Ok, so I have a question and I’m not totally educated on tariffs and the history of its impacts on American economy, but I see a lot of people who are upset about the tariffs and saying things such as “ugh, I have to buy from SHEIN and temu before prices jump up… bla bla I can’t believe trump would do this it’s so damaging”. I understand that, but these are the same people who happened to have told us years ago to boycott fast fashion, ie shein temu, any mainstream fashion brand. Fast fashion is built upon massive environmental damage and unfair labor laws/child labor and exploitation… which many people who are democrat (I, included) are very into minimalism, environmentally conscious, repurposing, compost boxes, thrifting that shit etc. Aren’t these tariffs going to discourage the production of products from China, in which they mostly have horrible working conditions and maybe even lessen the environmental impact? And perhaps, even boost jobs here?
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Ok, so I have a question and I’m not totally educated on tariffs and the history of its impacts on American economy, but I see a lot of people who are upset about the tariffs and saying things such as “ugh, I have to buy from SHEIN and temu before prices jump up… bla bla I can’t believe trump would do this it’s so damaging”. I understand that, but these are the same people who happened to have told us years ago to boycott fast fashion, ie shein temu, any mainstream fashion brand. Fast fashion is built upon massive environmental damage and unfair labor laws/child labor and exploitation… which many people who are democrat (I, included) are very into minimalism, environmentally conscious, repurposing, compost boxes, thrifting that shit etc. Aren’t these tariffs going to discourage the production of products from China, in which they mostly have horrible working conditions and maybe even lessen the environmental impact? And perhaps, even boost jobs here?
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>but these are the same people who happened to have told us years ago to boycott fast fashion, ie shein temu, any mainstream fashion brand.
I’m going to suggest to you that they are not, in fact, the same people.
There are tens of millions of Democratic party voters. Most of them probably don’t think about the impact of fast fashion on the global ecosystem at all.
> which many people who are democrat (I, included) are very into minimalism, environmentally conscious, repurposing, compost boxes, thrifting that shit etc.
There are really very few people who are consistently minimalist. The average Democrat is not a minimalist or doing any of this.
>Aren’t these tariffs going to discourage the production of products from China, in which they mostly have horrible working conditions
Slightly yes, which will cause China to engage in worse behavior with regards to environmental regulations and worker treatment to try to drive prices lower.
>and maybe even lessen the environmental impact?
Global economic collapse will kill a lot of people and damage a ton of lives but may also lessen environmental decline very very slightly. It’s not a good trade off.
>And perhaps, even boost jobs here?
Zero chance, it will be a net loss of jobs guaranteed.
I’m still going to buy what I intend to buy, tarriffs or not. It’s only going to make me pay more for purchases I already intend on making.
The problem is that there is no alternative to buying goods internationally.
Sure, not buying from Temu isn’t a big deal, but the issue is that there is no major American clothing retailer who isn’t buying their stock from outside the U.S., usually in Southeast Asia. So it’s more like Temu goes out of business and clothes at Target, Gap, Nike, Nordstrom, etc. all double in price.
And even if you want to make your own clothes, the cost of fabric, zippers, sewing machines, etc. also doubles.
And even if you thrift, the prices of thrifted clothes go up due to increased demand and reduced supply.
Sure.
They will also make it a lot more expensive to install solar panels and batteries.
Tariffs being generally bad is one of those things that has broad economic consensus. There are exceptions, but economics is not a zero sum game. People engage in trade because both parties benefit from it, and that broader and more open the trading field, the better.
There is also lots of history of protectionist tariffs and trade wars being a dark stain on presidencies, and basically learned not to do that anymore (except for Donald Trump).
As for horrible working conditions in China, that’s tricky, because hundreds of millions have been lifted our of poverty in China due to China’s prosperity. You could argue things would be worse if companies weren’t hiring cheap labor in China.
>I understand that, but these are the same people who happened to have told us years ago to boycott fast fashion
Are they? There have been calls for boycotting fast fashion on the left, but pretty much everyone with any economic understanding is against these tariffs. This also assumes that the only thing we import from anywhere else in the world is fast fashion and other disposable low quality good, which is also flat out wrong.
Yeah child labour to make stuff in Canada. /S
In general you got the concept and correct. There is more complications obviously, and you can find decent breakdown videos on you rumble and youtube. Hopefully that’s how things go, right now it is more of a push to get new trade deals across the board. China one is a bit different. Last I checked 70 countries a calling up to get new deals moving. We can’t know all the results for awhile, but Trump seems pretty serious about getting the cost of gov and budget under control. Time will tell.
The companies he is protecting also source from cheap labor in developing countries. They just want to be able to profit as the middle man and sell the same shit to us for higher prices that we can all go and buy from Temu, etc.