They are absolutely buying goods that are manufactured in countries subject to these tariffs. They have to buy clothes and all sorts of everyday items, and since they can't afford to buy things manufactured in the US (when that's even an option), it's very likely they buy things that are made in China/etc at a higher rate that wealthier people. Even going back to your examples, flour will be going up in price, as well as gas and car parts.
Your comment insinuates that people complaining about tariffs are disconnected from those living in poverty, but thinking that those living in poverty won't be affected by prices going up around the board is a much bigger disconnect.
Oil may go down. Flour? The combine to reap the wheat will go up, why would flour go down?
Poor people in the hood still wear clothes. Clothes will go up.
That car on the verge of breaking down? Car parts will go up.
Poor people still have a supply-chain footprint that has many branches outside the country. At least some of the things they need are going to get more expensive.
Yeah and when it does break down, the parts are going to cost more to fix it.
And what are they gonna do when their car breaks down catastrophically? Buy a used car? The prices of those will skyrocket once the price of new cars goes up.
Then really desperate people will steal cars as the value of them, and used parts start to skyrocket.
It doesn't even take half a brain cell to see how this works.
> They are not buying the latest igadget, or really anything chinese/gloablist for that matter, except for whatever junk at dollar tree. They buy flour, they buy gas and they pray their car doesn't break down.
You don’t understand how interconnected the economy is.
You don’t really think that flour appears on the shelves at the store without any coupling to internationally-sourced goods, do you? The parts for the farm equipment, the steel for the buildings it’s stored in, the vehicles that deliver it to the store.
This idea of the economy as an ultra-simplistic 1:1 line between raw product and the supermarket shelves is not how the world works.
Ignoring that, you conveniently glossed over the part about their car breaking down. What happens now when their car does need new parts? Tires wear out?
It’s also absurd to claim that poor people don’t enjoy things like access to cheap cellular phones.
Sure, I'll take you up on that offer. I grew up in a poor fishing family struggling to survive living in a trailer park so I'm very well aware of what it's like growing up in deep poverty.
Frankly I know more poor people than you pretend to know and the reality is that they are going to suffer far more under these tariffs than anyone else. All that stuff they buy at dollar tree because they have no other options are imported from all over the world because that's the cheapest stuff available.
You won't convince him, because he is not open to be convinced.
I think things will get ugly for the poorest people in society, but I am curious at how things will get ugly exactly.
I don't think price increases due to tariffs will be the worst if it. I think the perfect storm of higher prices, lower economic activity due to the halt in global trade, poor stock market perform performance, and ultimately economic contraction will result in mass layoffs, companies going out of business, and high unemployment rate.
Suddenly people won't even be able to find that odd job anymore.
They are absolutely buying goods that are manufactured in countries subject to these tariffs. They have to buy clothes and all sorts of everyday items, and since they can't afford to buy things manufactured in the US (when that's even an option), it's very likely they buy things that are made in China/etc at a higher rate that wealthier people. Even going back to your examples, flour will be going up in price, as well as gas and car parts.
Your comment insinuates that people complaining about tariffs are disconnected from those living in poverty, but thinking that those living in poverty won't be affected by prices going up around the board is a much bigger disconnect.
[flagged]
You're not listening.
Oil may go down. Flour? The combine to reap the wheat will go up, why would flour go down?
Poor people in the hood still wear clothes. Clothes will go up.
That car on the verge of breaking down? Car parts will go up.
Poor people still have a supply-chain footprint that has many branches outside the country. At least some of the things they need are going to get more expensive.
2 replies →
Yeah and when it does break down, the parts are going to cost more to fix it.
And what are they gonna do when their car breaks down catastrophically? Buy a used car? The prices of those will skyrocket once the price of new cars goes up.
Then really desperate people will steal cars as the value of them, and used parts start to skyrocket.
It doesn't even take half a brain cell to see how this works.
> They buy flour, they buy gas and they pray their car doesn't break down.
All of which are going to get a lot more expensive, too. We all swim in the same pool here.
I don't see that happening. As a matter of fact, I see staples such as flour going down in price.
That is a stated goal of the administration.
As of the time of this writing WTI is down nearly 7%. Expected, goal seeked and by design.
Certain products might go down in prices as retaliatory tariffs come into effect.
But again you’re missing all of the second-order effects, like people losing their jobs in the resulting contraction of demand.
You have a wildly simplistic view of the economy that ignores all of the well-understood second order effects that are inconvenient to your argument.
We'll see. I don't see any real path to the improvements you expect, but time will tell.
> They are not buying the latest igadget, or really anything chinese/gloablist for that matter, except for whatever junk at dollar tree. They buy flour, they buy gas and they pray their car doesn't break down.
You don’t understand how interconnected the economy is.
You don’t really think that flour appears on the shelves at the store without any coupling to internationally-sourced goods, do you? The parts for the farm equipment, the steel for the buildings it’s stored in, the vehicles that deliver it to the store.
This idea of the economy as an ultra-simplistic 1:1 line between raw product and the supermarket shelves is not how the world works.
Ignoring that, you conveniently glossed over the part about their car breaking down. What happens now when their car does need new parts? Tires wear out?
It’s also absurd to claim that poor people don’t enjoy things like access to cheap cellular phones.
Sure, I'll take you up on that offer. I grew up in a poor fishing family struggling to survive living in a trailer park so I'm very well aware of what it's like growing up in deep poverty.
Frankly I know more poor people than you pretend to know and the reality is that they are going to suffer far more under these tariffs than anyone else. All that stuff they buy at dollar tree because they have no other options are imported from all over the world because that's the cheapest stuff available.
You won't convince him, because he is not open to be convinced.
I think things will get ugly for the poorest people in society, but I am curious at how things will get ugly exactly.
I don't think price increases due to tariffs will be the worst if it. I think the perfect storm of higher prices, lower economic activity due to the halt in global trade, poor stock market perform performance, and ultimately economic contraction will result in mass layoffs, companies going out of business, and high unemployment rate.
Suddenly people won't even be able to find that odd job anymore.