Trump finalizes tariffs on Canada, Mexico, China, triggering likely trade war

Nike is not a national security issue.

Not even sure what your point is with the idea Nike or a shoe/textiles company need to “secure” their business. I’m sure many businesses realized after COVID they needed more flexibility in supply chains. But right now their business isn’t being threatened by a pandemic or the CCP or Vietnamese govt or any other foreign govt. It’s being threatened domestically by the communist govt in the United States.

 

I’m sure you have incredible credentials and have been a successful manager at every step of the way. But if you are involved in supply line logistics, and don’t have every day of your life upended with uncertainty, then I think you ar the unique individual with the unique experience. I’m a lawyer—not on the tariff front lines—but my clients and friends sure are. And I’ve yet to hear from a single involved in international supply lines or international logistics that hasn’t had the theoretical stroke over the daily uncertainty and unpredictability literally manufactured by Trump.

 

Ok Walter Mitty.

No one in America wants to work in a shoe factory. No one. It’s a shit job that they will do cheaper elsewhere. It is more productive to use the LIMITED American labor for other stuff that pays better. Arguing with you is pointless. You just avoid the specifics of the debate:

• You cant move production immediately yet that is how the tariffs are structured
• You cant move production to the US period because their is no labor to do what is being done
• There is no point to the tariffs on shoes: they wont move here and we cant support shoe factories even if we did
• YET there are shoe tariffs.

You could follow that line for thousands of business categories and all people like you will do is post ignorant non-specific lectures using words like slave-labor cuz you can’t answer what we already know… you have no idea.

 

You expecting something coherent?

Guy literally in one post goes from ‘I have no sympathy for those greedy globalists chasing overseas profits like capitalist pigs’ too
‘Oh yeah, you’re challenging my expertise? I’m a ballin’ globalist supply chain manager who does business with 11 countries’.

 

This says exactly what you just said you’ve been hearing. A letter from a gas and oil company to the fed discussing the uncertainty driving difficulty in business planning.

 

If you don’t know what securing your business means then I quite simply do not know what to say.

 

True, but a robot will work in that shoe factory and never complain.

 

LOL. Bling knows about business.

100% Nike has sustainabilty assessments on supply chain, political impacts, ethical labor, and business disruption plans for all its resources and final manufactured product. Hilariously they didn’t plan for all of those things being the US.

 

The company I am with now had the foresight so that the 4th post in the covid thread was me discussing our 4th business contingency meeting on Feb 25.

There is no business contingency for 125% tariffs in industries that are 80-100% done in China except paying more.

 

Ok, Mr manufacturing expert, who said anything about replicating communist sweatshops?? Show where I advocated for that. All manufacturing used to be a sweatshop environment. Are you really that arrogant, no wait, you are to think that I don’t know what manufacturing workers are willing and not willing to do for the given pay scale in a given area. What I am saying, please look up so at least you can see it going over your head is; Shoes are only the given example here. They are not the overall subject that I am talking about. Automation is the key. Long gone are the days where 500 workers will line up at a gate to clock in and make an average 2 units/day each at $15 bucks an hour. But 50 workers running various levels of automated equipment cranking out an average of 20 units/day each making $35/hour you will have a line at your staffing office.

Let’s just agree to disagree on the topic at hand but agree that you have very little knowledge of manufacturing whatsoever(inclusive of the crap you read and post from lib sites) and have no knowledge of current manufacturing processes and capabilities. When was the last time you walked a manufacturing floor? When was the last time you took a group of manufacturing workers out for a nice lunch to celebrate an achievement? While we’re at it let’s just agree that your only purpose is to bash anything Trump does even at the expense of proving your ignorance with every sentence.

Has it ever dawned on you that Trump is is in negotiating mode? Ever occur to you that the vast majority of these tariffs will never become long term? Ever occur to you that once their factories have to slow down taking their economies with them that these countries will be making deals to get their factories running full speed again?

The answer to those is a massive NO, you haven’t. It’s just another opportunity to show your lib colors.

You have not yet reached the high bar of ridiculousness that you set in 22 with your “Transitory Inflation” bullshit, but you’re starting to get close.

 

Negotiating mode? That's truly laughable. And what happens to supply when the tariffs kick in and orders slow or cease? And what happens to prices during times of major shortages?

Meanwhile, it will take months for supply chains to normalize. Just like post COVID. And it's not like new factories can be built and staffed in short order.

Higher prices also tend to be sticky. Even after supply chains finally get back to normal.

If Trump is in negotiation mode, he should be announcing deals now, before the tariff deadlines get closer. When's the last deal Trump has announced?

Problem is, Trump isn't negotiating from a position of strength he thought he was in. That's because many foreign countries hold a lot of US bonds. If Trump announces huge tariffs, the bonds get called in, and the economy crashes real hard. This came real close to happening last time before Trump panicked and declared 3 month moratorium on tariffs.

It puts Trump in a no win scenario. He has no leverage to negotiate with. Enact the b tariffs and prices rise and the economy gets crushed. Do nothing and Trump looks weak.

 

The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.

Friedrich August von Hayek

this is the guy negotiating. thoughts?

 

1. We are taking about footwear specifically so you can’t weasel out with general automation bullet points. Building a shoe is actually a very complex process with very specific tooling and lots of manual work. It will always have a lot of manual labor to it. It will never be done in the US, ever. Tariffing shoes on a Tuesday afternoon is bullshit and has no purpose. More than glad to switch products as long as you are specific about the discussion. I’ve been to many shoe factories, including Nike’s.
2. Trump is “negotiating”? What is he negotiating? Is it free trade? Is it replacing income tax? Is it stopping fentanyl? Is it making us so poor that we have to make shoes for $2 an hour to be awesome? Sure buddy. Trump’s a genius. Ask him.
3. PM me if you want my resume. I am positive it is up to the task.

 

Okay, Mr. Manufacturing/Supply Chain/Engineering/Economics/Financial Markets/Negotiation/Public Health expert, please tell me what he is negotiating, specifically? For lower tariffs, like we had before he cancelled TPP? For higher permanent tariffs? For a relatively devalued currency? For a relatively higher value currency? For lower trade deficits (as ridiculous as that would be)? To end fentanyl smuggling? For people to buy his crypto? Perhaps you can inform us what the purpose of these short-term tariffs are, specifically.

 

In my friend group, our most dedicated Trump supporter has repeatedly noted that early 1990s democrats made the same arguments that current democrats are criticizing. It was just his birthday, and I kid you not, another one of us got him this T-shirt.

 

What is interesting is that if Trump is such a great deal maker why is he abandoning trade deals he made in his first term which he touted as such great deals?

 

1) Building a shoe is very complex, huh? Obviously you don’t know what complex is.

2) He is negotiating lower tariffs that we are charged on our exports. Since you don’t make anything but reports, actually building a product and trying to sell it in countries that build obstacles for imports is probably a foreign concept to you. You need to wake up. The coffee is brewing and you can smell it if you try. Most of the rest of the world does not practice free trade. It is a great concept and I wish it were practiced, but that is not the world we actually live in.

3) I have no interest in seeing your resume. You tour factories, I build them and/or repurpose them. You lost your credibility three years ago when you insisted that Biden’s Inflation was “transitory” and denigrated and attacked all who told said otherwise.