You can go into hypotheticals, but unfortunately for you the data exists.
And the data shows that American buyers are not paying their international supplies less for goods than they were before. In fact, if anything, they are paying slightly more, which maj be explained by general inflation and the fact that tariffs mean American buyers are placing smaller orders and therefore getting smaller percentage volume discounts.
That opens up greater margin for local production. Not everything is elastic, but as long as the producer side cheats in term of local subsidies, less regulation, slave labor etc, implementing tariffs seem a good choice.
you cannot just carbon tax everything locally and then let the other corner of the word produce at a fractional price polluting the same world, exploiting worker etc, without wrecking your internal labor market.
What you see as customer paying more is cause by government letting this shit go on for too long, and now the correction is ugly. But it not like its not needed, and at some point needs to happen before it reaches the breaking point.
I'm not in favor of the current round of tariffs as used by current administration which seem a baseless negotiating tactic, but the effect of outsourcing to bad faith actors has pushed the working class out of balance, they simply have no way of competing internationally unless by accepting a step downgrade in working and living conditions
> That opens up greater margin for local production
My country mostly produce pine wood (and other soft wood). I like hardwood furniture, but its only imported stuff because we have very few producers. Putting a tariff on hardwood furniture could be a good idea to increase local production, as long as hardwood is not tariffed. If both hardwood and hardwood furniture get taxed, i will have to pay more, and local production will never have greater margin, as those will be hit by base material tariffs.
(To be clear: I live near on of the biggest hardwood harbour in Europe, and buy my wood directly out of the sawmill, but my point stands)
Yeah and thats where I was going with the last point about tariff needing to be integrated with the rest of the economic system as a tool and not arbitrarily as a tool for negotiation. Tariff are a damper to any economic system and reduce efficiency, they need to be proportional, predictable and non escalatory (well, as much as possible)
> That opens up greater margin for local production.
It opens up a larger profit margin for local producers for sure. Production? Maybe. Maybe not. Because there is no incentive to produce more or better. Because the cheap bad faith actor is gone and prices can now match the export price or be just slightly below it.
>but the effect of outsourcing to bad faith actors has pushed the working class out of balance, they simply have no way of competing internationally unless by accepting a step downgrade in working and living conditions
> What you see as customer paying more is cause by government letting this shit go on for too long, and now the correction is ugly. But it not like its not needed, and at some point needs to happen before it reaches the breaking point.
You don't seem to see the contradictions in both these statements. If the prices go up and working class isn't paid as much for their effort then it is for naught. The failure hasn't been to continue outsourcing, failure has been to improve wage conditions - because market was supposed to correct it or worst case it is "socialism" to even try and raise wages.
But as always people want to test economic theories for themselves and they should. See if their lives improve under a capitalist government which is going to trample on their rights.
And the data shows that American buyers are not paying their international supplies less for goods than they were before. In fact, if anything, they are paying slightly more, which maj be explained by general inflation and the fact that tariffs mean American buyers are placing smaller orders and therefore getting smaller percentage volume discounts.