(April 3, 2025 at 8:58 pm)Fake Messiah Wrote: 22 weeks apart.



The Economist Op-Ed: "Donald Trump has committed the most profound, harmful and unnecessary economic error in the modern era. Almost everything he said - on history, economics and the technicalities of trade - was utterly deluded."

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Trump’s new tariff math looks a lot like ChatGPT’s

Economist James Surowiecki quickly reverse-engineered a possible explanation for the tariff pricing. He found you could recreate each of the White House’s numbers by simply taking a given country’s trade deficit with the US and dividing it by their total exports to the US. Halve that number, and you get a ready-to-use “discounted reciprocal tariff.” The White House objected to this claim and published the formula it says that it used, but as Politico points out, the formula looks like a dressed-up version of Surowiecki’s method.

In case you weren’t sure, Surowiecki calls this approach “extraordinary nonsense.” So why did Trump’s team use it? Well, like plenty of people who’ve realized their homework is due in three hours’ time, it seems like they may have been tempted by AI.

A number of X users have realized that if you ask ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, or Grok for an “easy” way to solve trade deficits and put the US on “an even playing field”, they’ll give you a version of this “deficit divided by exports” formula with remarkable consistency.

https://www.theverge.com/news/642620/tru...laude-grok

So the more stuff we buy from a country, the more we increase taxes on ourselves for buying their stuff. Maybe that's why that little country on a mountain in the middle of South Africa is getting tariffed at 50%.

Have the penguins responded with tariffs on the USA?

Based on what stocks and prices on household goods are doing, these tariffs might be the best chance to get Trump out of office. Or, at the least, rein him in.

Boru

It's funny listening to Maga on X still believing the dream. On the upside, the revenue generated by a tax on Americans will somewhat offset the 2017 tax cut extension. But revenue as a whole will likely sink due to reduced spending and reduced collection due to IRS cuts.

I don't believe the ChatGPT story. I think Trump used a magic 8 ball instead.

(April 4, 2025 at 11:13 am)Angrboda Wrote: It's funny listening to Maga on X still believing the dream.  On the upside, the revenue generated by a tax on Americans will somewhat offset the 2017 tax cut extension.  But revenue as a whole will likely sink due to reduced spending and reduced collection due to IRS cuts.

The tariffs are a lose-lose situation. If they work like they’re supposed to - shoring up US companies - you won’t get the tariff revenue. If they fail - by other countries seeking new markets and reducing or eliminating exports to the US - you won’t get the tariff revenue (or at least not as much.

In either scenario, American consumers are going to be hit with increased costs for everyday items.

Boru

It will take time for those things to happen. In the meantime, they will generate revenue.

The craziest part is how the tariffs themselves have absolutely nothing to do with what is actually causing the trade imbalances. In that frame of reference, they're essentially random.

(April 4, 2025 at 11:38 am)Angrboda Wrote: It will take time for those things to happen.  In the meantime, they will generate revenue.

Fair point.

Boru

(April 4, 2025 at 11:38 am)Angrboda Wrote: It will take time for those things to happen.  In the meantime, they will generate revenue.

Sure, on the backs of working people to support tax cuts for billionaires.