US Protectionism and Tariff Strategies

This week we talk about tax hikes, free trade, and the madman theory of negotiation.

We also discuss EVs, Canada, and economic competition.

Recommended Book: How Sanctions Work by Narges Bajoghli, Vali Nasr, Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, and Ali Vaez

Transcript

On January 20, 2025, the 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump, was inaugurated as the 47th President of the US following a hard-fought election that he ultimately won by only a little bit in terms of the popular vote—49.8% to 48.3%—but he won the electoral vote by a substantial margin: 312 to opponent Kamala Harris’ 226.

Trump is the oldest person in US history to assume the country’s presidency, at 78 years old, and he’s only the second US president to win a non-consecutive term, the first being Grover Cleveland back in 1893.

This new Trump presidency kicked off even before he officially stepped into office, his people interviewing government officials and low-level staff with what have been called loyalty tests, to assess who’s with them and who’s against them, including questions about whether they think the previous election, which Trump lost to former president Biden, was rigged against Trump—a conspiracy theory that’s popular with Trump and many of his supporters, but for which there’s no evidence.

There was also a flurry of activity in Israel and the Gaza Strip, last minute negotiations between then-president Biden’s representatives gaining additional oomph when Trump’s incoming representatives added their heft to the effort, resulting in a long-pursued ceasefire agreement that, as of the day I’m recording this at least, still holds, a few weeks after it went into effect; hostages are still being exchanged, fighting has almost entirely halted between Israeli forces and Hamas fighters in Gaza, and while everyone involved is still holding their breath, worried that the whole thing could fall apart as previous efforts toward a lasting ceasefire have, negotiations about the second phase of the three-phase ceasefire plan started yesterday, and everything seems to be going mostly according to plan, thus far.

That said, other aspects of the second Trump presidency have been less smooth and less celebrated—outside of the president’s orbit, at least.

There have been a flurry of firings and forced retirements amongst long-serving public officials and employees—many seemingly the result of those aforementioned loyalty tests. This has left gaps in many fundamental agencies, and while those conducting this purge of said agencies have claimed this is part of the plan, and that those who have left or been forced to leave are part of the alleged deep state that has it in for Trump, and who worked against him and his plans during his first presidency, and that these agencies, furthermore, have long been overstaffed, and staffed with people who aren’t good at their jobs—so these purges will ultimately save the government money, and things will be restructured to work better, for some value of “better,” anyway.

There have been outcries about this seeming gutting of the system, especially the regulatory system, from pretty much everyone else, national and international, with some analysts and Trump opponents calling this a coup in all but name; doing away with the systems that allow for accountability of those in charge, basically, and the very structures that allow democracy to happen in the country. And even short of that, we’re seeing all sorts of issues related to those empty seats, and could soon see consequences as a result of the loss of generational knowledge in these agencies about how to do things; even fairly basic things.

All of which has been accompanied by a wave of revenge firings and demotions, and threats of legal action and even the jailing of Trump opponents. In some cases this has included pulling security details from anyone who’s spoken out against Trump or his policies in the past, including those who face persistent threats of violence, usually from Trump supporters.

On the opposite side, those who have stuck by Trump, including those who were charged with crimes related to the January 6 incursion at the US Capitol Building, have been pardoned, given promotions, and at times publicly celebrated by the new administration. Some have been given cushy jobs and promotions for the well-connected amongst his supporters; Ken Howery the partner of venture capitalist and owner of government contractor Palantir, Peter Thield, and close ally of serial CEO and enthusiastic Trump supporter Elon Musk, was recently made ambassador to Denmark, for instance.

Some of these moves have caused a fair bit of chaos, including a plane colliding with a military helicopter, which may have been the result of understaffing at the FAA, alongside an executive order that froze the funding of federal programs across the country.

That executive order has been blocked by judges in some areas, and the Trump administration has since announced that they’ve rescinded the memo announcing that shutdown, but the initial impact was substantial, including the closure of regional Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid infrastructure, and the halting of government funded research and educational programs.

Lots of people had their livelihoods threatened, lots worried they wouldn’t be able to afford necessary medical procedures or be able to pay their bills, and many people worried this might cause the country to lose ground against competitors in terms of scientific and technological development, while also leading to some pretty widespread negative health outcomes—the government has also pulled health data, so information about disease spread and even pandemics is now inaccessible, further amplifying that latter concern.

And that’s just a very abbreviated, incomplete summary of some of the actions Trump’s administration has taken in its first two weeks back in office; part of a desire on their part to hit the ground rolling and get rid of elements that might stand in their way as they fundamentally change the US system of government to better match their ambitions and priorities.

What I’d like to talk about today, is a specific focus of this new administration—one that was a focus of Trump’s previous administration, and to a certain degree Biden’s administration too: that of US protectionism, and the use of tariffs against perceived enemies; but also, in Trump’s case, at least, against long-time allies, as well.

—

On February 2 of 2025, Trump posted about tariffs on the twitter-clone he owns, Truth Social. And I’m going to quote the post in full, here, as I think it’s illustrative of what he intends to do in this regard in the coming months.

“The “Tariff Lobby,” headed by the Globalist, and always wrong, Wall Street Journal, is working hard to justify Countries like Canada, Mexico, China, and too many others to name, continue the decades long RIPOFF OF AMERICA, both with regard to TRADE, CRIME, AND POISONOUS DRUGS that are allowed to so freely flow into AMERICA. THOSE DAYS ARE OVER! The USA has major deficits with Canada, Mexico, and China (and almost all countries!), owes 36 Trillion Dollars, and we’re not going to be the “Stupid Country” any longer. MAKE YOUR PRODUCT IN THE USA AND THERE ARE NO TARIFFS! Why should the United States lose TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS IN SUBSIDIZING OTHER COUNTRIES, and why should these other countries pay a small fraction of the cost of what USA citizens pay for Drugs and Pharmaceuticals, as an example? THIS WILL BE THE GOLDEN AGE OF AMERICA! WILL THERE BE SOME PAIN? YES, MAYBE (AND MAYBE NOT!). BUT WE WILL MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, AND IT WILL ALL BE WORTH THE PRICE THAT MUST BE PAID. WE ARE A COUNTRY THAT IS NOW BEING RUN WITH COMMON SENSE — AND THE RESULTS WILL BE SPECTACULAR!!!”

So there are several things happening there, probably the most fundamental of which is the claim that other countries, including the US’s allies, like Canada and Mexico, are taking advantage of the US when it comes to trade. This post followed Trump’s signature of an executive order that applied a 25% tariff on all Canadian and Mexican imports, and a 10% tariff on all Chinese imports.

A tariff is basically a tax on certain goods brought into a country from other countries.

So the US might impose a tariff on Chinese cars in order to keep those cars from flooding US markets and competing with US- and European-made models. And that’s what the US did under the first Trump, and then the Biden administration—it imposed a 100% border tax on electric vehicles from China, the theory being that these cars are underpriced because of how the Chinese economy works, because of how workers there are treated, and because the Chinese government subsidizes many of their industries, including the EV industry, so their cars are quite good and sold at low prices, but they got that way because they’re competing unfairly, according to this argument. Chinese cars sold at their sticker price on the US market, then, might kill off US car companies, which is not something the US government wants.

Thus, the price on Chinese EVs is effectively doubled on the US market, and that, on a practical level, kills that competition, giving US carmakers cover until they can up their game and compete with their foreign rivals.

The usual theory behind imposing tariffs, then, if you’re doing so for ostensible competitive reasons, at least, is that slapping an additional tax on such goods should allow local businesses to better compete against them, because that additional tax raises prices, and that means local offerings have a government-provided advantage. This can help level a perceptually imbalanced playing field, or it can rebalance things in favor of brands in your country.

In reality, though, tariffs often, though not always, become a tax on customers, not on the companies they’re meant to target.

Chinese vehicles have had trouble coming to the US for other reasons beyond price, including a change in safety standards that would be regulatorily required, and a slew of advantages provided to US companies beyond the hobbling tariffs enforced on their foreign competition. But other goods come into the US market from all over the place, and when there’s a tariff of say 10 or 25%, that tax is generally just tacked on to the sticker price on the US market, and US consumers thus pay more for something they might have otherwise bought more cheaply, sans tariffs.

This creates an effective tax within various industries in the US economy, and it generally has an inflationary effect, as a consequence; things become more expensive, so the money people earn doesn’t go as far.

So the new Trump administration announced a new 10% tariff on all Chinese goods, and 25% tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico, though energy products like oil from Canada will only face a 10% tariff.

China has already lobbed a bunch of counter-tariffs at the US over the past few administrations, and it suggested it would add more to the tally in response to this new flat tariff, and now Canada and Mexico are rattling the same sabers, saying they won’t stand by while their neighbor, with the world’s biggest economy, elbows them out, causing possibly substantial damage to their local businesses that export goods to the US.

The Canadian government has said it will apply 25% tariffs on $155 billion of American goods, including things like orange juice and appliances, those tariffs phased in over the next three weeks. And the Mexican government has said they’ll do similar things, without giving specific details, as of yet.

That means US manufacturers, companies that make stuff that ends up being sold in Canada and Mexico, could soon see comparable tariffs on their goods sold in those markets. That, in turn, could lead to significant economic consequences for such companies, but also everyday people living in all the affected countries, because of that inflationary effect—that effective tax on all of these goods.

So even without those counter-tariffs, these new tariffs from the Trump administration against Canada, Mexico, and China to are expected to cause some real damage to the US economy, and to normal Americans. The Tax Foundation has estimated that they’ll shrink US economic output by .4% and increase taxes by $1.2 trillion between 2025 and 2034, which on a micro-scale represents an average household tax increase of about $830 in 2025, alone; an extra $830 out of pocket per household on average because of these punishments that are ostensibly aimed at other countries, to try to get them to do things Trump wants them to do.

Most of that $1.2 trillion tax increase is just from the Mexico and Canada tariffs: $958 billion of it, in fact. And during his first term in office, Trump’s tariffs imposed about $80 billion worth of new taxes on American households in a single year, from 2018 to 2019—which isn’t the same as just hiking taxes, but it amounts to the same outcome; and when compared to straight-up tax hikes, this represents one of the largest tax increases in several decades.

Biden kept most of Trump’s tariffs from his first administration in place when he stepped into office, and Biden added some of his own, too: especially on strategically vital tech components like computer chips, and next-step product categories like electric vehicles. And the net-impact of these tariffs on the US economy is generally considered to be mostly negative, in terms of practical tax hikes and its inflationary impact, but also in terms of reduced economic activity and employment.

Trade wars can sound pretty tough and often serve as nationalistic red meat when reported upon, but most economists consider them to be the legislative equivalent of shooting oneself in the foot; completely open, free trade comes with downsides, as well, including the potential for a nation like China to dump products at low prices in foreign markets, putting local manufacturers out of business, then raising their prices once they’ve soaked up all the oxygen.

But trade conflicts often result in a lot of downsides for everyday, tax-paying citizens, have long-term negative effects on businesses, and can also stoke inflation, causing secondary and tertiary negative effects that are hard to tamp down, later.

Knowing this, many analysts have speculated that Trump might be using these tariffs as a sort of shot across the bow, wanting to renegotiate all sorts of agreements with enemies and allies, alike, and using the madman theory of negotiation, trying to convince those on the other side of the eventual negotiation that he’s not in his right mind and is willing to burn it all down, wounding himself and his country in order to take out those who he feels have wronged him, if he doesn’t get what he wants.

There’s a chance this could work for him, and his many threats and implied threats have already led to a whole lot of cowtowing and cancelled lawsuits against him and his people, even from folks and entities that have previously been staunchly against Trump and everything he stands for.

There’s also a good chance that these other governments will see whatever it is he’s demanding from them as a small price to pay to get back to something approaching normal relations with the US, and normal dealings with the US’s economy.

His demands so far, though, have mostly revolved around seeming specters; he’s alleging insufficient efforts aimed at drug imports into the US, and that both Mexico and Canada are enabling all manners of money laundering and transnational crimes; allegations that both countries deny, but which probably aren’t the point to begin with. These accusations are generally being seen as a means of forcing these tariffs through without the usual process, which would take a while and present the opportunity for government systems to derail or weaken them, which happened to some of the tariffs Trump wanted to hurl at other governments during his first administration.

So those seeming rationales might be primarily justifications to force these tariffs through, and it could be that the tariffs are meant to be negotiating leverage first and foremost, going away as soon as he gets what he wants—whatever that actually is.

That said, it’s also been speculated that a manman-theory-style false threat that’s seen to be a false threat—hardcore, arguably nonsensical tariffs against allies, for instance—may not serve their purpose, because everyone knows they’re false. That may mean those on the other end of them, if they hold their ground and are willing to suffer a little, could make it out the other side without giving too much away, the US suffering more, and thus, the president eventually giving up, coming up with justification for shifting to a new strategy but mostly just trying to lower inflation levels he raised, and bring life back to a stock market that he collapsed.

Either way, it looks like there’s a pretty good chance a lot of established norms and folkways will be trampled over the next few years, possibly with good reason, if you support the ends of this administration, at least, though by some indications maybe because of a fundamental misunderstanding of how economics works at this scale, or maybe for different reasons entirely: part of that larger plan to disrupt and demolish aspects of the US system of governance, making way for replacements that are more to the current administration’s liking.

Note: after recording this episode, but before it went live, the Chinese tariffs went into effect, but the tariffs against Mexico and Canada (and those countries’ counter-tariffs) were paused. More information: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/02/04/us/trump-tariffs-news#here-are-the-latest-developments

Show Notes

https://www.npr.org/2024/05/06/1248065838/cheap-chinese-evs-us-buy-byd-electric-vehicles

https://ustr.gov/usmca

https://www.axios.com/2025/02/01/trump-cfpb-rohit-chopra-fired

https://www.axios.com/2025/02/02/trump-netanyahu-gaza-ceasefire-hostage-deal

https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/federal/trump-tariffs-trade-war/

https://taxfoundation.org/blog/trump-tariffs-impact-economy/

https://www.axios.com/2025/01/03/biden-blocks-us-steel-nippon-japan

https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/113934450227067577

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/01/02/biden-blocks-nippon-us-steel-deal/

https://www.axios.com/2025/01/03/nippon-steel-us-steel-sue-biden

https://restofworld.org/2024/china-tech-tariffs-which-countries-will-impose/

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/02/02/us/trump-tariffs

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/02/business/trump-tariffs-china.html

https://apnews.com/article/trump-tariffs-trade-china-mexico-canada-inflation-753a09d56cd318f2eb1d2efe3c43b7d4

https://www.reuters.com/business/trump-stretches-trade-law-boundaries-with-canada-mexico-china-tariffs-2025-02-02/

https://www.theverge.com/news/600334/trump-us-tariffs-imported-semiconductors-chips

https://www.uschamber.com/international/u-s-chamber-tariffs-are-not-the-answer

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c627nx42xelo

https://www.axios.com/2025/02/01/trump-canada-mexico-tariffs

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-02/mexico-pledges-retaliatory-tariffs-against-us-while-calling-for-cooperation?embedded-checkout=true

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/what-are-tariffs-trump-canada-mexico-what-to-know/

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-tariffs-25-percent-mexico-canada-trade-economy-84476fb2

https://english.elpais.com/international/2025-02-02/from-cartels-to-terrorists-trump-imposes-a-new-paradigm-on-mexico-in-the-war-on-drugs.html

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2025/feb/02/canada-mexico-china-donald-trump-trade-tariffs-us-politics-live

https://budgetlab.yale.edu/research/economic-and-fiscal-effects-trump-administrations-proposed-tarrifs

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/31/us/trump-freeze-blocked.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_United_States_presidential_election

https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-hamas-war-news-ceasefire-hostages-02-01-2025-bb560151db1437d0b35ac1d568457a46

https://www.axios.com/2025/02/01/trump-moves-missed-plane-crash-dei

https://apnews.com/article/trump-tariffs-dei-federal-workers-plane-crash-733303f2c808834f4cc4b30dfaf308a7

https://apnews.com/article/trump-federal-grants-pause-freeze-e5f512ae6f1212f621d5fa9bbec95e08

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit letsknowthings.substack.com/subscribe