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United States42673 Posts
On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this?
You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it.
The trade is mutually beneficial.
The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade.
If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose.
Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it.
America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it.
But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
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On July 29 2025 21:21 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 21:00 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 18:10 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 29 2025 17:45 Jankisa wrote:
Honestly it's pretty sad you have to write all that in order to justify attacking a pretty simple and surface level (and stated as such) analysis of how this affects EU.
Europeans came into this negotiations and walked away with absolutely nothing, it's pretty simple.
You just wrote 2 pages of something that everyone (explaining how Trump didn't write his book in 2025, jesus) knows and about stuff that actual economists have been writing and talking about for a year, jeez.
Trump sees it as zero sum game, he wants to bring back mercantilism, he didn't write his book and he's not great at deals, next you'll reveal to us he bankrupted a few Casinos.
He still humiliated and got the better of EU, simple. You're coming at this with the assumption that the importer and exporter are going to share the costs of the tariff to keep the same level of business. If you want to argue this point, it would be great to see some data backing it up. I would love to see your sources for this. In my experience (see Brexit, for example), when the importer gets hit with higher costs, they just tack on that extra cost to the price of the item. It is also a great opportunity for importers to increase their profit margin because everyone else is also increasing their prices. The end result in my experience (see Brexit, for example) is just less trade and lower economic growth for both and the joys of inflation for everyone. I like how I keep, in every post I make mentioning the other part of these "negotiations", bigger investment in the US and more purchases of energy but you guys keep on attacking the point that not all of the 15 % will be on the US customers / importers. I stated a few times that EU got humiliated and got literally nothing out of this, after months of negotiations. In the one before this one I also wrote out how if the prices go up 15 % and there are equivalent products in the market people will start buying less, which is just common sense, but that also keeps being ignored. My sources are common sense, that 15 % doesn't just fade into the void and has no effect on anything, saying it does seems like a fantasy. There have been tariffs in place on a bunch of countries for months now, the baseline 10 % is there for everything, Canada and Mexico have more, where are all the price increases, who is eating them? Do you have sources on this? I don't think the onus is on me to prove to you guys that putting unilateral tariffs on a trading partner is a bad thing for that partner because that is just what common sense implies. Last year EU exported $605 B to the US, at 15 % that is $ 90 B, that figure is real and it's going to come from somewhere and end up in the US treasury. The EU also pledged $600 billion investment in the U.S. and buy $750 billion worth of U.S. energy. Let's just scratch the energy because after Russian invasion of Ukraine that was something that was happening anyway.
White House said on Monday that the “massive” pledge would be “in addition” to current investment flows from the bloc, which it said exceed $100 billion a year.
Just to re-titerate because everyone keeps ignoring this no matter how many times I say it, I'm taking the deal at face value because it was signed by the EU and US, I am not naive enough to think that it will be 100 % the same as I stated multiple times, but we are talking about it as it is. If EU companies invest $ 200 B every year for the next 3 in the US, on top of existing $ 100 B that were planned / done anyway, that means that they will not have that money to invest it in EU countries. My country has a BDP of just under $ 100 B, and I'm supposed to not be pissed off at EU capitulating and promising 2 times my country's BDP worth of investment to US? This is, as stated and signed, a terrible deal for EU, we get nothing, it's very, very simple. universal tariffs are bad for the country imposing them, more then for the partner they are imposed on. That is why no one does it, except a moron like Trump who has no concept of what a tariff even is. Again, a tariff doesn't make it more expensive for a foreign country to sell you things, it makes it more expensive for you to buy a thing. Its use is to protect domestic industries from cheap foreign goods flooding the market by artificially raising the price of said foreign goods. Tariffing the EU is not punishing the EU, its punishing yourself. No one is talking about the investment and energy 'commitments' because its meaningless numbers and Trump talking like Trump. you talk about the EU buying 750 billion worth of US energy. The EU spend 76 billion in 2024. The US's total energy export to the entire world was 318 billion in 2024. So what is this number even? Does the EU buy double the US global export in 1 year? seems bullshit and impossible. Is it over 10 years? then that's just the number the EU spends anyway. Trump doesn't understand what numbers mean, the guy is a fucking moron. You can't talk about what the numbers mean because its just shit pulled from his ass. here is literally one of the first results on looking at EU investments into the US. Show nested quote +BRUSSELS — The European Union has admitted it doesn’t have the power to deliver on a promise to invest $600 billion in the United States economy, only hours after making the pledge at landmark trade talks in Scotland.
That’s because the cash would come entirely from private sector investment over which Brussels has no authority, two EU officials said. https://www.politico.eu/article/eus-600bn-us-investment-will-come-exclusively-from-private-sector/
So in an absolutely brilliant negotiation move the EU has 'sold' Trump on a 600 billion investment made entirely by private businesses, over which it has no control. Its a promise of literal air and utterly worthless but Trump eats it up like a kid in a candy store and runs to shout it to the press because he is an actual fucking moron. That is why no one is talking about meaningless bullshit numbers.
I asked who is eating the tariffs, no answer.
I asked why are EU leaders, both politicians and industry pissed at this and predicting negative effects on EU economy, let's move on and talk some more how Ursula absolutely swindled Trump and he's really dumb.
Chinese who are retaliating with reciprocal tariffs, you won't believe it, also dumb.
Anyone who thinks that 15 % tax on imports from a country will have effect on these imports, dumb morons who believe dumb Trump.
I suppose I am just to accept that everyone's lying, there will be no negative effects on the companies who's goods are now more expensive and it's all a show for Trump, despite what countries and leaders are saying. It's all a show guys, EU humiliated itself in a brilliant move to show the world how smart they are by bending over and accepting these tariffs while getting absolutely nothing.
I will respectfully bow out of this conversation because it's not really a conversation it's just "duh, all of this is just fiction and Trump is really stupid".
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On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him.
Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
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On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this?
I think that the logic behind any (perceived) concessions and humiliations would be that playing hardball / turning away Trump could lead the unhinged American president to blow up in even more serious and detrimental ways. I'd imagine a lot of our allies are just trying to make it through the next few years (Trump's term) with as few explosions as possible, and our allies are less likely to become collateral damage if they don't go out of their way to poke the proverbial (fascist, rapist) bear. They're likely considering long-term self-preservation and acting responsibly for the future of their countries.
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United States42673 Posts
On July 29 2025 22:00 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him. Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone.
If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you.
If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
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Trump winning the negotiations thus far with EU is clear. If that is good for the US is of course a separate question, Trump is not about what is good for the US so those are separate topics.
Trump wants money into his accounts, he got state financed stays at his golf courts (likely at massively inflated prices) and the PR from that. Small win right there. Then his stated goal was to change trade balance of manufacturing away from EU, this will likely cause it long term if it sticks around. Thus a win on his stated goals. (If it ends up moving to US or some other low cost country with low tariffs is where it breaks down for the US gains.)
EU goals was to have open trade without tariffs and not need to pay the US anything. Both failed.
The only way this deal will be signed by all EU nations is by offering internal deals to the holdouts and promising they get thrown away when Trump is out of office.
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On July 29 2025 22:11 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 22:00 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him. Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone. If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you. If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this.
I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation.
For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals.
Again, this is pretty simple.
If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored.
If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff.
As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
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United States42673 Posts
On July 29 2025 22:35 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 22:11 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 22:00 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him. Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone. If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you. If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this. I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation. For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals. Again, this is pretty simple. If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff. As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
The tariff increase is a cost to him.
How are you not getting this?
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On July 29 2025 22:08 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this? I think that the logic behind any (perceived) concessions and humiliations would be that playing hardball / turning away Trump could lead the unhinged American president to blow up in even more serious and detrimental ways. I'd imagine a lot of our allies are just trying to make it through the next few years (Trump's term) with as few explosions as possible, and our allies are less likely to become collateral damage if they don't go out of their way to poke the proverbial (fascist, rapist) bear. They're likely considering long-term self-preservation and acting responsibly for the future of their countries.
Sure, but where does it end?
Are you sure that Trump or a Trumpian figure wont' be there in 4 years? Should EU just concede everything hoping that American democracy and institutions that have been rolling over for Republicans and him specifically for a decade now to somehow win? The same institutions that are being gutted are going to stop this? Do you think that this Supreme court will tell him he can't run for a 3rd term or do anything to impede his agenda?
Do you think that EU rolling over and giving him win after win, with Ursula repeating his insane tariffs justification back to him as the main quote for justifying this helps with making the American public like him less?
Asked about what concessions, if any, the US had made in the talks, the Commission chief replied with a general remark about shared prosperity.
"The starting point was an imbalance, a surplus (of goods) on our side and a deficit on the US side. We wanted to rebalance the trade relation, and we wanted to do it in a way that trade goes on between the two of us across the Atlantic," she said.
When has this sort of approach ever worked with bullies? Praising them, conceding and hoping that he won't take it further or that they'll magically just go away, that works with aggressive people, right?
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On July 29 2025 22:37 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 22:35 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 22:11 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 22:00 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him. Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone. If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you. If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this. I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation. For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals. Again, this is pretty simple. If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff. As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball. The tariff increase is a cost to him. How are you not getting this?
In what way are they a cost to Trump?
He obviously loves them, he said it a million times, he put them in effect when we were all being convinced he doesn't really mean it, in much higher percentage then anyone dreamed of.
He loves them, he won't feel them, they have 0 cost to Trump.
I said, many times that I understand the tariffs are bad for US citizens, do you think that Trump cares about that? Is he acting in that way?
He got what he wanted, it's simple. He doesn't care about the consequences because he's isolated from them.
He got a deal that's great for him, how are you not getting that?
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United States42673 Posts
On July 29 2025 22:47 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 22:37 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 22:35 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 22:11 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 22:00 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him. Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone. If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you. If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this. I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation. For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals. Again, this is pretty simple. If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff. As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball. The tariff increase is a cost to him. How are you not getting this? In what way are they a cost to Trump? He obviously loves them, he said it a million times, he put them in effect when we were all being convinced he doesn't really mean it, in much higher percentage then anyone dreamed of. He loves them, he won't feel them, they have 0 cost to Trump. I said, many times that I understand the tariffs are bad for US citizens, do you think that Trump cares about that? Is he acting in that way? He got what he wanted, it's simple. He doesn't care about the consequences because he's isolated from them. He got a deal that's great for him, how are you not getting that?
So you're distinguishing between Trump, the president of the United States acting on behalf of the United States negotiating deals for the United States, and Trump, an orange baboon?
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Trump shot himself in the foot, exactly as planned. Another tally in the win column, what a stable genius.
also, an alleged billionaire tanking his economy in which he is heavily leveraged certainly does have a cost, obviously.
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On July 29 2025 22:35 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 22:11 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 22:00 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 21:50 KwarK wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US? Where is the logic in this? You’re not understanding, despite the long post explaining it. The trade is mutually beneficial. The tariff is paid by Americans but still interferes with the trade. If Americans start taxing themselves more then the trade goes down and both sides lose. Germany is one of the sides that would lose and so they don’t want it. America is one of the sides and therefore they shouldn’t want it. But Trump doesn’t know the first thing about anything and he thinks that if Germans are losing then that’s somehow a win for him. Well, thank you for finally acknowledging what I said 2 pages ago, EU loses, US citizens lose, it's a bad deal for everyone. If that’s what you were trying to express when you said Trump won and was a great dealmaker then I think the responsibility for me not understanding your post lies with you. If you say something that appears completely false (Trump is a great deal maker), I educate you on why that’s false (he thinks trade is zero sum and will construct deals that hurt him a lot and think they’re good), and you subsequently declare that you always meant the thing I literally just taught you then we’re going to get nowhere with this. I said Trump looks as a great deal maker because he struck a deal where he's giving nothing and getting stuff back with no retaliation. For Trump, who cares about 2 things, looking good and getting tariff revenue, he struck a great deal. You can write books about how he's dumb or doesn't understand how tariffs are overall bad, but these were his motivations and he achieved both of his goals. Again, this is pretty simple. If the deal was flipped everyone would be floored. If the deal was the same but with no tariffs on either side everyone would praise EU for making the tariffs go away while promising some vague stuff. As it stands, he got 10 % (on average) tariff increase at no extra cost for him, something he wasn't able to get with China because China is actually playing hardball.
Does Trump look like a great deal maker? I mean... maybe? But the EU doesn't and shouldn't care about that. The EU's job isn't to make Trump look bad, it's to get the deal that will best serve EU citizens. Did they manage that? I don't know. As I said above, this deal is terrible. But if you're negotiating with a madman who is insisting on shooting you both in the foot and the only choice he's giving you is the caliber, and whether you whip out your own pistol and shoot you both in the other foot as well... then maybe it's okay that you kept the caliber fairly small and chose not to draw your own pistol.
Of course, if the foot-shooting goes on long enough, then maybe it would've been better to tell the madman to pull out the biggest shotgun he can find, and join him with your own shotgun. Initially it'll be far far worse, but maybe it'll also stop sooner. But neither you nor I know what the future holds here. You're advocating the shotgun so that he doesn't "win", which is just a really weird stance, especially if you understand, as you claim to do, what Kwark pointed out: nobody here is winning anything, and the EU isn't aiming to win, they're aiming to keep their own feet as whole as possible.
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To be fair, Trump's presidency is one giant optics game where he gets to announce the new spin off show, the appresidentice, so the more attention he gets the better. Outcome be damned. It's the wild ride that actually mattered. But also his new show.
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United States42673 Posts
Trump taxing Americans is an internal matter. He's not raising taxes on Europeans, he's raising taxes on Americans in a way that has negative consequences for Americans and negative externalities abroad.
It's like if Trump had a policy of sinking half of the US Navy Atlantic fleet. Europeans have an opinion on it because they have a vested interest in there being a strong US Navy in the Atlantic but ultimately they're not involved, he's the US President, it's his navy to do with as he wishes.
If he goes in insisting that he's going to sink half his fleet whereas the Europeans are recommending that he sinks 0 of his own ships and they eventually agree that he'll sink a quarter then I struggle to see how that's a great deal for America. He might think it is because the Europeans will leave unhappy but he's an idiot.
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https://www.theguardian.com/money/2025/jul/28/us-student-loan-debt-default
Redmond, 46, stayed behind, working overtime at his job in pharmaceutical manufacturing. He has federal student loan debt of $61,696, and after a period of forbearance which ends on 30 August, he’ll need to pay $806 a month.
[...]
“I had hopes for Trump when he got elected and he talked about dismantling the Department of Education and stuff,” Redmond says. He thought this might have meant federal student loans being able to be canceled on the same terms as other loans in bankruptcy court. But Redmond found it “disappointing” that the Trump administration later said what remains of the department will continue to govern student debt.
"Democrats lose elections because their policies are unpopular" nah fuck off, they lose elections because half the country are functionally illiterate imbeciles.
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On July 29 2025 08:06 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 06:38 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 06:03 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 02:04 Fleetfeet wrote:
It seems clear to me.
UK sells thing to burger king
Burger King pays import tax
Burger King makes the consumer pay 5% of that import tax
Burger King pays 5% themselves because they're royalty
The remaining 5% must have incorporated into the UK's original cost of good in order for them to be competitive.
It isn't a singular final sale, there aren't only two participants. There are at least three - UK, Burger King, final consumer. Thank you, I didn't think it was that hard to get because it's obviously a vast oversimplification but I don't think it's unfounded to say that in some of the cases with some of these goods this will happen, and the underlying conclusion that this is a much better deal for the US then EU seems pretty simple to me, but who knows, I do have issues understanding stuff apparently. Why is it a better deal for the US, in your eyes? Tariffs are not a good thing to have on imports, your taxing your own people to make the goods they buy more expensive. Now you can certainly have situations where as a country your ok with that to protect/promote your own local businesses from cheap foreign competition but then its still a bad thing, just a bad thing your willing to accept as a consequence. And Trump isn't even encouraging domestic production with this. Is it a worse thing for Europe? it doesn't cost them money directly. I might make them less competitive with other countries towards selling in the US except everyone is under tariffs so no one takes the advantage there. So why do you think the US got the better end of the deal here? I don't think the US citizens got a better deal, since the US government isn't very keen on spending this tariff revenue for their betterment, but Trump looks (and to me it's hard to deny it) as a great deal maker, he gets 15 % of everything imported to the US from EU, more investment and more energy sales. EU, as clearly shown in the quotes above doesn't get anything other then him backing down from another arbitrary number. I think the EU citizens did, in a few different ways. Short term, sure, EU feels less impact since they aren't imposing the tariffs. The impact will, however, be felt in the companies that are now having less business, when things get more expensive, if there is a similar good that is produced in US or in a less tariffed country, EU company loses that business, perhaps lets some people go if they can't find that revenue somewhere else. US is a uniquely rich country and a lot of goods EU produces are premium and luxury goods, some people will cut back on French or Italian wine or cheese, those producers get sell less to the US. I don't really get, honestly how is this even a real question, if it is followed through as it currently stands, US gets 15 % tariff, 600 B in investments and more energy sales, maybe (likely) the EU institutions shoot it down, but if EU worked like US currently does and Kings word is law, we would get a terrible deal.
Yeah, that is what I distinguished quite a few replies ago.
I think everyone except a few right wingers around here thinks tariffs are bad for the US overall.
I have never said anything other then this is good for Trump, it's what he wanted and what he got. Imposing tariffs without getting tariffs back.
To re-iterate, bad for:
EU exporters (less business inevitably if the tariffs stick)
US citizens (functionally 15 % tax on everything coming from EU)
EU citizens (they work for the companies who will lose business)
Good for:
Trump (because he likes tariffs and he imposed them with no consequences)
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On July 29 2025 22:55 brian wrote:
Trump shot himself in the foot, exactly as planned. Another tally in the win column, what a stable genius.
also, an alleged billionaire tanking his economy in which he is heavily leveraged certainly does have a cost, obviously.
More then half his wealth is in crypto now. He and his spawn have positioned themselves just fine. He can also leverege exemptions to these tariffs in order to receive more bribes. His investment in actual US economy is fairly minimal compared to his actual businesses.
Ruining US is just his side hustle.
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On July 29 2025 23:14 LightSpectra wrote:https://www.theguardian.com/money/2025/jul/28/us-student-loan-debt-defaultShow nested quote +Redmond, 46, stayed behind, working overtime at his job in pharmaceutical manufacturing. He has federal student loan debt of $61,696, and after a period of forbearance which ends on 30 August, he’ll need to pay $806 a month.
[...]
“I had hopes for Trump when he got elected and he talked about dismantling the Department of Education and stuff,” Redmond says. He thought this might have meant federal student loans being able to be canceled on the same terms as other loans in bankruptcy court. But Redmond found it “disappointing” that the Trump administration later said what remains of the department will continue to govern student debt. "Democrats lose elections because their policies are unpopular" nah fuck off, they lose elections because half the country are functionally illiterate imbeciles.
When was the last Democrat move to make student loan debt dischargeable in bankruptcy the way most other debt operates? They have had power many times. Why is student debt not able to be discharged in bankruptcy in normal cases? Because doing so means universities would have to deliver market driven value and lendors would have to appropriately price risk into interest rates. For some reason I think 90% left leaning universities' special interests might not want their own party to end that gravy train.
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On July 29 2025 22:44 Jankisa wrote:Show nested quote +On July 29 2025 22:08 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:On July 29 2025 21:11 Jankisa wrote:On July 29 2025 20:34 Gorsameth wrote:On July 29 2025 20:22 KT_Elwood wrote:On July 29 2025 17:53 Gorsameth wrote:
"America taxes itself in humiliating move to the EU"
sorry buddy, still not seeing it. EU CEOs want to slash their central-european workforce anyway, they gonna eat the tariffs by killing jobs seems to be on the menu for us. German steel? Dead. German cars? Made in Hungary. German Defense Industry?: Hiring in Romania. German plastics and chemicals?: Call the Chinese office for orders. except, once gain, the EU doesn't eat the tariffs. the US does. A German company does not pay 15% extra to ship steel to the US. The US client pays 15% extra to the US government. Can you please explain to us why is Germany desperate to sign the deal and get the tariffs down from 25 % to 15 % if this is such a non issue, the US is paying it, why would they care? www.ft.comHere are some quotes from industry and leaders in EU, even Mertz who praised the deal getting done is saying it will have negative consequences on the EU and German economy, why is this so difficult to understand? Why did EU humiliate itself and gave all these concessions if all tariffs are doing is making shit more expensive for the US?
Where is the logic in this? I think that the logic behind any (perceived) concessions and humiliations would be that playing hardball / turning away Trump could lead the unhinged American president to blow up in even more serious and detrimental ways. I'd imagine a lot of our allies are just trying to make it through the next few years (Trump's term) with as few explosions as possible, and our allies are less likely to become collateral damage if they don't go out of their way to poke the proverbial (fascist, rapist) bear. They're likely considering long-term self-preservation and acting responsibly for the future of their countries. Sure, but where does it end? Are you sure that Trump or a Trumpian figure wont' be there in 4 years? Should EU just concede everything hoping that American democracy and institutions that have been rolling over for Republicans and him specifically for a decade now to somehow win? The same institutions that are being gutted are going to stop this? Do you think that this Supreme court will tell him he can't run for a 3rd term or do anything to impede his agenda? Do you think that EU rolling over and giving him win after win, with Ursula repeating his insane tariffs justification back to him as the main quote for justifying this helps with making the American public like him less? Show nested quote +Asked about what concessions, if any, the US had made in the talks, the Commission chief replied with a general remark about shared prosperity.
"The starting point was an imbalance, a surplus (of goods) on our side and a deficit on the US side. We wanted to rebalance the trade relation, and we wanted to do it in a way that trade goes on between the two of us across the Atlantic," she said. When has this sort of approach ever worked with bullies? Praising them, conceding and hoping that he won't take it further or that they'll magically just go away, that works with aggressive people, right?
For a president, "it ends" when their term ends. And you're right that there's no guarantee that there won't be another terrible human being as the next president, but that doesn't mean you should go out of your way to mess up both your short-term and long-term situations.
Trump is indeed a bully, but there are different ways to handle different bullies, depending on different contexts. Trump's position of power, narcissism, wealth, irrationality, term limit, and old age are all unique factors that make me think that allies ignoring and nodding and smiling at him could very well be a legitimate way for them to play the game for now, as opposed to trying to pick a fight with a guy who would probably nuke half the world if his next well-done steak didn't come with a side of ketchup.
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EPT
