Summary
Fox News host Julie Banderas warned that President-elect Donald Trump’s proposed tariffs—25% on products from Mexico and Canada and 10% on those from China—could significantly raise costs for Americans, as many businesses rely on foreign goods.
While some companies are shifting to U.S.-based suppliers or stockpiling goods ahead of the tariffs, Banderas noted that buying American often results in higher prices.
She highlighted that the financial burden would likely fall on consumers, questioning, “Who’s going to pay for that? We are.”
Economists have also warned of inflation risks.
Here’s the thing. Even if the terrifs, somehow, didn’t directly cause inflation, the fact that we are taking about inflation means that companies can raise prices and gouge just like last time.
Deflation is actually really bad. It essentially means that not spending money is the best option, which makes it so people stop buying as many things and the economy slows down dramatically. A small amount of inflation is ideal. It encourages spending but doesn’t do much harm either.
This sounds completely backwards, like if you are talking purely about investment.
If not it seems to completely ignore that high prices alone would discourage spending, particularly on non-essential things (even then, don’t think for a second that there aren’t people skipping healthcare or meals).
The only other way I could interpret would be that high prices force people to spend more money on just essentials (even if they’re buying less than they otherwise would), somehow painting living paycheck-to-paycheck as a good thing because it means more money in the economy.
That’s actually neoliberal propaganda and not true. “The economy” in the context of GDP turned out to really mean “rich people”.
