Trump caves again: exempts Apple iPhones, all computers and TVs made in China from tariffs

[ChloeTzang]

My tv is 3 or 4 years old which nowadays is nearly obsolete (ha)

I was going to get a new one… but since Trump chickened out again, I’ll wait.

Golden Shower Age!

Start up a company here manufacturing TV's. LOL

 

[ll74]

The black market is going to be on fire right now.....just saying!

 

[ll74]

JFC with this fuckhead. Instability is his mental default

https://www.hindustantimes.com/worl...opyURL&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=ht_site

Trump on Sunday declared that no country is ‘off the hook’ for what he called unfair trade balances, adding that no tariff exception was announced on Friday.​

 

[Rotadom]

The black market is going to be on fire right now.....just saying!

Lots of appliances will be "falling off" the back of trucks!

 

[Rotadom]

 

[MajorRewrite]

View attachment 2526973

Trump: “Don’t believe the White House! They are all liars!”

 

[Wylie3]

No wonder the Orange turd was always going bankrupt, Make a deal you can refuse then back down and the horses head would end up in his bed not the guy he was trying to intimidate.

The Art of the Deal like most losers makes money by selling books

 

[ChloeTzang]

Well as far as I can see big tech companies are temporarily off the hook but all the smal comoanies an business that import from China are still being royally screwed and will be shutting down over the next few months as they cease importing. Many of them have their money tied up in orders and shipments which they cannot now afford to take delivery of and will be forced to abandon, closing them down, causing them losses which will put them out of business and create all sorts of flow on effects becauee (a) there's no suppliers here they can switch to and (b) even if they could their money is tied up in orders from China they now cannot take deliver off and they will be going out of business....

Trump's wild vacillations and changes mean absolutey no-one can preditc what is going to happen, and the only thing to do is wait it out. No small company can afford to make investments in a situation like this.

I'll use my mom as an example - she does acupuncture and traditional chinese medicine, all her acupuncture needles are imported from China. She's just taken delivery of 2 years worth of acupuncture needles from her (US-based) supplier and another couple of years worth of disposable sheets - also imported, and a small truck load - when this started being announced the first thing she did was place an order and stock up because those prices will be going up. She cleaned out the supplier of disposable sheets, took his entire stock (he's a small business too). She won't be ordering any more until she has to - so that small business is going to see it's cash flow dry up because others are doing the same - and due to the tariff uncertainty he will have difficulties restocking because his margin is nowhere near enough to cover his costs doubling overnight - and even if he does order, shipping is going to be a challenge with everyone else's orders being cancelled or put in hold - just filling up containers and getting them shipped to the US from China will be a challenge now, so whole chunks of the supply chain will be impacted.

These absolute bozo's have no idea what they are doing. I'm afraid Trump is ensuring the GOP will be unelectable for twenty years with the absolute economic disaster he's creating. And the real problem is, even if he baks off completely, he's already done a trmendous amount of economic damage and damaged our relationships with everyone we trade with. I would have thought that was impossible, but he's managed that, as well as tanking all our military and security alliances.....if he wanted to ensure China becomes the USA's sucessor as THE world superpower, he couldn't have done better.

 

[Lance_Castro]

https://townsquare.media/site/204/files/2024/11/attachment-RISING.jpg?w=780&q=75

 

[Rotadom]

Why would any foreign firm invest in an American company or America right now? That would be bad business and investors will be pissed.

 

[RobDownSouth]

I'll use my mom as an example - she does acupuncture and traditional chinese medicine, all her acupuncture needles are imported from China. She's just taken delivery of 2 years worth of acupuncture needles from her (US-based) supplier and another couple of years worth of disposable sheets - also imported, and a small truck load - when this started being announced the first thing she did was place an order and stock up because those prices will be going up. She cleaned out the supplier of disposable sheets, took his entire stock (he's a small business too). She won't be ordering any more until she has to - so that small business is going to see it's cash flow dry up because others are doing the same - and due to the tariff uncertainty he will have difficulties restocking because his margin is nowhere near enough to cover his costs doubling overnight - and even if he does order, shipping is going to be a challenge with everyone else's orders being cancelled or put in hold - just filling up containers and getting them shipped to the US from China will be a challenge now, so whole chunks of the supply chain will be impacted.

Off-topic as hell, but I'm genuinely curious here: where did your Mom learn acupuncture and how long was her training?

I used to think of Chinese acupuncture as Asian hoodoo (akin to American chiropractic medicine...which cures cancer now, y'know?) but then I went on a seven day cruise and tweaked my neck. The cruise ship featured a spa with an acupuncturist and after two treatments I was sold.

I found an acupuncturist here in Houston, an ancient lady about 100 years old who sells these odd looking "traditional Chinese herb from gallon sized mason jars. She told me candidly once that for almost 15 years she made the majority of her sales selling ephedra bark (Ma Huang) to oil feld workers and college students for "asthma" (Ephedra bark is "Chinese Meth" and now banned. The "Ephedra" sold nowadays is Ephedra leaves, about 5% as effective). Ephedra was good if you needed to stay up all night.

I lift weights, and my acupuncturist say that makes acupuncture much less effective. Muscles too stiff to relax.

 

[Lance_Castro]

I lift weights, and my acupuncturist say that makes acupuncture much less effective. Muscles too stiff to relax.

Yet you can still flex.

Lol

 

[DeYaKen]

Here is a novel idea. Make things that other countries want to buy, at prices they can afford and see if there are still trade deficits.

 

[DeluxAuto]

 

[Fuzzy1975]

View attachment 2527789

But hey, you might get 1000 new auto manufacturing jobs....go tariffs!!!

 

[DeluxAuto]

But hey, you might get 1000 new auto manufacturing jobs....go tariffs!!!

John Oliver destroyed this round of tariffs by exposing how fucked up trump's first round was. We lost so much money and jobs compared to what we "gained."

 

[Fuzzy1975]

John Oliver destroyed this round of tariffs by exposing how fucked up trump's first round was. We lost so much money and jobs compared to what we "gained."

The US lost over 7 trillion in investment money, no way in hell Trump will ever make that back by tariffs. He's gone and fucked you guys totally!

 

[Politruk]

I'm afraid Trump is ensuring the GOP will be unelectable for twenty years with the absolute economic disaster he's creating.

Why can't Republicans just, you know, listen to economists?

 

[ChloeTzang]

Off-topic as hell, but I'm genuinely curious here: where did your Mom learn acupuncture and how long was her training?

I used to think of Chinese acupuncture as Asian hoodoo (akin to American chiropractic medicine...which cures cancer now, y'know?) but then I went on a seven day cruise and tweaked my neck. The cruise ship featured a spa with an acupuncturist and after two treatments I was sold.

I found an acupuncturist here in Houston, an ancient lady about 100 years old who sells these odd looking "traditional Chinese herb from gallon sized mason jars. She told me candidly once that for almost 15 years she made the majority of her sales selling ephedra bark (Ma Huang) to oil feld workers and college students for "asthma" (Ephedra bark is "Chinese Meth" and now banned. The "Ephedra" sold nowadays is Ephedra leaves, about 5% as effective). Ephedra was good if you needed to stay up all night.

I lift weights, and my acupuncturist say that makes acupuncture much less effective. Muscles too stiff to relax.

LOL. Sounds like you found a good one.

Okay, totally off topic. After university, she worked in IT for a couple of years and then went to a Traditional Chinese Medicine school in San Francisco (we have family on mom's side there), she spent 5 years doing her Dr of TCM studies, exams and certification and also all the hands on training - it's very hands on. Almost all her teachers were TCM doctors from China who'd moved here. After that she actually worked part time and taught part-time at the same school - running student acupuncture clinics and teaching chinese herbal medicine. It sounds about as tough as a medical dr's course - but different emphasis. A lot of the best text books are in Chinese, and there are a lot of them in Chinese that you just don't get in English at all - my mom speaks and reads Chinese so that really helps - she said the students that didn't know Chinese had it a lot harder and missed a lot. There are all sorts of techniques in chinese texts that you never see in English. And chinese medicine is a combo - acupuncture, acupressure, tuina massage, cupping, moxibustion, herbal medicine, chinese nutritional medicine - it all works together and acupuncture is really only one facet of it. To apply it proper;y, you really need to know it all, and it's unique to each patient, so a technique that works for one person may be useless on another.

Which is why physio's and nauropaths and other people using acupuncture by rote after a week or two's training is just a joke. They have no idea what they are doing or why. Same with massage therapists. Most people don't know it but "Swedish massage, which originated with Dr. Pehr Henrik Ling, who is considered "father of Western massage therapy" was developed from the techniques Ling was taught by a Chinese Medical Dr in the early 19th century - and is based on Tuina Massage, but without the knowledge of the underlying chinese medical theory behind the massage techniques. Swedish Massage is basically Tuina Massage by rote, without an understanding of the underlying medical theory - and in China, Tuina is combined with other treatment modalities for an inclusive treatment plan. And Tuina Massage is far more effective.

Anyhow, my mom has the most amazing collection of chinese herbs in - yes - those big glass jars LOL - I grew up with that smell - love it - and I used to scare my friends with some of the ingredients, like dried lizards and scorpions and snakes and things LOL. She has big jars of chinese spirits with things I don't want to know about steeping in them. Eeeeeeeeewwwwwww. But she knows her stuff, she makes chinese herbal medicine - it's really tailor made for each person so you absolutely have to know yout herbs as well as the chinese medical diagnosis - there's a LOT of TCM dr's that don't / aren't that good. Nw my mom's a bit hmmmm I was going to say weird, but she knows more western medicine than most Dr's, and she also does things like Bioenergetic Testing, which again, is based on chinese medical theory and acupuncture points and it's quite effective for diagnosis - when you know what you're doing. She gets referrals from western medical Dr's and vice versa - it's very complementary to western medicine in many ways.

And for things like pain relief and your neck, it can be amazingly effective. When I lived at home I used to train really hard at taekwondo and acupuncture always used to speed up the recovery time from hard training sessions - but you don't want tight muscles when those needles go in so a good massage first really helps - altho my mom's Tuina massages can be really painful!!!!!

 

[ChloeTzang]

Another OMG moment. Trump has paralyzed the diamond industry and brought an $82 billion trade to a grinding halt.

Deliveries through the gem trading center of Antwerp have dropped to about one-seventh of normal levels, the Financial Times reports. According to Karen Rentmeesters, CEO of the Antwerp Diamond Center, diamond shipments from Antwerp, one of the world's busiest gem trading centers alongside Dubai, have stalled since Trump announced new global tariffs this month. Rentmeisters estimated that daily shipments were only one-seventh of normal levels. She said this is devastating the industry, and added that everything has stopped. An ordinary diamond travels around the world many times before it ends up in the hands of a buyer, between producing countries such as Botswana, trading centers including Dubai, and cutting centers in India. The only part of the supply chain that is located in the United States is the certification process. The world's largest certifying agency, the Gemological Institute of America, is located in California and employs 3,200 people.

The normal process of transporting diamonds to and from the US for certification is now under threat.

India, whose large polished diamond industry processes over 90% of the world's diamonds, could be particularly hard hit. Since processed diamonds are considered to be originating from the country where they were cut, India's multi-billion-dollar diamond export industry will be affected by the 27% tariff proposed by the US on Indian goods, unless the two countries reach a tariff avoidance agreement.

The impact won't be on jewellery so much as on industrial users of diamonds - and that could impact all sorts of industries.

Trump literally has no idea what he is doing or what the ramifications are. I'd never realized how the diamond industry works, but this could really bring be an industrial bottleneck unless it's resolved. Personally, I suspect what will happen is certifying will rapidly be switched elsewhere and a few thousand people in Caifornia will shortly be out of work. And the cost of industrial diamonds in the USA will jump. Because I doubt Trump has even thought of tariff avoidance agreememts with India on diamonds and these things can take years to negotiate.

You know, he's going to cause such economic chaos that Congress is going to have to bite the bullet and remove him. This is getting so fucked up it may be impossible to unravel the mess.

https://www.msn.com/en-ca/money/top...S&cvid=0eb46f12d006425e94803809cf07ff1b&ei=17

 

[ChloeTzang]

If Chinese-built containership fines take effect, 'we're out of business in U.S.,' ocean carrier says​

Atlantic Container Line, an ocean carrier which handles large industrial items including the wings for Airbus planes, says it will be forced to abandon the U.S. market if the government follows through on threats to fine Chinese-built shipping vessels. Its CEO Andrew Abbott tells CNBC that freight rates will head back to Covid surge levels and there will be no economic rationale to continue to operate as a niche freight company within the U.S. “This hits American exporters and importers worse than anybody else,” says Abbott. “If this happens ... we’re going to have to shut down.”

If ACL abandoned the U.S. market, domestic manufacturers would lose their only U.S.-headquartered North Atlantic carrier, and primary North Atlantic carrier of oversized and project cargo to Europe. ACL handles vehicles, construction equipment, aircraft including Airbus wings, and project cargo, including more than half of the American construction equipment, agricultural equipment and oversized machinery moving from the ports of New York, Baltimore and Norfolk to Europe. “All the Airbus wings are made here in the U.S. and we carry those to the UK,” Abbott told CNBC. “If we disappear, you’d have to find another brake bulk ship.”

President Trump said in his recent speech to Congress that his administration will create a special office dedicated to shipbuilding and offer tax incentives for domestic manufacturing. Abbott says the current reality in the U.S. shipbuilding industry is one of the forces leaving ACL reliant on China. “The only reason why I use the Chinese is because when we went to the American yards, they told me they couldn’t build a ship for seven years. ... The shipyards that we were talking to were booked up with military. They didn’t have any space to build a commercial ship. If you’re getting $2.5 billion for a destroyer, why are you going to mess around with a $75 million-$80 million cargo ship? It wouldn’t make any sense.”

Major ocean carriers are making plans to work around the fines if the U.S. government enacts them, with significant consequences for some U.S. ports.

More genius moves from US politicians.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/27/if-...were-out-of-business-in-us-carrier-warns.html

 

[ChloeTzang]

The Good News Keeps Coming: Cargo ship cancellations cause concern at largest container port in the US​

Long-threatened tariffs from U.S. President Donald Trump are escalating concerns of job losses at the nation’s ports. The Port of Long Beach in Southern California expects a 20% volume reduction this year if the tariffs continue as planned, worrying officials and seafarers alike. (AP Video: Eugene Garcia). They're looking at major job losses as a result.

17 canceled sailings already, and consequences like job losses. Not just port workers bur seamen as well. Container ships that were heading for the USA are being turned around and going back.

https://apnews.com/video/cargo-ship...rt-in-the-us-47a1a9ece5134871b1972ea3795fca89

 

[MajorRewrite]

So many unintended consequences. Thanks for sharing.

 

[ChloeTzang]

So many unintended consequences. Thanks for sharing.

I know. International trade is really complex and nobody in the Trump Maladministration seems to understand the ramifications of Trump's blanket applications of tariffs. Judicious renegotiation of tariffs and onshoring of strategic industries in a planned manner has a place, but what Trump is doing is rank insanity. Until this came up and I started seeing all the news articles I had no idea of all the flow-ons - unless these tariffs are straight out cancelled and Trump does a "mea culpa, I'm a fuckwit and I fucked up badly" - which we all know is impossible because he's a genius - then we're heading for a stupendous economic mess.

I don't think too many American voters are as yet aware of the coming shitstorm heading our way.

 

[Wylie3]

Remember like all property developers they go boom & bust, Trumps just doing it with the American economy and you idiots voted for him.