Summary
Donald Trump announced that the U.S. will impose 25% tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports starting Monday, including from Canada and Mexico.
He also plans “reciprocal tariffs” on goods from countries imposing duties on U.S. products.
Markets reacted negatively, with stocks dropping over tariff concerns.
Trump previously paused tariffs on Canada and Mexico but imposed 10% duties on China.
I’m torn about this. On the one side, i support (a low level of) import tariffs in general, but on the other hand, the only reasonable exception i see to this is in minerals, because they are non-uniformously geographically distributed, and sometimes can only be sourced from abroad.
Then again, steel and aluminum are made from minerals which are so incredibly wide-spread, that it probably makes no difference to implement tariffs on them, because they can be sourced from every country, including your own.
Protectionism tends to sound good in theory. But in the end it doesn’t turn out that way
I would be a bit more careful about only listening to previous empirical data. Not everything can be extrapolated from the past.
There is the story of the cock:
Also, this XKCD:
O mean trump did the same thing in his last term. Well see