Where are “people” (Conservatives) getting this idea from? Governments do not have total information of the production of all goods produced in the world. How hard is it to understand they just look at the shipping location of items and their classified category?
If governments could actually trace every screw in a phone, they’d be able to stop weapons flowing into conflict zones too. But they can’t. So how could they micromanage tariffs?
Frankly, the inner workings of tariffs is not an important discussion.
What does he think tariffs will accomplish? What problem are they solving?
Almost certainly, they’re solving the offshoring of production from the US, which is a real problem that affects lots of people.
I’m sure he agrees that companies did that initially because it was profitable, and that profits were more important than the impact on US workers. He’ll likely agree that companies will tend to put profits over people, and he’ll likely agree that society shouldn’t run that way - we should prioritize feeding children, even if it’s not profitable.
Y’all can agree that the role of the US government is to be a counterbalance to companies maximizing profits at the expense of people. Y’all can agree that tariffs are A way of doing that, by lowering profits for companies that offshore production. The details are unimportant, but you should agree that they are an option.
I think you can then point it that that’s a horribly inefficient way of getting companies to move production here! The government is just deciding to make things more expensive?? No matter who pays that artificially higher price (companies or consumers), it’s a waste! The government is throwing a monkey wrench into companies just trying to get by! Inflation is already bad, why are we making things more expensive!?
I think you can then have a discussion on better ways that the government could incentivize companies to move production here. Point out that the only way the current government can influence companies is by trying to make doing the right thing more profitable (with either subsidies, taxes/tariffs, or fines), and that that’s a very blunt, imprecise tool.
Present an alternative: the government sees that we need factories, and then just pays for factories to be built. Acknowledge brainworm downsides about “the government is bad at stuff”, but point out that tariffs are way more invasive for companies, and ask if he would rather the government stick it’s hands in every company’s business or have it focus on building new stuff and leave existing businesses alone.
I imagine “but muh deficit” would come up, and I wouldn’t try to oppose that directly. “Yes and” him to “it costs money, sure, but it’s a good, effective use of money that puts American people to work.” I might even say that we can use the money from the tariffs to pay for building factories!
I’d also point out that if we have the government build factories, they don’t have incentives to cut corners like for-profit companies do. Tap into “military good” or NASA for examples of how the government can invest heavily into building world-class equipment. Maybe even mention that a lot of the waste in the military comes from the government being willing to pour ungodly sums of money into “protecting the troops” [sic], but greedy for-profit companies overcharge and cut corners.
Ultimately, tariffs are a bad solution to a real problem. You will never change his mind just by emphasizing that they’re a bad solution - you will come off as out of touch. “Yeah, obviously there are downsides, but there’s a real problem to be solved and we need to do what it takes to fix that problem.”
You must start from agreeing on the problem, or your opinions have no credibility. Once you’re both on the same side and trying to fix the underlying problem, it becomes a collaborative discussion where you’re working together to think of solutions.
You are no longer trying to win an argument, you’re trying to share your perspective and learn from theirs. Between the brainworms, they will have interesting takes, legitimate concerns, and perspectives that you haven’t considered. Search for the best version of their arguments, be open to learning and changing your mind, and quick to let them know when they’ve made good points.
We should always be refining our analysis, and carefully considering and being open to new ideas is how we can do that. There will be a lot of old, bad ideas, and if you’re able to effectively challenge those ideas then it should serve as a signal that your analysis is correct.
I wrote more about my general approach to discussions here.
Wait, so what do these people think happens? I haven’t been keeping up with Chud Logic
He thinks items in the US are getting tariffed based on like a production manifest that lists out the origin of each component, I think. In the “discussion” he also mentioned stuff about ATV engines being sent from Mexico/US to Canada being blocked because they didn’t have their emissions stats included due to some error so I’m assuming he mentioned that as a parallel to the component-list tariff idea.
And I think they also think that this includes stuff exiting the US too? I’m not sure. My idiot father also gets mad as fuck when I actually get him to clarify what he’s talking about. The other day we were arguing and he said he told my mother to get new tires for her car and I kept asking how he “told her” this because I’m pretty sure she blocked his phone number because all he does is send curt, barely-literate demands to people via phone, which sucks ass to receive at all. Anyway, he wouldn’t say how, he just kept restating that he told her.
Edit: I’m suspecting this is their mental cope to explain, like, tariffs driving price increases and that the companies need to just move production to the US or purchase US parts to solve it because that adds more US production to the manifest list which would bring down prices or something? I really don’t know, it’s so fucking stupid what I’m hearing. He said a guy at Honda (I’m assuming a dealership here and not the HQ) who was importing stuff “didn’t understand it either”. Which I think just means he kept doing the same shit he does with me and the other guy just gave up and pretended not to know either to get him to shut up because he will not shut the fuck up sometimes.
the other guy just gave up and pretended not to know either to get him to shut up because he will not shut the fuck up sometimes.
Reactionaries do this all the time and think it means they won the argument when people disengage. I’ve seen this a lot where they gloat about “owning some lib.” Like no, you did fuck all. The person you were arguing with just realized you’re so fundamentally wrong it would take hours to explain why and you’re not worth the time.
Conservatives say the wildest shit deliberately because for them it’s not about reaching an understanding, it’s about throwing their weight around for clout. By flinging enough nonsensical shit, they can hone in on whatever the other person doesn’t immediately dispute as a gotcha, allowing them to skip over whatever brainrot easily disproven.
that’s… Weird. Why do they not think that the way tariffs actually work explains increased prices? Because they totally do.
Might honestly just be straight stupidity.
It’s just bizarre to me that they’re resistant to the idea that increasing the cost to do business will increase prices. What else would happen?!
He thinks items in the US are getting tariffed based on like a production manifest that lists out the origin of each component
This, uh, does happen. It depends on the kind of item. When you’re importing a wristwatch, for example, you have to separate out the country of origin and value for the strap/bracelet, case, and movement and they’re handled separately. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVwIyciIIiI
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
What’s funny is that the only time this was attempted was by the USSR and Chile in the 70s when they were trying to computerize this information for purposes of economic decision making. Nobody else has done any publically available cybernetics work.
Too many people think that capitalist societies work like socialist societies. They implicitly think that the government has full control over the knobs and levers of economic production and can build whatever it wants (just get rid of corruption) of implement any kind of policy.
Labour Theory of Tariffs
If fox news had a breakdown of how tariffs worked would he believe it? Any other information sources he would trust that isn’t a chud/grifter podcast?
If the answer is no, he’d only ever believe info from a silly podcast or america’s silliest news network, I advise you cut your loses on this one.
My dad’s no trumplerite but I learned a while ago if my ideas aren’t corroborated by NYT or some funny lib on twitter my dad will never willingly agree with me.
As a proud trans woman and refugee living in a camp after fleeing Uganda’s anti-LGBTQ+ law, I read this with tears in my eyes. I’m fighting daily against hunger, stigma, and silence. I share my story to raise awareness, and I’d be so grateful if anyone took a moment to listen, Just being seen means the world to us.
If you have a friend in customs maybe they can explain? But then again you can send flat earthers to the moon and they’ll still believe the earth is flat.
No, he doesn’t respect at least me (or seemingly anyone) and I can show him actual government webpages or whatever and he’ll just pretend to agree and then revert back to whatever his initial position was with his mouth-breather coworkers. Talking with people like him (and my aunt on my mother’s side is the same) isn’t dialogue where there’s interplay of information and ideas, but instead I get to uncover what his internal prior belief is that’s already established and based on nothing (AKA a feeling) that’s somewhere in his subconscious. He talks until his belief is uncovered and then he’ll just keep restating that belief over and over in a recursive loop until I get pissed off.
This is every time I talk to my father in law about politics. He believes, with every fiber of his being, that the dollar is gold backed because “why else would there be so much gold in Fort Knox!” He will not suffer to hear the name Bretton Woods spoken aloud.
Well this clearly won’t do any good, but Richard Wolff has a lot of good explanations on tariffs on his youtube channel.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
why waste your breath? any adult who’s still a trumpist in 2025 is unsalvageable
