by Julianne Malveaux,
<TriceEdneyWire.com> — Because I lack a degree in psychology or pathology, I cannot speculate about the motives of the 47th president who, on March 4, embarked on a tariff war with our neighbors and closest allies, Mexico and Canada. But I can emphatically say that the 47th president’s actions will hurt American consumers. The president who promised to lower prices and reduce inflation has taken actions that will increase prices and increase inflation. By inflicting tariffs on our major trading partners (and neighbors), he has aggressively ignited a destructive trade war.
Why? Part of me is tempted to ask whether the 47th president is really a Putin plant. Is he bound and determined to blow our country, our political and economic relationships, and the world as we know it? To what end, or is his disruptive behavior just a manifestation of his narcissism. For the 47th president everything is personal. He attempted to humiliate Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, with an unseemly and undiplomatic shouting match in the ‘House that Enslaved People Built’ (also known by the racially myopic as the White House). Zelenskyy pushed back and the 47th president has paused aid to Ukraine in retaliation.
It’s retaliation all around. There is a witch hunt against the federal agencies that the current president opposes, including the National Labor Relations Board, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and many others. The purchased co-President Elon Musk, with his attitude and oversize chain saw, has no limits, or at least none that the 47th president will impose. And while most economists cringe at his economic policies, he is hell-bent at making a disruptive set of points about tariffs.
Imposing 25% tariffs on goods coming from Canada (and 20% plus from China) hits low-income consumers where they spend, especially because many lower cost goods come from China. Canada and China have imposed retaliatory tariffs as soon as the U.S. imposed theirs. Mexico says it will announce its own retaliatory tariffs on March 9. All these tariffs do is increase the cost of imported goods. So, a car manufactured in Mexico that once cost $30,000 will now cost about $37,500. That’s inflationary. Whoever buys the car at $37,500 will normally mark it up, and they might absorb some of the costs or pass them all along to the consumer. Inflationary. The price hikes may drive consumers to lower priced cars that are manufactured here, but manufacturing is international. Auto parts come from everywhere. Our markets are international, something the current president seems to have forgotten.
I’m talking cars, but what about produce? Fruits like strawberries, blueberries and avocados are imported from Mexico. Energy products are imported from Canada. While this will hit consumers hard, the 47th president doesn’t seem to care. This is an inflationary tax increase, short and simple. The consumers who will pay are those on the bottom. A 10 or 15 cent increase on a pint of strawberries won’t hurt the oligarchs, but it will hurt those at the bottom who are stretching their pennies. And with government layoffs looming, many of those at the bottom, not the administrators and leaders, but the clerical workers and janitors, are the ones most affected.
The tariff wars will have a negative effect on the U.S. economy, courtesy of the president who said he would bring prices down. Senate Majority Leader John Tronee (R-S.D.) says he doesn’t mind paying more if it the “temporary” tariffs are a means to an end. But what is the end? The destruction of our nation as we know it? The yielding of world leadership to Russia, China, or BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa)? The United States taking second fiddle to the European Union?
With our country playing the isolation game, those at the bottom are most acutely hurt. By tariffs, by layoffs and, at the end of the day, by a despot whose narcissistic tendencies oppress people all over the world.
(Dr. Julianne Malveaux is an economist and author based in Washington, D.C. Visit <Juliannemalveaux.com>.)
