit Antarctic Islands Inhabited by Zero Humans and Many Penguins
https://www.wired.com/story/trump-tariffs-antarctic-islands-...
This is cosmic-level hilarious.
LLMs are basically just good at sourcing ideas from the internet. Me thinks this just means that this tariff idea exists on the internet, especially since grok, chatgpt, etc all come up with the same idea. We used to not have income taxes and funded the govt with tariffs so this probably isn't a new concept despite media outlets pretending like it is.
Jesus Christ.