There are lots of American car and truck manufacturers, from luxury to sports cars to jeeps and trucks. It's not like Tesla will own the market because of the tariffs. It might persuade some to go from a BMW or Mercedes to a Cadillac or Lincoln, but if you are rich you will still buy that Rolls Royce, Ferrari, or whatever car you want to buy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_automobiles_manufactured_in_the_United_States Get yourself a honda or toyota..
You're missing the point. Cap and trade and the whole green energy and emissions was a giant grift until Tesla came along. And to this day, Tesla is grifting off N America and Europe. Now leftist hate it. Republicans have a new grift - Push price pressure off EV's and make them more of a financial incentive through tariff and tax deducible interest on EV's.
My response was to that weird comment where you said you can rage or buy a Tesla. There are plenty of brands to choose from. If someone wants a Tesla that's their choice. I could care less what people buy. A car is a personal choice. I've owned a few different Fords, a Subaru, Chevrolet, Honda, and Fiat, and none of my choices were political. I never owned or wanted to own a Tesla before Musk took office, and politics has nothing to do with me not wanting a Tesla. I just hate to see tariffs drive the prices up, but luckily I don't need a new car anytime soon.
I bought a 2023 Chevy Colorado last year I'm not big on throwing what I spent on things but..... I spent 50K without tariffs. American made, so tariffs won't affect me, right?????? Well check this out below: The Chevy Colorado is primarily manufactured in the USA, specifically at the Wentzville Assembly Plant in Missouri235. However, engines and parts for the Colorado are also made in GM factories located in Canada, Brazil, Argentina, and China4. I suspect if I went to buy one later this it would cost me over 60K. Not all American cars are that American.
Toyota assembles the RAV4 in Canada. The hybrid version is made in the US but the normal RAV4s are all produced at the Ontario assembly. They also assemble the Lexus RX and NX here as well. Honda produces CRVs in Ontario (as supplemental capacity to the plants in Indiana and Ohio as production at those is well below demand for CRVs). They also produce Civics at the Ontario assembly.
Made in X country is really assembled in X country from parts manufactured in China. Soon enough it'll be manufactured in India as companies have already begun to move there as costs have risen in China.
I feel sorry for kids these days. You used to be able to afford a vehicle, even working 30 hours a week on minimum wage. That, with plenty of money to spend on concerts, and entertainment. In 1978 min wage was $2.65 . Now it's $7.25. In 1978 the Model: Ford F150 1/2 Ton S had an MSRP of $4,729. Now the base price is $37,075. Many more kids could do their own maintenance on used trucks a lot easier than now too. They weren't as complicated and packed under the hood. We've had an Increase in Texas minimum wage of 173.68% since 1978, but an increase in the price of trucks of 684.6%. Concerts averaged around $8, and now they average around $122. They have increased over $1425%.
Without tarrifs, you can afford a Chinese electric car with incredible value. It's just that we're belatedly realizing that it aint great in the long term to hollow out our manufacturing. Look at how fast and hard England is heading. They can't make their own weapons grade steel, and the government is forced to pay a foreign company to keep whatever's remaining alive. At the other end, most Americans are lazy and avoid going into STEM cuz it's hard or they think you end up in a soulless or joyless career AND earn pennies compared to do-nothing Influencers or parasitic Wall Street bankers. So our factories workforce become lower skilled or incredibly overpayed for the output. That or you fight automation tooth and nail since the jobs that replace it require STEM degrees that factory mills (old and new) like Alabama, Detroit, or Pittsburgh resent culturally and viscerally. We're kinda boned if we don't shape up our priorities and educational culture.
I have seen several - the problem is that tariffs in large part have been shown to have negative consequences. There are specific examples, in niche areas where there is genuine debate, but not on large scale tariffs. So it is like saying: Is there large scale and unbiased pieces on the pros and cons of beating your children. The outcome will seem to be against corporal punishment of children because the research findings overwhelmingly don't support it. Having said that - I have also learned that anyone that claims that they know exactly what the US or world economy will do in the short term is lying. It is more of a soft science than a hard one and many things come into play.
Yes - and a genuine discussion needs to be had on what is the proper response. "American" doesn't mean what it did 60 years ago, an American company is owned by stockholders, which are not required to be American, the cars are made of parts that are often not made in the USA and sometimes they are not even assembled in the USA. Further - if there is not going to be a cultural or government push for mass transportation, then the question has to be asked if it is ethical to artificially increase costs of vehicles for Americans. England will be fine - Western Europe will be fine. I don't think it is a recent discovery that a lack of manufacturing is a concern, it has been known for some time - but there is a lack of central authority in the USA, and businesses and "progress" pushed us in this direction. When there was a lack of wars or enemies post Cold War, it is less of an issue. With a return of enemies, it becomes a national security issue. Manufacturing can be brought back to an extent in the USA - but it has to be strategic. Is that medications? Cars? We will never be able to have manufacturing to the degree China has and India will have because of wages. The average Chinese makes like 20% of what an average American makes. Further, China is trying (and failing) to move from a manufacturing economy to a consumer economy. A very close friend of mine is very high in an international engineering corporation, he is only 31 years old and is the highest in the company at his age. He has had to live in Germany, Northern Europe and even some in China. He said that the overall quality of engineers and STEM based employees in the USA are the best in the world. That there are some good ones in Europe as well, but overall not on par. So I don't think that STEM is nearly as big a concern in 2025 as it was in 2010. Further, as he points out, 80% of the best young STEM people he works with that are not US citizens want to get US citizenship and have families in the USA. There are now a lot of multi-generational STEM families that came from India and other nations 60 years ago and now their children and grandchildren are STEM heavy in employment. Yes - of course they are going to be overpaid, the average American earns far more than others across the globe - and it is why these people wanting to be bring all manufacturing back to the USA are on a fools errand. There are niche markets - especially in highly specialized fields where manufacturing can do well. We can also make some decisions to have very selected tariffs for medicine, or appliances or vehicles, but those need to be well thought out because it will still strain US families. Innovation and specialization is still the huge key to being able to benefits and growth in the USA. There need to be more trade schools that perhaps require less classes on world history, but specialize on physics and practical math for use in those jobs that are mostly higher level blue collar jobs. All of this is nothing new - the same thing was said in the 1970's and again in the 1990's - every 25 years or so the world shifts, and new innovations happen and the key is to be on the forefront of those changes. While I have no trust of Trump - I will at least give him credit for attempting to update a government that is still stuck in the post World War mindset with the only real tweaking being by Reagan 45 years ago and Clinton 25 years ago.
Hmm. The bag of coffee I purchased last week was $7.18. This week it was $8.69. Both purchased at HEB. Also don't think one rando on twitter equals "Democrats".
I'm just not sure if America has the stomach to onshore all this manufacturing via tariffs because it will not be some short term fix. I will take MAGA at its word that this is more about onshoring manufacturing than simply get minor concessions ( but that very well could be true).
Who knows how long it will take to have the equipment and tools to manufacture all the products they relied on from abroad, and meanwhile Americans will bear the costs. It's like selling the eggs before you have the chickens. Speaking of eggs, the Dept of Agriculture is spending a billion dollars to address the eggs. Now we are stuck importing the from Taiwan, South Korea, and Brazil. Remember when folks blamed Biden for egg prices? SMH
I would've agreed with most of this a few weeks ago. The US has been positioned well ahead in the event of most global disruptions because of its geographical and geological bounty. That also makes us fat and lazy. Semianalysis, a trade paper mostly focused on chipmaking came out with a report on how far ahead China has gotten with assisted factories and robotics. A lot of this is usually thought to have been found in high end fabs in Taiwan, Japan, or SK but they're claiming more local shops in China are adopting those practices. They also detail how the Chinese are planning to use robotics as the edge for foreign marketplaces. A lot of factors are building a virtuous cycle in their dominance, such as China being the global supply chain center, Xi's earlier efforts to focus on engineer graduates which they funnel into AI assisted and other tech research, and their existing monopolies in clean tech and high end precision manufacturing (such as Apple products that are not cheap or crap quality). Granted some China fears of the past decade hasn't come, such as China's university system surpassing ours due to quantity , but it's enough to reconsider what we're willingly leaving behind...ie domestic manufactured goods over cheap throwaway **** with planned obselescence ... financialized "wealth effects" where the stock market is headline news over a resilient supply chain to produce goods, weapons, ships, and real jobs... https://semianalysis.com/2025/03/11/america-is-missing-the-new-labor-economy-robotics-part-1/ I'd rather have Biden's global policy over whatever the **** sockpuppet shadee JD and Trump are peddling. I can't tell if they're closing loops into a Clash of Civilizations redux or are actually deluded into thinking everything can still funnel through the US by calling Big Shots and making everyone else grovel in its wake. They're doing a little of both rn. Rightfully playing up China fears because we can't outgun or out ship them anymore, while pretending to be the only dominant swinging dick in town. In a prolonged war, some truths are destined to change if we don't wake up about what we can/can't do and what they can/can't do. Biden was more subtle and believed the Western alliance can handle the burden while people like Vance and Peter Thiel have totally written Europe off and want them to burn.
Its disingenuous to use minimum wage as some sort of metric because 80% of American workers make more than 15 dollars an hour
My whole metric was based on my first paragraph, which said.... "I feel sorry for kids these days. You used to be able to afford a vehicle, even working 30 hours a week on minimum wage. That, with plenty of money to spend on concerts, and entertainment." I wasn't talking about anyone else. It was about kids who work part-time minimum wage jobs while going to high school, like at the movie theater or at the mall. I wasn't talking about adults.
