There was a short point made about how German companies think tariffs for cars are worthwhile. Since then we have had ~10 posts discussing if Germans are stupid in the US politics thread...
On July 30 2025 23:22 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On July 30 2025 20:24 Broetchenholer wrote:On July 30 2025 17:22 KwarK wrote:On July 30 2025 14:24 Broetchenholer wrote:On July 30 2025 10:36 KwarK wrote:On July 30 2025 10:23 BlackJack 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:
[quote]
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.
Tariff = lose-lose is an oversimplification. For example the EU's 10% tariff on cars. Is the EU also too stupid to realize that tariff = bad or perhaps they think the protection it offers to domestic auto companies outweighs any negatives to their consumers? Clearly the EU thought it was "good" to have a tariff against US cars but if a US tariff against EU cars is automatically bad then I'd like to hear some reasoning for the discrepancy.
German lobbying.
The discrepancy is German lobbying? German lobbying is bad? Germans are stupid to not realize they are hurting themselves with tariffs? Care to explain?
Not sure why you immediately jumped to “Germans are stupid” but maybe some are.
First, can you be less of an asshole? Seriously, just try once not to be an asshole.
I didn’t say, suggest, or imply that Germans were stupid. That would be a stupid thing to imply, everyone knows Germans have made huge contributions to the expansion of human knowledge over the years. But if you, a German, feel the need to jump in and straw man my view as “Germans are stupid” then you can’t subsequently whine if I partially agree with you. You were looking for a reason to be offended and found one in your own words, I wasn’t involved, you wanted to get upset.
Show nested quote +On July 30 2025 20:24 Broetchenholer wrote:
As you before argued that tariffs are always bad and shooting yourself in the foot, you must believe that germans are stupid because they wanted to shoot themselves in the foot.
1. I didn’t argue that tariffs are always bad. That’s yet another attempt to put words in my mouth.
2. I don’t believe that Germans are stupid. I also don’t believe that industry lobbyists speak for an entire nationality. But again, if you really want to get offended by your idea that Germans are stupid then it’s your prerogative. Just don’t drag me into it.
3. Not all EU residents are Germans. If my argument is that German lobbying is making the EU is shoot its residents in the foot then that does not imply that they foolishly wanted to shoot themselves in the foot. They could want to bar Spaniards from buying cheaper imported cars in favour of German ones. The interests of German industry and of the rest of the EU residents are not necessarily aligned.
4. Not all Germans are car industry lobbyists. The interests of car industry lobbyists and all Germans are not necessarily aligned. If I suggest that German lobbyists have encouraged a particular policy then that is not a statement about the intelligence of the German people.
5. Nobody has to be stupid. People working for the German car industry can rationally want to force everyone to buy German cars without being stupid. This can be an objectively bad policy for the EU as a whole and still become policy without anyone being stupid. The good of the group and the good of subsets of individuals within the group need not be aligned.
This whole discussion of stupid Germans is absurd. Nobody but you is arguing that Germans are stupid and I don’t know why you’re trying so hard to convince me that they are. I believe Trump to be stupid because of all of the things that he says and does. He's an individual. No part of my observations and conclusions about Trump can be extrapolated to the population of Germany.
EPT
