Major price shocks do not cool down consumerism unfortunately. The culture doesn’t respond to economic swings that way. People just suffer.

Extremely well put. The individualism really is weird and terrible. The main character syndrome is part of what takes away the agency, I think… Like, we need to hear The Call To Adventure. We need The Plot to show up at our fucking house. We need to be The Person that Does The Thing in the Room Where It Happens. The Founding Father. It’s all or nothing. Either the thing we personally do somehow fixes the country, or we don’t do it at all.

Maybe we imagine that we can be the hero and shoot the bad guy and save the day. But we can’t imagine, like, Fixing Things. Deciding what the future holds. What would that even look like? Boldly waving a parchment in the air? When would everybody cheer for me in particular?

No, it doesn’t look like an individual. It looks like a crowd. It looks like people, outside, angry. I hope enough people see that in time.

Cheers to Good Trouble.

I know Trump is dumb. I know his administration is dumb. I still can’t fathom that someone is this stupid.

Oh but it can get more stupid, don’t you worry. The following is a quote from Trump’s Trade Representative, where they describe how the tariffs were calculated:

The recent experience with U.S. tariffs on China has demonstrated that tariff passthrough to retail prices was low (Cavallo et al, 2021).*

What is this recent experience that the Trump administration learned from, you ask? Cavallo et al studied the impact of Trump’s tariff on China in 2018! What else did they find?

US profit margins decreased on both imports AND exports as a result of the tariffs, while China’s was much less affected. The paper clearly shows American tariffs hurt Americans more than literally anyone else, and the Trump Administration “read” that paper and publically cited it as a source on a government website.

Our analyses indicate that the price incidence of US import tariffs falls largely on the United States… Our results suggest that retailers are absorbing a significant share of the increase in the cost of affected imports by earning lower profit margins on those goods… [These analyses reveal] that the recent tariffs applied by foreign governments on US exports have affected total foreign import prices far less than was the case for the recent US tariffs

*Please note while prices remained stable in response to that one tariff, Cavallo did not suggest it was a generalizable fact. It’s not.

TL;DR:

• Research shows Trump’s 2018 tariff hurt US importers’ profit margins more than anyone else. They paid the cost (that time) to keep prices stable.
• It also shows China’s reciprocal tariffs hurt US exporters much more than it hurt China’s importers.
• The Trump administration legitimized this research when they cited it in their flawed reasoning that domestic prices always remain stable after tariffs (they don’t)

Thank you for the insightful contribution ‘PM_Your_Nudes_Please’!

Really though, you have my sympathies and you’re absolutely right. Of course tragedies and disabilities can break up marriages. It doesn’t necessarily mean that either spouse did anything wrong.

Anything that changes a person can change a relationship, and anything that changes a relationship can end the relationship.

Don’t sit and wait for better opportunities. Fuck the lists. Band together for some of Booker and Lewis’ Good Trouble. Get out on the streets. There are millions of people who are just as upset as you are, and every voice added to the crowd multiplies the reach.

Most of them are so isolated that chaos in the streets really wouldn’t change their lives or opinions

Emphasis mine. This has been said about every single ruling class ever. It has been proven wrong many times. The wealthy are afraid of the lower classes. Their lives depend on the status quo, and their lives change when the status quo changes. Otherwise they wouldn’t press so goddamn hard on the boot.

Except that this 4D chess move is not going to make the wealthy a fortune. Dismantling the global economy will only hurt, everyone, in the long-term. Including billionaires’ profits. Just the threat of tariffs is enough to do that damage. Whatever short-term gains anyone might make on a market dip are going to be completely washed out by the long-term losses of destabilizing international trade on a whim.

Even if it is “according to plan”, it’s a stupid fucking plan, and it won’t work.

He should just flashback to the first segment, “apologize” for taking it out of context, and quote the Dr’s “context” while holding a rusty canoe and waving his eyebrows suggestively at the camera

Seems like a formatting thing, thanks. I’ll stick to just inline hyperlinks instead of footnotes I think

This is nonsense that gets spread way too often. The wealthy benefited from Covid, but they did not benefit from the Great Depression. Billionaires are shortsighted hoarders who can’t help but screw themselves over in their race to the top end. They really are so fucking stupid and greedy that they will crash the economy by accident, AGAIN.

Plenty of people supported Coolidge and Hoover until they felt it in their wallets. This is going to hurt, for everyone, and it will provide opportunities to change minds. Not just the minds of Trump supporters, but the minds of everyone who thinks there’s no point fighting. We have a lot of common ground opening up beneath our feet.

This is a terrible mistake for them to make. The Republican party has made this mistake before. It lead to the New Deal. History sure is rhyming, and things aren’t playing out quite the same, but we have a chance - however small it is - to take advantage of their mistake again, and turn things around.

The evidence that Trump’s Administration themselves cited in their official explanation of their tariff “calculations” (trade deficit / imports) flat out states that when the US tries to tariff other countries:

1. American importers pay for the US tariff AND
2. American exporters pay for the foreign retaliatory tariffs.

The source (Cavallo et al, 2021) clearly demonstrates that American tariffs are paid directly by Americans in both directions, meaning out of everyone on Earth, US tariffs screw the US the most. Trump’s administration legitimized the source by citing that research for its calculations on the tariff rates.

The Trade Representative’s explanation freely admits that the stupid parameters were chosen more or less arbitrarily, and they cited the paper to justify their position on tariff price throughput but conveniently didn’t list it in their “References” section.

Our analyses indicate that the price incidence of US import tariffs falls largely on the United States… Our results suggest that retailers are absorbing a significant share of the increase in the cost of affected imports by earning lower profit margins on those goods… [These analyses reveal] that the recent tariffs applied by foreign governments on US exports have affected total foreign import prices far less than was the case for the recent US tariffs

The meme is referencing the official US Trade Representative’s explanation¹ of the tariffs, where yes, the math really is as stupid as it seems, but it gets worse.

The research that Trump’s team used to determine that “calculation” flat out states that when the US tries to tariff other countries:

1. American importers pay for the US tariff AND
2. American exporters pay for the foreign retaliatory tariffs.

The source clearly demonstrates that American tariffs are paid directly by Americans in both directions, meaning out of everyone on Earth the tariffs screw the US the most. Trump’s administration legitimized the source by citing that research for its calculations on the tariff rates.

The explanation freely admits that the stupid parameters were chosen more or less arbitrarily, and they cited the paper (Cavallo et al 2021)² but conveniently didn’t list it in their “References” section.

Our analyses indicate that the price incidence of US import tariffs falls largely on the United States… Our results suggest that retailers are absorbing a significant share of the increase in the cost of affected imports by earning lower profit margins on those goods… [These analyses reveal] that the recent tariffs applied by foreign governments on US exports have affected total foreign import prices far less than was the case for the recent US tariffs

_{1 https://web.archive.org/web/20250403013314/https://ustr.gov/issue-areas/reciprocal-tariff-calculations}

_{2 https://www.nber.org/papers/w26396}

He said for us to go out and cause some good trouble. Necessary trouble to redeem the soul of our nation. I want you to redeem the dream. Let’s be bold in America, not demean and degrade Americans. Not divide us against each other. […] This is a moral moment. It’s not left or right, it’s right or wrong. Let’s get in good trouble. My friends, Madame President, I yield the floor.

Don’t let anyone, anyone, pretend that this was business as usual. Senator Booker came out and gave people what they’ve been asking for - a call to action. This isn’t empty democrat promises, this isn’t “both sides” bullshit. This was a United States Senator telling the public that shit has hit the fan, and that politics isn’t enough anymore.

Fuck the apathy. Fuck the doomerism. This wasn’t business as usual, this won’t be business as usual. Listen to what the man had to say. Get together. Trouble is coming whether we like it or not. May as well make it good trouble.

This is really not true. The wealthy aren’t playing 4D chess with the economy, they are just as short-sighted behind closed doors. The Great Depression fucked a lot of wealthy people up and turned the entire nation against them. It can happen again.

Edit - and for the record, the abundance does vanish in a depression scenario. Factories shut down, productivity collapses. The world will literally extract, refine, process, and build less of everything. You can’t build a fleet of yachts without a functioning economy.

The Roaring Twenties (1920s) was a time of wild economic growth and insane deregulation. Coolidge and Hoover caused the Great Depression by dismantling the government’s ability to regulate commerce and by raising tariffs to an insane level. America enjoyed a brief Gilded Age for the wealthy that caused a global economic collapse.

The reason Bank of America and Merrill Lynch have to operate as two separate entities is because of the Glass-Steagal act, enacted in response to the Great Depression, which split up commercial and investment banking to stop them from making the same mistakes again.

Like almost every other economic downturn, the Great Depression was caused in large part by laissez faire capitalism. Unregulated banks were gambling with too much of their customer’s money by making extremely risky investments in the stock market and agriculture (in 2008 it would be risky investments in sub-prime mortgages).

The tariffs were temporarily successful at isolating and enforcing american industry (note that the domestic industry was still strong enough to benefit, unlike now). But the Banks’ speculation bubble collapsed in the Wall Street Crash of 1929, and since commercial and investment banking were still intertwined, it wasn’t just people losing the vaue of their stock portfolios - the banks were gambling with the money in their customers’ savings accounts.

Once people realize that the bank doesn’t have the funds to cover all of its accounts, that starts a run on the banks. Without the FDIC to insure your savings, when your bank goes bankrupt, you go bankrupt. The Great Depression begins in full.

Those same tarrifs prevent any relief or recovery from overseas. US citizens couldn’t afford to live. They couldn’t afford to buy domestic goods made down the street or heavily tariffed imports. Even when tariffs were pulled back it took time for supply chains to be rebuilt.

Reciprocal tariffs from overseas craters international demand for US goods, and suddenly US citizens couldn’t afford US products either. No customers, no money. Factories begin to close with no available replacements in the supply chain.

Domestic agriculture and industry collapsed, at a time when there was (intentionally) very little trade with other nations. Americans suffer, starve, and die. Tension builds, eviction standoffs begin, and homeless populations assemble by the thousands in “Hoovervilles” - shanty towns that looked very similar to the living conditions in Gaza pre October 7th.

Without constant planting, irrigation, and harvest, and with the long-term damage done by unregulated agriculture, Middle America becomes the Dust Bowl. It takes less than 5 years for the landscape to transform, and dust storms hit Washington DC in 1935.

90 years ago. 1935. You probably know someone that old. There are about a million Americans alive today who were born at a time when over a million Americans were homeless, many living in refugee camps in the new American Desert. There were cars, and airplanes, and CRT TV’s, and American children starving by the tens of thousands.

All of it started because a Republican President let corporations gamble recklessly without oversight while “protecting” American industry with extreme tariffs that cut the nation off completely from the global economic network.

Trump dismantles regulatory and social support agencies and enacts tariffs on a level we haven’t seen since Coolidge and Hoover caused the Great Depression

The collapse is going to be the democrats fault

Keep on keepin’ on my friend

Edit - whoosh? You’re saying it’ll be blamed on the democrats I think? Either way I don’t think it’ll be that easy this time. They fucked up too much stuff too fast, all while obviously in complete control. ‘Oft evil will shall evil mar’ and all that.

As terrible as this is and will be, I have hope we can change a lot of minds. Social security started from the ashes of the great depression. It can be done again.

1920’s 2: electric boogaloo. Good luck everyone. Wish it didn’t have to be this way. Do what you can to prepare your families and your communities, because this is going to hurt.

If we get the chance in the 1930s, let’s make sure we pull an FDR and not a Hitler, please?

My experience says that I don’t have the money to pay for everyone who won’t be able to pay me back. So I’ll pay for the things I need and use, and let everyone else do the same.

You quite literally pay for everyone when you pay private health insurance anyway. The math works out that either you are unfortunate enough to need care and everyone else pays for you, or you don’t need extensive care and you pay for people that need it more. This is the same for privately funded or publicly funded healthcare.

The difference is that under the private healthcare system you also pay a whole bunch of salesmen, managers, investors, and executives, who can choose to delay or deny your care based on their professional medical opinion parasitic whim. Oh, and you also pay into all the super PACs and marketing agencies that reinforce the myth that the system is currently working for anyone.

The move, the department has said, is expected to save $1.8 billion from the agency’s $1.7 trillion annual budget — about one-tenth of 1%.

This story has been corrected to show the savings is about one-tenth of 1%, not about 1%.

Good stuff AP, fixing their mistake and lampshading the idea that this has anything to do with budget.

Dismantling the Department of Health for a savings of ~0.1% will surely help all of the people suffering in debt or without treatment from the American healthcare system.

If you’re a federal worker, please, do your best to force them to walk you out the door. Work together. If we get real lucky and things turn around, many of you will have one hell of a class action lawsuit on your hands. Talk to lawyers. Sue for wrongful termination, discrimination, etc.

Everyone else, but especially healthcare workers - talk to your unions and associations! If you don’t have one, join or start one! Show up to the meetings! Doctors, nurses, aides, many of you are already organized around your shared interests. Take advantage of that.

The system was broken from the start but it took a beating during the pandemic. Many of you have seen how things have gotten worse than they were.

With leadership like this, it’s only downhill. Less staff and support. More desperate, angry, or misinformed patients. ICE agents on the unit, police interrogating miscarriage survivors and OBGYN staff, medication and supply shortages even if we don’t see a second pandemic.

Talk to each other, talk to your reps and your leaders and your politicians. Stay safe and stay strong.