the *DON* JONES INDEX…
http://donjonesindex.com/title http://donjonesindex.com/dji.250403.htm http://donjonesindex.com/dji.250410.htm	GAINS POSTED in GREEN LOSSES POSTED in RED 4/10/25... 14,673.02 4/3/25... 14,702.64 6/27/13... 15,000.00
*(THE DOW* JONES INDEX: 4/17/25... 3@; 4/10/25... 37,625.31; 6/27/13… 15,000.00)**

LESSON for APRIL 17th, 2025 – “OF TARIFFS and TAXES”

Tuesday was Tax Day.

Well, maybe not for some. For reasons potent or petty, the Internal Revenue Service – acceding to the wishes and the whims of the weather, the President and, one presumes, God, five states enjoyed another two weeks’ leisure to pick up the damages from Helene and Milton, tote up their earnings for 2024, and send the results (and, if applicable, their money) in to Washington.

Taxation is almost as ancient as civilization. Today’s tax codes are extensive and ever-changing, but many of the basic tax types governments depend on today, including sales taxes, excise taxes, and property taxes, have been around since early civilization.

A concise history of the gumment levies dates back about 5,000 years ago, to ancient Egypt, where... according to a brief history by taxfoundation.org (Attachment One), the Pharaoh collected a tax equivalent to 20 percent of all grain harvests. Later, the Greeks were responsible for taking the idea of taxation and spreading it throughout the developed world, as they expanded their realm and civilization evolved.

Julius Caesar was first to implement a sales tax: “a 1 percent flat rate that was applied across the entire Empire. Under Caesar Augustus, the sales tax was 4 percent, closer to a rate we see today in many U.S. state sales taxes.” Augustus also imposed a direct taxation system that resembled an income tax. “This began as a direct tax on an individual’s wealth,” but when proven difficult to execute, the income tax replaced that collection. Rome was also the pioneer in imposing inheritance, or death, taxes

Originally, property taxes were levied in Egypt, Persia, and China based on the production value of the land, or how much the plot was expected to yield in goods, and so, therefore, “were typically paid by farmers.” Property taxes continued in Medieval Europe under William the Conqueror in England. ”Famously, Lady Godiva rode a horse through the streets naked in protest of the property tax rate her husband was forced to pay.”

Tariffs also date back to the 3000s BCE “on trade of metal and wool between the ancient city of Kanesh in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) and Assyria (in modern-day Iraq).” The Roman Empire adopted them and were, thereafter, imposed to control the trade of certain goods like wool, leather, butter, cheese, and more.

Taxes, our history and educators... most of them, largely contend... are the price Americans pay for living in a nation where freedom is charisted, justice is practiced and opportunity is ever knocking at the door. American colonies levied “property taxes, excise taxes, poll taxes, and some early forms of income taxes”, though tax rates and burdens were far less than their counterparts in Great Britain and the Crown, consequently struck out against their colonies by taxing sugar, printed materials and, in 1767, the the tax on tea “that led to the Boston Tea Party.”

After the war for independence, tariffs were “the original pipeline of tax revenue for the U.S. government, including the “Tariff of Abominations” in 1828, which increased tensions between the North and South leading up to the Civil War,” after which industrialization, emabled the nativist dream of exports becoming more common than imports. The result was a foreign version of Old World Only, causing revenues to decline. “In 1913, as a result of declining tariff revenues and as part of a political push to shift tax burdens onto the wealthy and limit the excesses of the Golden Age, the 16^th Amendment was ratified, allowing for federal taxes to be levied on individual and business incomes.

“The World Wars led to the expansion of the federal income tax to boost the national budget and further increase progressivity in the federal tax code. Today, the income tax is the top stream of government revenue.”

The postwar consumption craze engendered decades of deficit spending - but when the party stops, voters... at least in the (small “d”) democratic countries... tend to cut off the music or even shoot the jukebox.

Prior to November, 2024, bakertilly.com (investment advisors and @ ) issued a report contending that the United State was facing a pivotal fiscal cliff next year, as numerous Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017 provisions affecting individuals, estates and pass-through entities will sunset at the end of 2025, resulting in increased tax burdens for the majority of taxpayers (ATTACHMENT TWO) creating instability and resentment.

Two months before the election, bakertilley issued another report on the state of the state and the state of Americans’ money and their findings – atop the other burdens falling atop the Democratic Party were predicted to determine the outcome of the contest, and the country.

Dividing and comparing the tax policy promises and platforms of the competing parties, bakertilley.org opined that the G.O.P. supported “making the temporary TCJA provisions permanent” while President and candidate Biden and his replacement, Kamala Harris promised to roll them back for taxpayers making over $400,000. bakertilley.org further broke down the economic issues into specifics – summarizing the party platforms as follows...

Business tax

“The largest difference in the Republican and Democratic business tax policy platform (was) the proposed corporate tax rate.” Republicans, then as now, campaigned on maintaining or even decreasing the current 21% corporate rate, “while Democrats would like to see an increase to 28%, which is still well below the pre-TCJA 35% rate.”

(See charts and graphs as ATTACHMENT THREE, 9/4/24)

Individual tax

Republicans also promised to make all of the expiring individual provisions permanent. Harris, the replacement nominee by then, campaigned on the Biden pledge to the under-$400,000 taxpayers plus an array for further sock-its like “the expansion of the net investment income tax and/or a wealth tax for ultra-high-net-worth taxpayers.”

Trust, estate and gift taxes

“The estate tax exemption (was) the primary focus in this area.” Republicans proposed that $10 million exemption per taxpayer, indexed for inflation; (13.61 million for 2024) extended or the entire estate tax repealed. Democrats wanted these made “more restrictive”.

Other policies were compared, although neither party had much to say about tariffs at the time – Trump, according to his previously stated views, promising to “implement a 10% to 20% tariff on all imports and a 60% tariff on Chinese imports.” Harris focused on increasing the corporate tax rate.

Both expressed support for the popular proposal to eliminate taxes on tips and gratuities.

After four years of Sad Old Joe, plague, wars and inflaton, Americans rose up on their hind legs last November; growled, and voted to bring back Donald Trump, the President they’d rejected four years earlier. This time around, a more experienced, wilier coyote could point to the twenty twenties with a grin and a grimace – the latter reflecting upon Biden and his legacies: plague and war, higher prices everywhere and fear and respect for the American eagle plummeting.

Two days after D-Day another financial corporation, Fidelity.com, issued its own autopsy on the Biden-Harris campaign and the restoration of Ol’ 45... now New ’47. (November 6^th, ATTACHMENT FOUR) and surmised that President-elect Donald Trump’s Republican victory (including control... however narrow... of the House and Senate) could “give him the upper hand in driving his agenda through Congress.”

Trump expressed support “for lowering corporate taxes to 15% from their current 21% rate” while the Democrats had wanted this raised.

On the other, left or populist hand, incoming Veep Vance expressed support for increasing the Child Tax Credit to $5,000 per little American, Trump proposed tax credits for “family caregivers taking care of a parent or loved one” (although nothing for retired or low-income below the poverty line or dependent on Social Security, Medicare and/or Medicaid... now all rumoured to be on the chopping block).

A week after Trump 2.0 took office U.S. News and World Report author Jorge Guajardo cited unnamed polls by “our” pollsters that recommended lowering the corporate tax rates “because it brings businesses and jobs back to the United States” rather than locating them overseas to avoid the U.S. government taking such a large cut and a full 61% of those polled said “spending cuts are necessary and worthwhile to lock in the 2017 tax cuts.” (Jan 28^th, ATTACHMENT5)

And now we are nearly one fiscal quarter into that New American Order wherein another Cato-mite, Kimberly Clausing, toiling for U.S. News, argued that the public perception of wasted federal spending “shows a clear openness to making hard fiscal trade-offs. Even liberal voters acknowledge the need for spending restraint, with Democratic poll respondents stating they'd willingly cut about a third of federal expenditures to achieve greater fiscal responsibility,” no matter Democrats said it would mean hungry children, a lessening of American influence among our economic and military allies and as the liberals over there at GUK and IUK contend and the homegrown tax and spenders in Washington screeched, a neglected, eventually collapsing infrastructure.

“Many know that preserving our financial future means drastically shrinking the size and scope of government. Two-thirds of voters correctly conclude that cutting spending strengthens rather than hurts the economy, rejecting the Washington tax-and-spend orthodoxy. U.S. News’ Clausing cited Cato’s polling (Jan. 8^th, ATTACHMENT SIX)

Congress, with Speaker Mike in control and, as Democrats charge, cravenly beholden to Djonald UnContested, is disposed to do what it always does; meddle with the status quo and legislate improvements that usually consist of improvements for some, corrosion for others. In the case of MAGA... perversely – according to liberals, Democrats and liberal Democrats – it was the economic pains and aims of the lower middle class that pushed Ol’ 45 back over the top again, making him our New 47.

The Republican base, in 2024, had not, for the most part... gone to elite universities like Harvard (also on the President’s hit list, albeit for other reasons), many had had no education further than high school, if that. Many worked with their hands and made things that the businesspeople sold to other Americans and paid them workman’s wages that they paid out for food, shelter, some diversions of a limited nature, some savings for retirement or their children – if they were fortunate – for the American necessities of the time like a car, a television, maybe an iPhone or computer with Internet access and... often... a gun.

They had watched and felt their prospects declining through the Joe years – years when bad bugs from China (as they were told) killed their families and empowered government regulators as made them wear masks, like outlaws, and get stuck with needles bearing what they were told would be cures and preventions, but might also be vaccines that might contain other diseases to make them sicker or stupider, maybe nanoparticles to follow them around or turn, perhaps, to perverted practices that Democratic elits performed or, if not at least condoned.

Their betters told them that they were no better than the “peasants” that J. D. Vance saw in the Chinese, spat in the face of their God and took away their taxes to give to the bottom class of beggars and bums and criminals – the migrants from dark and dirty places swarming, like the cockroaches in Robert DeNiro and Danny Trejo’s “Machete” movie, over our borders to despoil and derail the American dream.

Squeezed from above and below, they united behind the promise of Making America Great Again and threw both the bums and the betters back into the swamps from whence they had crawled.

To the Marxist madmen of the left, they responded to allegations of inquality with affirmations of acknowledging their subservience – so long as movers and shakers of politics, economics and culture made things – things they needed or, at least, desired – and if some of them appeared to be making nothing other than money... well, it was only proof that they were better and smarter and more favored by God, so they stilled their doubts and chanted along with their Master: “God bless America! God keep us safe!”

To the extent that it protected them and gave them dreams to sleep upon of a night, these Americans... mostly Republicans, although more than a few had been born to parents or raised by grandparents who’d lived through depression and war and had pulled the lever for FDR and maybe JFK until the leftists deserted them on contentious issues like crime and race and citizenship while MAGA replaced the tired old issue of the class war with identity politics.

If the President also nurtured identity and personal grievances, well those were their grievance too and his solution to the troubles – tariffs, bigger and more beautiful tariffs that would put the rest of the world back into its place... appreciating the innovations and generosity of Americans instead of stealing our technology and undercutting our economy with their mindless army of coolies and peasants flooding our markets with the cheap substitutes for the goods that Americans of other times had made and claimed as their own.

After all, prior to the invention of the Federal Income Tax... a consequence of World War and the actually progressive Progressives of a century ago before Warren Harding shut the door on poor and working classes to kick off a decade of debauchery that ended in the Great Depression... the country was able to thrive on tariffs and so, King Donnie now maintains, should go back in the Wayback machine and do that (and a few other things) – bringing us closer and closer to Tax Week, 2025.

A view from across the pond... the Independent U.K. (not as liberal as the Guardian, but liberal nonetheless) termed Trump tariff trauma a “queasy” rollercoaster ride: posting on Truth Social that “THE BEST DEFINITION OF INTELLIGENCE IS THE ABILITY TO PREDICT THE FUTURE!!!”

But, while a wave of his magic wand could send the Dow soaring hundreds, even thousands of points up with the rest of the Wall Street idices profiting too, gravity has occasioned the nasty habit of bringing the markets back to earth again.

There are signs that the American people are getting more fed up with the erratic nature of all of the tariffs, the Brits... as also the Euros, the Asian markets, the angry Chinese (but not the untaxed Russians) and as many as two thirds of Americans) now contend. (ATTACHMENT SEVEN) Ray Dalio, the founder of the hedge fund Bridgewater Associates, “warned that a recession could be the least of the United States’ worries, and that a reorganization of the global trade structure could have catastrophic results for the nation.”

Trump has sown chaos in global commerce and financial markets with a chaotic on-again, off-again approach to imposing duties on products from … basically the entire world. He has shaken investors’ faith in the U.S. dollar and in federal bonds, while major stock markets have plummeted. “Experts are increasingly warning the U.S. may be entering a recession – or worse,” Olivier Knox of U.S. News concurred. (Monday, April 14: ATTACHMENT EIGHT)

Describing the ups and loops, the downs and now... except to China... the temporary outs of the tariffs, Mr. Knox set his own timeline beginning on April 2^nd when the President (still playing the Fool in the view of many) announced what he called “reciprocal tariffs” of up to 50% on American trading partners. “The president also set a baseline 10% tariff on imports from scores of other countries and territories. Then, under pressure from the bond market, he suspended the former for nearly everyone for 90 days.”

Then, on Friday, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials announced (at what was certainly the behest of the best and brightest among Donald’s Cabinet of Curiosities) “a carve-out for high-tech items such as smartphones, laptops and television displays, many of which come from China.

@ConSec @ Lutnick told ABC’s “This Week,” that all the tech toys “were going to have a special focus-type of tariff to make sure that those products get reshored.”

The problem is that it will take years, in some cases, to bring the industry up to the standards of the Chinese and other imports. Hasty replacements will result in more planes falling out of the sky, guns that backfire, failed scientific experiments... and as for nuclear safety... well...

“One of the biggest X factors,” Knox concluded, is whether the president “will reach some kind of trade ceasefire with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Senior Trump aides in recent days have talked up the importance of the two leaders speaking to each other, while also insisting that Xi must make the first move.”

He hasn’t. And he’s said that he won’t.

“You think tariffs are bad?” asked Adam Michel director of tax policy studies for the Libertarian-right gang of pot smokers, wife swappers and tax haters at Cato – also moonlighting for U.S. News, also on Monday... “Wait till you see what's next.”

Trump’s tariffs are raising prices on imported goods, roiling financial markets and angering many U.S. consumers who now have to pay what is an extra tax on those items from abroad. “But an even larger tax hike is looming on the horizon: the expiration of the 2017 tax cuts passed during Trump’s first term.” (ATTACHMENT NINE)

Cato commissioned YouGov to conduct a poll of 2,000 Americans which showed “overwhelming support for making those tax cuts permanent. Americans, regardless of their political differences, say they can't afford higher taxes and prefer to cut spending rather than hike taxes to make up for the loss of income to the federal government.

There are several nails within these Nikes of good intent – many opinionators, even some of whom are Republicans, acknowledge that tariffs are taxes on Americans because... whether the foreigners retaliate or not upon goods and services of varying necessity being tariffed with additional tariffs of their own... the combined price increases upon merchers of everything from cars to cloths, gas to groceries, will compel them to raise their prices at the pump or the aisles (those, that is, that are not driven out of business). Further, since the discretionary/necessity indices favor the more affluent, funding the government through tariffs will only increase inequality (as we shall explore in next week’s Lesson),

5 guajardo

6 clausing

7 IUK

8 KNOX

9 michel us news

10 tax policy center

Attempting to spin a nonpartisan (or, at least, less partisan) spin on the taxes and tariffs, the Tax Policy Center, back before Christmas with Trump elected but still waiting in the wings, took note of the upcoming expiration of the 2017

@begin

A10

	Our Lesson: April 10 through April 16, 2025
Thursday, April 10, 2025 Dow: 39,593.66	Adter a week of tariff-toll declines, the Dow takes its biggest upward leap since 2008 as the result of President Trump’s sudden 90-day pause on all increases (with the exception of those imposed on China – which bans Hollywood movies for retaliation). Trump claims victory, Peter Navarro boasts of “beautiful deals” but Dems say T quit because of “yippiness” of the bond markets. @ Kevin Hassett says all the countries of the world are lining p to make deals, but farmers remain worried about what and how much to plant. Russia swaps US ballerina who donated to Ukraine and got 12 years for a spy and arms dealer. They they resume bombing Ukraine’s schools and hospitals. Masters week begins as 4 year old Poppi McElroy scores a hold-in-one on the par 3 children’s tournament and the day ends with Justin Rose taking the lead.
Friday, April 11, 2025 Dow: 40,212.71	It’s National Pet Day. Death toll in Dominican Republican roof collapse hits 221 as rescue turns to recovery. Bankruptcy and near bankruptcy toll in USA strikes Weight Wartchers, Publisher’s Clearing House and Prada takes over Versace.. Dems accused Republicans for anti-vaxxing as RFK junior says that the measles outbreak has “plateaued” and promises that he will search for and find a cure for autism (which is up 400% since 2000). Stupid criminal tricks include the Georgia muder accidentally freed – who went directly to his mother’s house, was arrested and sent back to jail (hopefully after at least one home-cooked meal). In @, 17 year old neo-Nazi Nikola Casap is arrested for thinking Trump weak and has to be assassassinated to set off a coup that will set a new leader in charge... himself!... but succeeds only in killing his parents, stealing their car and driving off with the family dog – quickly located and busted.
Saturday, April 12, 2025 Dow: Closed	It’s Passover. After celebrating seder with family, Gov. Shapiro’s home in Harrisburg, PA is set on fire by an arsonist who is arrested and who hated the Governor... either for being a Democrat and promoting the namby-pamby Proud Boys or for beng a Jew. Israel celebrates Holy Week by bombing and strafing Gaza as America moves “military assets” closer to Iran to guard against nuclear research, envoy Steve Witkoff to hold polite discussions with Mad Vlad. These and other wars continue. Trump pivots again to exempt tach and electronics from 145% China tariffs which UBS says, will double the costs of iPhones. Farmers and small businesses relieved, but still fearful, “Be cool!’ Trump says, “everything is going to work out OK.” But he also warns, “sometimes you ave to take medicine.” Doctors and sick people remind him that the universal tariffs will also raise the price of medicine. Courts hand POTUS a split decision... ruling for the DOJ’s deportation of Columbia anti-Israel, maybe anti-Semitic and pro-Islamist Islamic student protester Mahmed Kahlil. But another orders that Trump bring back the wrongly deported Amado@ Garcia, whom the Feds say is a terrorist – Djonald UnResponsible say the matter is in the hands of El Salvador’s Bukele amd goes off to a UFC match
Sunday, April 13, 2025 Dow: Closed	And now, for the Christians, Palm Sunday. President Trump pivots again, taking palms off Apple and ilk by pausing tariffs on Chinese made or pared iPhones for an undisclosed epoch – maybe a month. Shopper scurry to buy phones and other electronics, as also new cars and ibuprofen. Witkoff (above) terms Iranian talks “positive”, but those dastardly Danes (still defiant over Greenland) arrest American tourists and have held them in jail for two weeks for disputing an Uber bill. Is a hostage swap in the works? On the Sunday talkshows, ComSec Lutnick says Trump always wanted to pause tariffs on Chinese electronics and the 145% was a ploy to get Xi to deal – which he has refused to do. Taiwan, too, because he expects them to be conquered by the ChiComs, sooner or later. Constipated anal-ists say it could take years to “re-shore” cellphone manufacturing, but 47 might not even give them a whole month. “He has the ball. I want him to have the ball. He’s the right person.” Sen. Elizebeth Warren (D-Ma) disagrees, citing Veep Vance’s insult that the Chinese are a bunch of “peasants”, She says we’ll need the courts to prevent recession because there will be a budgeting vote and the question is whether Republicans will bend the knee to support the “chaos or corruption” after Trump threw “a bucket of paint” over the economy – a bad thing, unlike some former “modern artists” who threw buckets of paint, even bananas around, and reaped millions, ABC roundtabler and former RNC chair Reince Priebus says Speaker Mike, not Trump, was behind the tariff pauses; former DNC chair Donna Brazile credits (or blams) bent-knee Republicans in Congress for passing a pro-billionaire budget by 2 votes. Panelist Rachel Bade says tariff 180° pivot happened “because markets spoke” – other panelist Sara Isgur said Trump won on ending grants to DEI, lost on immigration. On “Face the Nation” trade rep Jamison Greer said “we’ve shifted from one bucket of tariffs to another bucket of tariffs.” Or paint, as above
Monday, April 14, 2025 Dow: 40,524.77	Arsonist Cocy Balmer, a neo-Nazi mechanic “who expressed disdain for Democrats” fails in his attempt to assassinate Josh Shapiro by firebombing the Pennsylvania Governor’s mansion Passover night; authorities unclear whether the attempt was political or religious. Trump denies responsibility, calls him a nut. His problems are with China, who rejects deal offer and refuss to sell magnets newly pandering AI bosses at Apple, Google and Nvidia need. Doctors decry drug cutoffs to Big Pharma as small businesss worry about lack of cheap Chinese clothes, toys and novelties. Farmors worried about exporting soybeans as egg prices rebound – just in time for Easter. (TV e-con-mystics suggest dying potatoes or marshmallows,) Rory McIlroy wins Masters and sweep of majors on playoff after more twists and turns than tariff policy. WNBA holds draft of college athletes – Uconn’s Paige Buckner@ goes #1 (see here for list). “Minecraft” tops B.O. but draws complaint as rowdy fans throw chickens and trash theaters. 5.2 EQ strikes near San Diego, but the only casualties are wines and bourbons in liquor store bottles. @Sec Kash Patel fired for not showing up at his @ job. White House doctor calls Trump “fit to serve.” Devil cashes in as Cash 3 Lotto winning ticket is 666.
Tuesday, April 15, 2025 Dow: 40,368.96	It’s Tax Day. (See above) Celebrity female astronauts (Katy Perry, Gayle King, Aisha Bowe and three others) return from short, safe sojourn in space. Gayle kisses the earth and gets trolled, Katy sings “What a Wonderful World”. Back on Earth, President Trump angrily pulls $2.2B from Harvard for defying him on DEI and threatens to end their tax exempt status, calling it a terrorist training school. After El Salvador refuses to return the migrant sent to prison by mistake, Trump suggests he might round up un-cooperatives American citizens and deport them. The Democrats’ old guys, Former President Joe and the Bern rock out... Biden calls on GOP to defend Social Security, Sanders trips at Coachella (which, recovering from traffic problems makes tickets almost worth the cost. A big green dumpster takes up residence next to Gov. Shapiro’s firebombed mansion as balmy bomber Balmer spews the blarney in court, begging bail by saying he hates both Trump and Goneaway Old Joe. He doesn’t get it. Also in the dock: a Mangione wannabee who invades United Healthcare “to make a statement” and a school shooter in Dallas (on the one year anniversary of a 2024 killing), a man arrested for cutting off kittens’ tails. Animals retaliate, a rabbit gets into the engine of a Boeing 737 in Denver and starts a fire.
Wednesday, April 16, 2025 Dow: 37,625.61	@

THE DON JONES INDEX

CHART of CATEGORIES w/VALUE ADDED to EQUAL BASELINE of 15,000

(REFLECTING… approximately… DOW JONES INDEX of June 27, 2013)

Gains in indices as improved are noted in GREEN. Negative/harmful indices in RED as are their designation. (Note – some of the indices where the total went up created a realm where their value went down... and vice versa.) See a further explanation of categories HERE

ECONOMIC INDICES		(60%)
CATEGORY	VALUE	BASE	RESULTS by PERCENTAGE			SCORE		OUR SOURCES and COMMENTS
INCOME	(24%)	6/17/13 revised 1/1/22	LAST	CHANGE	NEXT	LAST WEEK	THIS WEEK	THE WEEK’S CLOSING STATS...
Wages (hrly. Per cap)	9%	1350 points	3/27/25	+0.23%	5/25	1,561.18	1,564.72	https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/wages 30.89 .96
Median Inc. (yearly)	4%	600	3/27/25	+0.057%	4/10/25	741.21	741.64	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 43,530 555 580
Unempl. (BLS – in mi)	4%	600	3/27/25	+2.38%	4/25	556.38	543,13	http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000/ 4.1 4.2
Official (DC – in mi)	2%	300	3/27/25	-0.12%	4/10/25	220.75	220.48	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 7,291 304 313
Unofficl. (DC – in mi)	2%	300	3/27/25	-0.26%	4/10/25	211.51	210.95	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 15,154 194 234
Workforce Participation Number Percent	2%	300	3/27/25	+0.027% -0.0051%	4/10/25	298.49	298.47	In 163,469 3,513 557 Out 102,646 689 732 Total: 266,202 289 61.428 424 421
WP % (ycharts)*	1%	150	3/27/25	+0.32%	4/25	150.71	151.19	https://ycharts.com/indicators/labor_force_participation_rate 62.40 .50
OUTGO	(15%)
Total Inflation	7%	1050	3/27/25	+0.2%	4/25	942.43	942.43	http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.2
Food	2%	300	3/27/25	+0.2%	4/25	268.10	268.10	http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.2
Gasoline	2%	300	3/27/25	- 1.0%	4/25	238.51	238.51	http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm -1.0
Medical Costs	2%	300	3/27/25	-0.3%	4/25	283.68	283.68	http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.3
Shelter	2%	300	3/27/25	+0.3%	4/25	255.61	255.61	http://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm +0.3
WEALTH
*Dow* Jones Index	2%	300	3/27/25	-10.91%	4/10/25	327.79	292.37	https://www.wsj.com/market-data/quotes/index/ 42,225.32 37,625.61
Home (Sales) (Valuation)	1% 1%	150 150	3/27/25	+4.41% +0.68%	4/25	128.69 282.27	128.69 282.27	https://www.nar.realtor/research-and-statistics Sales (M): 4.26 Valuations (K): 398.4
Debt (Personal) CANCELLED 3/27	2%	300	3/27/25	+0.043%	4/10/25	265.30	265.30	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 75,162 CANCELLED crypto, credit card debt border encounters gold &silver

GOVERNMENT	(10%)
Revenue (trilns.)	2%	300	3/27/25	+0.14%	4/10/25	432.81	433.42	debtclock.org/ 5,070 078 085
Expenditures (tr.)	2%	300	3/27/25	+0.11%	4/10/25	291.58	291.25	debtclock.org/ 7,076 084 092
National Debt tr.)	3%	450	3/27/25	+0.08%	4/10/25	366.57	366.28	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 36,646 675 704
Aggregate Debt (tr.)	3%	450	3/27/25	+0.07%	4/10/25	385.06	384.79	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 102,747 893 3,039

TRADE	(5%)
Foreign Debt (tr.)	2%	300	3/27/25	-0.13%	4/10/25	279.34	278.98	http://www.usdebtclock.org/ 8,649 660 671
Exports (in billions)	1%	150	3/27/25	+3.22%	5/25	167.51	173.21	https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html 269.8 278.5
Imports (in billions))	1%	150	3/27/25	+0.025%	“	135.93	135.96	https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html 401.2 401.1
Trade Surplus/Deficit (blns.)	1%	150	3/27/25	+7.09%	“	160.62	171.99	https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/current/index.html 131.4 122.7

SOCIAL INDICES		(40%)
ACTS of MAN	(12%)
World Affairs	3%	450	3/27/25	+0.7%	4/10/25	474.98	475.45	Defiant Danes take two Americns hostage over Greenland and Uber bill. Russia swaps ballerina hostage for neo-Soviet spy. Americans plotting failed Congo coup to face trial in U.S., 32 USAID workers fired during Ebola outbreak in Uganda. Vengeful Danes arrest US tourists for Uber fare dispute. Hungary bans gatherings of gays.
War and terrorism	2%	300	3/27/25	-0.3%	4/10/25	287.59	288.42	Protests in Pocatello escalate after autistic teen shot by cops dies. The wars in Ukraine and Gaza continue with no end in sight, nobody seriously talking peace or even ceasefires.
Politics	3%	450	3/27/25	+0.2%	4/10/25	472.80	471.85	After skipping Carter funeral, Michelle Obama denies she’s divorcing Barry. Or running in 2028. Trump envoy Witkoff meets Iranians in Oman, says talks went well. Hegseth aide fired for leaking classified docs. Kash Patel is quietly fired for repeated no-shows on the job.
Economics	3%	450	3/27/25	-0.1%	4/10/25	439.21	438.77	Prada buys out Versace for $1.4B California legislators debate allowing people who can’t afford kited rents to sleep in their cars. Bankruptcies include Publishers’ Clearing House, @ Angry Canadians and Euros cancel American tourism.
Crime	1%	150	3/27/25	-0.4%	4/10/25	217.50	217.06	In other crime news, cops shoot Weezer bassist’s wife and then arrests her for threatening them, @ South Carolina executes @ Mahdi by fireing squad, prison guard killed by mystery inmate in Groveland Prison, @.
ACTS of GOD	(6%)
Environment/Weather	3%	450	3/27/25	-0.2%	4/10/25	369.73	369.36	Spring snow strikes New York, New Jersey and New England.
Disasters	3%	450	3/27/25	-0.1%	4/10/25	414.47	414.88	Dominican dead 184 last Thursday after nightclub roof collapse - @ today as rescue pivots to recovery. Six die in NYC copter crash, three in Boca Raton Fl. plane attacked by birds. With egg prices still rising for Easter, a truckload crashes and burns in Illionois.
LIFESTYLE/JUSTICE INDEX		(15%)
Science, Tech, Education	4%	600	3/27/25	+0.1%	4/10/25	616.46	615.23	Myster object from the skies crashes through a New Jersey auto body shop. ET needs repairs?
Equality (econ/social)	4%	600	3/27/25	+0.1%	4/10/25	657.84	658.50	@ becomes first Bahmian in space. DoE opens website for students to report DEIstic teachers.
Health	4%	600	3/27/25	-0.1%	4/10/25	435.51	433.77	White House doctor says Trump is fit. Pharmacies stop carrying drugs that sick people can no longer afford. Johnsonvlle recalls plastic-ky brats, Frito Lay recalls toxic Tostitos. Fischer-Price recalls crashworthy baby strollers,
Freedom and Justice	3%	450	3/27/25	+0.1%	4/10/25	483.08	482.60	Menendez DA’s display of crime photos causes elderly aunt to collapse and be hospitalized. Facebook antitrust trial essentially over after the Zuck pivots, sucks up to ’47.
CULTURAL and MISCELLANEOUS INCIDENTS			(6%)
Cultural incidents	3%	450	3/27/25	-0.1%	4/10/25	554.14	555.80	Lorne Michaels to produce a British version of SNL. “60 Minurtes” profiles comedy baseball team “Savannah Bananas” while May’s Cannes Filmfest will add a Stunt Man Prize. “Minecraft” wins BO despite chicken jockey fans vandalizing theatres. Hollywood will remake “The Bodyguard”. Michael Crichton’s widow calls Noah Wylie’s “The Pitt” a rip off of ER. In sports, Rory McIlroy wins Masters, Page Buchner is first selected in WNBA draft, RIP actor Nikko Kraft@ (“Dazed and Confused”) , LSU hoopster Kyra Lacy, talkshow host Wink Martindale
Misc. incidents	4%	450	3/27/25	+0.1%	4/10/25	535.58	536.12	Devil cashes in on winning lotto ticket: 666.

The Don Jones Index for the week of April 10^th through April 16^th, 2025 was DOWN 29.62 points

The Don Jones Index is sponsored by the Coalition for a New Consensus: retired Congressman and Independent Presidential candidate Jack “Catfish” Parnell, Chairman; Brian Doohan, Administrator. The CNC denies, emphatically, allegations that the organization, as well as any of its officers (including former Congressman Parnell, environmentalist/America-Firster Austin Tillerman and cosmetics CEO Rayna Finch) and references to Parnell’s works, “Entropy and Renaissance” and “The Coming Kill-Off” are fictitious or, at best, mere pawns in the web-serial “Black Helicopters” – and promise swift, effective legal action against parties promulgating this and/or other such slanders.

Comments, complaints, donations (especially SUPERPAC donations) always welcome at feedme@generisis.com or: speak@donjonesindex.com.

ATTACHMENT ONE – FROM

@PLACE in ATTACH, THEN RETURN

X24 X24 FROM US NEWS

You Think Tariffs Are Bad? Wait Till You See What's Next.

By Adam Michel | ContributorApril 14, 2025, at 4:52 p.m.

The Tax Hike Looming After Tariffs

President Donald Trump’s tariffs aren’t the only form of financial pain facing Americans. Trump’s tariffs are raising prices on imported goods, roiling financial markets and many U.S. consumers who now have to pay what is an extra tax on those items from abroad. But an even larger tax hike is looming on the horizon: the expiration of the 2017 tax cuts passed during Trump’s first term.

My organization, the Cato Institute, last month conducted a nationally representative poll of 2,000 Americans in collaboration with YouGov. The results show overwhelming support for making those tax cuts permanent. Americans, regardless of their political differences, say they can't afford higher taxes and prefer to cut spending rather than hike taxes to make up for the loss of income to the federal government.

In 2017, Congress delivered sweeping tax relief to families across all income brackets, revitalizing American businesses and jump-starting economic growth. Since then, these tax cuts have contributed to increased investment, boosted wages and strengthened families' finances. Yet despite the successes, the poll found that only about 10% of Americans are fully aware that the cuts are on the brink of expiration.

But lawmakers in Washington know well that unless Congress acts decisively families will face painful tax hikes. Starting next year, the average taxpayer will have an annual bill about $3,000 higher. Republicans in the House and the Senate recently passed a budget framework that will extend the tax cuts and allow for significant spending cuts – although the spending cuts are not required. Next, lawmakers need to determine the details: which taxes to cut permanently, which tax credits to eliminate, and how much spending reform to pair with the package.

Trump Is Right About Tariffs on China

Former ambassador to Beijing: Tariffs are a tool to counter China’s unfair industrial policies that threaten us all.

Jorge Guajardo Jan. 28, 2025

Once our pollsters informed those surveyed of the impending tax increases, an overwhelming 75% responded that they favor making the tax cuts permanent, agreeing with the statement that “stability is crucial for families and businesses planning their futures.”

Americans also strongly support extending some of the most pro-growth tax policies passed almost eight years ago. For instance, 60% endorse allowing businesses to immediately deduct expenses for investment and research instead of letting the deduction expire and raising taxes on American investments. More than two-thirds also favor keeping the 2017 reduction of the corporate income tax rate or lowering it further. Before the tax cuts under Trump, the U.S. had the world’s highest corporate income tax rate, at 35%. Now, that rate is 21% – an amount that’s slightly above average. A full 60% agreed with the statement that we should lower the corporate tax rate even further “because it brings businesses and jobs back to the United States” rather than locating them overseas to avoid the U.S. government taking such a large cut.

Moreover, Americans strongly favor simplifying the tax code and eliminating tax credits that benefit only certain taxpayers, such as for home improvements, college or electric vehicles. Three-quarters say they would happily trade existing tax deductions and credits for lower overall rates and a simpler tax system.

For example, 64% of those polled supported extending the $10,000 cap on deductions for state and local taxes, or SALT, meaning that if someone’s local tax burden is, say, $12,000, they can only deduct the first $10,000 against their federal taxes. Some in Congress want to expand the deduction, but that subsidizes high-income taxpayers in high-tax states. Support for repealing about $1 trillion in energy and environmental tax subsidies is also high, with nearly half of Democrats and 59% of all respondents favoring repeal.

With federal budget deficits set to surpass $2 trillion annually, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, keeping taxes low over the long term requires spending cuts to offset the tax money the government would otherwise need to collect.

That’s an exchange a large majority of those we polled are willing to make. A full 61% said spending cuts are necessary and worthwhile to lock in the 2017 tax cuts. And a remarkable 3 in 4 said the federal government spends too much, estimating that 59 cents of every federal dollar is wasted.

What Trump Doesn’t Get About Tariffs

International trade doesn’t work the way the White House thinks it does.

Kimberly Clausing April 8, 2025

Given that more than half of the federal budget goes to Social Security, health care entitlement programs such as Medicare and Medicaid, and national defense, the public perception of wasted federal spending shows a clear openness to making hard fiscal trade-offs. Even liberal voters acknowledge the need for spending restraint, with Democratic poll respondents stating they'd willingly cut about a third of federal expenditures to achieve greater fiscal responsibility.

Americans seem to understand the nation's dire fiscal situation. Many know that preserving our financial future means drastically shrinking the size and scope of government. Two-thirds of voters correctly conclude that cutting spending strengthens rather than hurts the economy, rejecting the Washington tax-and-spend orthodoxy.

Policymakers in Washington are less clear-eyed. While some Republicans rightly aim to prevent tax hikes, many have resisted pairing permanent tax relief with spending reductions. However, the new Cato Institute polling shows voters strongly disagree with this approach.

Congress must heed voters’ clear mandate: Be more disciplined about spending and make tax relief permanent, all with the goal of providing stability and certainty for American families. Lawmakers must extend the 2017 tax cuts and sharply reduce federal spending. With that, come Tax Day next year, Americans will be well on their way to lasting economic prosperity.

Adam N. Michel is director of tax policy studies at the Cato Institute, a nonpartisan think tank supporting individual liberty, limited government, free markets and peace.

Tags: taxes, tax cuts

THE MAGA BASE

EQUALITY ISSUES

x57 X57 from tax policy center

Unpacking the TCJA: Who Benefits and Who Loses from Extending Major Provisions

Margot Crandall-Hollick, Joseph Rosenberg December 19, 2024

Next year, nearly all of the individual provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) will expire unless Congress acts. Congressional scorekeepers have estimated that fully extending the TCJA would cost $4.6 trillion over ten years. The Tax Policy Center has shown that, on average, all income groups would get a tax cut relative to current law, but higher-income households would receive a larger benefit.

But it is important for policymakers to understand more than the average impact of TCJA extensions, especially as they consider changes to specific provisions of the 2017 law. Below we unpack how extending each of the TCJA’s major provisions would affect taxpayers in different income groups. The key takeaway is that specific provisions of the TCJA have very different distributional effects depending on a household’s income level.

The TCJA was a sweeping piece of legislation that made major temporary changes to many individual tax provisions, including reducing marginal tax rates, expanding the standard deduction, expanding the child tax credit, modifying the alternative minimum tax (AMT), and introducing a new deduction for businesses organized as pass-through entities (199A). It raised taxes by repealing personal exemptions and limiting itemized deductions.

Figure 1 shows the net effect of extending the expiring TCJA provisions (left panel), further breaking down the average effect of provisions that reduce taxes and those that raise them (right panel).

The following figures show how these provisions contribute to the net change in taxes by income group, with positive changes (tax increases) on the right side of the vertical line and negative changes (tax cuts) on the left side and different provisions identified by color.

First, low- and middle-income households primarily benefit from the TCJA’s larger standard deduction and expanded child tax credit (Figure 2). These gains are partially offset by the loss of personal exemptions. Taken together, extending these provisions would reduce taxes for households in the bottom income quintile by an average of 0.5 percent of their after-tax income, the net effect of a 0.9 percent income boost offset by 0.4 percent reduction.

Figure 3 also highlights the effects of extending TCJA’s rate cuts, which provide significant benefits for middle- and upper-income taxpayers. For example, middle-income households receive a 1.2 percent boost in after-tax income from the TCJA extension. This net effect is a combination of tax cuts (totaling 2.8 percent of after-tax income relative to current law) from a higher standard deduction, larger child credit, and lower tax rates, that are offset by tax increases (of 1.6 percent of after-tax income), driven largely by the repeal of the personal exemptions.

Figure 4 shows the effects of TCJA’s rate cuts along with other provisions that mostly affect higher-income households, including the limits on itemized deductions, changes to the AMT, and the 20-percent pass-through income deduction (199A). The highest-income taxpayers would benefit the most overall from these extensions, seeing net tax cuts of 2 percent of after-tax income for those in the top quintile (2.5 percent for those in the top 1 percent).

The bottom line: the individual provisions of the TCJA involve a combination of gives and takes that affect households differently depending on their income and other characteristics. Unpacking the effect of extending these provisions offers insights about how the overall cost and impact on households would differ if policymakers consider changing the core structure of the TCJA.

x61 X61 from salon

Amid tariff chaos, Republicans plot "massive redistribution" of wealth from workers to the rich

The cost of tariffs will eclipse any tax cuts most households see, experts say

By Russell Payne

Staff Reporter

Published April 12, 2025 6:00AM (EDT)

Donald Trump and Mike Johnson (Photo illustration by Salon/Getty Images)

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While conservatives hail the Republicans’ budget plan as the “biggest tax cut in history” and say that President Donald Trump’s tax plan is necessary tax relief, Trump and his allies are working to execute an enormous transfer of wealth from working Americans to the wealthiest.

Elizabeth Pancotti, a former adviser to Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and a managing director at the Groundwork Collective, described the current GOP plan as a “triple whammy of massive redistribution in a society that is already tilted toward the wealthy.”

“The end goal here is to redistribute trillions of dollars from the middle and working class at the bottom to the one percent and the wealthy folks,” Pancotti said. “They’re doing that in three different ways.”

"People are terrified": Fear over Medicaid cuts across rural America could sway some Republicans

The first is through tariffs. Although Trump’s decision to roll back his so-called “reciprocal tariff” plan was often referred to as a pause on tariffs, this isn’t exactly the case. His administration is maintaining a 10% tariff on all imports as well as a 145% tariff on imports from China, alongside a handful of tariffs on specific industries.

Tariffs, Pancotti said, are a regressive tax that disproportionately impacts lower earners because, in essence, a tariff is a sales tax on imported goods. Because lower-income Americans spend a larger proportion of their income on goods, they will also spend a larger proportion of their income paying the tariffs on affected goods.

At the same time, Pacotti said, the Trump tax cuts, which Republicans were planning to extend, were skewed to benefit the wealthiest Americans. While the top 1% of households received an average tax cut of $60,000, according to the Tax Policy Center, the bottom 60% of households received an average tax cut of less than $500.

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For comparison, the Yale Budget Lab estimated that Trump’s tariff plan will likely cost the average American household around $4,689 a year, a sum that eclipses the tax cut that most households received in the GOP’s budget plan while only being about 8% of the average tax cut the wealthiest households received. In practical terms, this means the Trump administration and his Republican allies in Congress are planning to hike taxes on most Americans while cutting taxes for the wealthiest households.

Pancotti pointed out, however, that this isn’t the only part of the GOP’s budget plan. They also passed a budget that will almost certainly result in dramatic cuts to services like Medicaid or CHIP, which serves as a safety net for the poorest Americans.

Dean Baker, an economist at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, told Salon that, in addition to this dynamic, cuts at the IRS, supported by Republicans and spearheaded by billionaire and Republican megadonor Elon Musk, will also make it easier for the wealthy to avoid paying the taxes they owe. Baker said that, in practice, it’s much easier for the wealthy and those who make money from capital investments to avoid paying taxes, saying, “Most of us have our tax deducted from our wages. We don’t have much choice in the matter.”

“So you both have, you know, the legislative changes that reduce their tax liability, but also, you know the fact of change is that if you don't have much by way of enforcement, you have a lot of people that don’t pay their taxes,” Baker said.

THE POOR

THE RICH

X59 X59 FROM nyt

Republicans Ponder the Unthinkable: Taxing the Rich

The idea of raising taxes on rich Americans has caught the Republican Party between its populist ambitions and low-tax instincts.

Listen to this article · 6:54 min Learn more

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By Andrew Duehren

Reporting from Washington

April 14, 2025Updated 3:32 p.m. ET

As Republicans prepare to cut trillions of dollars in taxes, they are grasping for ways to keep down costs. There are the typical conservative ideas for doing so, like cuts to health care programs, and the inventive ones, like changing how the budget is measured in the first place.

And then there is an unorthodox option Republicans on Capitol Hill and in the Trump administration are quietly considering: a tax increase on the rich.

The idea is one of many tax changes Republicans are floating. Lawmakers and lobbyists expect the party’s anti-tax antibodies to kick in and eventually block it. But even the possibility of raising taxes on high-income Americans has stirred a debate among Republicans about the party’s relationship with the richest Americans as its base of support increasingly comes from the working class.

Subscribe to The Times to read as many articles as you like.

Andrew Duehren covers tax policy for The Times from Washington.

X60 from ny post

Mike Johnson pours cold water on calls to hike taxes on the rich, despite Trump telling GOPers he’s open to it

Ryan King

Published April 13, 2025, 2:31 p.m. ET

137 Comments

Johnson pours cold water on calls to hike taxes on the rich

00:00

01:06

House Speaker Mike Johnson is pouring cold water on the prospect of Republicans hiking taxes on the rich to help pay for President Trump’s “big, beautiful” agenda package.

Despite Trump previously telling Republicans that he is open to a tax increase for the wealthy, Johnson (R-La.) argued that he’d prefer to find payfors elsewhere and underscored that the GOP needs to hustle on finishing the Trump agenda bill due to bond market jitters.

“I’m not a big fan of doing that,” Johnson told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” when asked about ratcheting up taxes on the rich. “We’re the Republican Party and we’re for tax reduction for everyone. So, I mean, that’s a general principle that we always try to abide by.”

Republicans are staring down a difficult arithmetic problem to fund Trump’s marquee agenda package, which includes tax cuts, stepped-up energy supply, border security and bolstered defense spending.

00:00

04:34

Fiscal hawks are adamant that the agenda package doesn’t add to the deficit, but moderates are skittish about deep cuts to programs like Medicaid, creating a predicament for Johnson, given the slim GOP control of the House and Senate.

“We’re going to protect Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid,” Johnson stressed. “At the same time, we have to root out fraud, waste, and abuse.”

About 61% of the roughly $6.75 trillion federal budget is mandatory spending such as Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid. Another 13% is interest on the debt.

Given that Republicans want to increase defense spending in the agenda package, that leaves less than $1 trillion of annual discretionary spending to cut based on fiscal year 2024 spending levels.

House Republicans were hoping to cut a minimum of $1.5 trillion over 10 years. And between the two chambers, Republicans had been eyeing somewhere between $5.8 trillion and $4.5 trillion worth of tax cuts and spending increases (for border security and defense) over the same period.

Tax hikes on the rich have been floated as a means of making that math work. Hardliners such as Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris (R-Md.) have expressed openness to it.

Privately, Trump had told Senate Republicans that he is open to jacking up taxes on high-income earners, Semafor reported.

Trump ally Steve Bannon insisted that Republicans will jack up taxes on the rich, telling “Real Time with Bill Maher” on Friday that “Trump and the MAGA movement will raise taxes on the wealthy.”

“People have different thoughts and theories on how we can find this perfect — solve this perfect equation to get all of this done,” Johnson added. “I would say, just stay tuned.”

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) had similarly cast doubt on soaking the rich, telling reporters, “We’re not looking for tax increases; We’re looking for locking in current rates so there is not a tax increase,” per CNBC.

During the development of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Republicans helped pay for the tax reductions in part by capping the state and local tax deduction (SALT), which imposed a stiffer burden on high-income earners.

Last week, Johnson managed to take a big first step towards advancing Trump’s agenda package. The House adopted a budget resolution — a blueprint that unlocks the reconciliation process, which allows Republicans to bypass the 60-vote threshold needed to break a filibuster in the Senate.

But that budget resolution gave House and Senate Republicans completely different frameworks about what the Trump agenda package should look like.

The speaker is hoping to get the final bill across Trump’s desk by Memorial Day, despite many unanswered questions about spending cuts and the contours of the tax cuts.

“The timing’s critical,” Johnson said, “because for all the reasons you know and you have discussed on your show all the time and that we know, we have to show that stability to the markets.”

137

What do you think? Post a comment.

We have to send a message to the bond market, the stock market investors, to our allies around the world and our enemies as well that America is on sound fiscal ground. And so we can bend the debt trajectory curve, get us back on a path to fiscal sanity.”

Johnson predicted that passing the Trump agenda package will help “calm” the economy “and start us back on that path to real recovery.”

If Republicans fail to act, key provisions in the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act will expire by the end of the year, resulting in a significant tax increase. Additionally, the Trump agenda package is the GOP’s plan to raise the debt limit.

Uncle Sam is expected to face a credit limit on borrowing at some point over the summer.

POLITICS and ECONOMICS

X52 X52 FROM guk

Top US companies spent three times as much on buybacks as taxes after Trump cuts – report

As president proposes new cuts, data shows 11 corporations collectively recorded nearly $500bn in profits since last cuts

Tom Perkins Wed 9 Apr 2025 07.00 EDT

Eleven top US consumer goods corporations spent more than three times as much on share buybacks as they did on taxes, using their savings from the 2017 Donald Trump tax cuts to supercharge purchases that enriched investors instead of lowering prices on goods essential to daily life, according to a new report.

The findings are part of a new analysis of company filings by the Groundwork Collaborative economic thinktank. They come as the US president proposes $5tn in new tax cuts that would again lower the corporate tax rate, and likely lead to more buybacks.

PepsiCo, Comcast, United Healthcare, personal care giant Kimberly Clark and the other companies have collectively recorded nearly $500bn in profits since the last cuts. They enacted $463bn in buybacks and paid just $140bn in federal taxes.

The figures are “startling”, said Liz Pancotti, a study co-author and director of policy with the Groundwork Collaborative, and highlight how the cuts incentivize buybacks.

“The companies are now throwing massive amounts of money at investors who are largely already wealthy people,” Pancotti added. “This is how you get the staggering wealth inequality in this country.”

Buybacks are a company’s purchase of its outstanding stock shares, which reduces the number of shares available on the market. That juices the stock’s value and investors’ wealth. By one estimate, publicly traded companies now collectively spend as much as 90% of their earnings on buybacks instead of reinvesting to keep prices down, or raising workers’ wages.

The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act nearly halved the effective corporate tax rate from 35% to 21% and was among Trump’s most unpopular initiatives because it largely benefited the wealthy and corporations.

Undeterred, Trump is now proposing lowering the corporate rate to 17%, which could generate a $50bn annual windfall to the 100 largest US corporations.

Food prices have shot up since the last cuts, in part driven by price gouging during and after the pandemic and Ukraine war.

General Mills and PepsiCo, two of the biggest packaged food and beverage companies, have returned $66bn to shareholders and paid just $16bn in taxes since the cuts.

As inflation hit its peak, the two companies drew ire as they increased prices and shrunk some of their product sizes. The tax cuts and price hikes have been good for their bottom lines: compared with the two years prior to the tax cut’s enactment, PepsiCo’s effective tax rate is now 11% lower and profits are up 58%.

Similarly, personal good giants Kimberly Clark and Procter Gamble have together returned $125bn to shareholders and paid just $18bn in taxes. They’ve seen their profits soar by at least 70% as they raise prices across their multitude of brands and consumers pay about one-third more overall on personal goods.

The two companies control up to 80% of the diaper market. The average US family in 20204 paid about $1,000 more each year per child than prior to the pandemic, prompting some state governments to start covering the costs under Medicaid.

But Republicans are proposing to in part pay for the next round of tax cuts by slashing Medicaid and other social service programs, which disproportionately benefit lower- and middle-income families. The cuts create a massive transfer of wealth from the lower and middle classes to the upper, Pancotti said, and companies are incentivized to spend their earnings this way.

“If you get to keep a larger piece of the pie because Uncle Sam takes even less and, then, it’s a lot more fun to rake in these profits and distribute them to the shareholders,” Pancotti said. “Now Trump is planning to reward them with even more tax cuts for doing just that.”

Housing costs have soared in recent years, in part fueled by a 30% jump in the price of new builds since the last tax cut. DR Horton and Lennar, the two largest US homebuilders, have returned $17bn to shareholders and paid $13bn in taxes.

Similarly, Comcast has blasted customers with a torrent of base price increases and new junk fees, even as it returned billions to shareholders. Its effective tax rate is 12% lower and its profits are 88% higher than prior to the cuts.

Meanwhile, AutoZone’s effective tax rate is now 37% lower and profits are 116% higher, and it used the windfall to triple the level of returns to shareholders.

The spending is part of the larger pattern, said Lenore Palladino, a University of Massachusetts economist who has authored several papers on the issue. She said buybacks are a symptom of the larger problem: “shareholder primacy”.

“It’s the legal fact that corporations exist solely to make money for shareholders – that’s their purpose,” Palladino said, labeling buybacks “legal manipulation” of stock price. “It’s weird that it’s totally legal because we have all these other rules against manipulating the price of stocks.”

Executives’ compensation is tied to stock price, and higher share prices keep activist shareholders at bay, so there’s plenty of reason for company leadership to enact them.

While lawmakers have proposed solutions that nibble around the edges, anything short of a ban on buybacks, or limits similar to those in other countries’ advanced stock markets, won’t address the problem, Palladino said.

“In today’s political climate, calling attention to how much these practices contribute to widening economic inequality and how buybacks are a huge waste of money is important,” she said. “When we have the political will to do policy … we need at a bare minimum bright line limits on these.”

· This article was amended on 9 April 2025. The previous version incorrectly said that the corporations in the analysis spent more than three times more on buybacks than taxes, instead of three times as much.

TAX LEGISLATION – NOW

X53 X53 from fox

Trump tax cuts survive key House hurdle as fiscal hawks threaten rebellion

Fiscal hawks who support this procedural vote may withhold that support later

By Elizabeth Elkind Fox News Published April 9, 2025 4:14pm EDT

Schumer blasts economic ‘chaos’ as Trump pauses some tariffs

Legislation setting the stage for Republicans to pass a broad swath of President Donald Trump's agenda survived an important hurdle on Wednesday afternoon.

House GOP lawmakers voted to allow for debate on the legislation, known as a "rule vote," a framework that serves as one of the first steps in the budget reconciliation process.

It's still unclear whether House Republicans have enough support to pass the legislation itself, though GOP leaders have indicated they're moving full steam ahead in a matter of hours.

"I think we can get this job done. I understand the holdouts. I mean, their concerns are real. They really want to have true budget cuts and to change the debt trajectory that the country is on," Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters ahead of the first vote.

HOUSE FREEDOM CAUCUS CHAIR URGES JOHNSON TO CHANGE COURSE ON SENATE VERSION OF TRUMP BUDGET BILL

The legislation advanced through the procedural hurdle in a narrow 216 to 215 vote, with three Republicans — Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky.; Victoria Spartz, R-Ind.; and Mike Turner, R-Ohio — voting with Democrats to block it.

Trump has directed Republicans to work on "one big, beautiful bill" to advance his agenda on border security, defense, energy and taxes.

Such a measure is largely only possible via the budget reconciliation process. Traditionally used when one party controls all three branches of government, reconciliation lowers the Senate's threshold for passage of certain fiscal measures from 60 votes to 51. As a result, it has been used to pass broad policy changes in one or two massive pieces of legislation.

Rule votes are traditionally not indicators of a bill's final passage, and they generally fall along party lines.

Several Republicans who voted to allow debate on the measure have said they will still oppose its final passage.

Passing frameworks in the House and Senate, which largely only include numbers indicating increases or decreases in funding, allows each chamber's committees to then craft policy in line with those numbers under their specific jurisdictions.

The House passed its own version of the reconciliation framework earlier this year, while the Senate passed an amended version last week. House GOP leaders now believe that voting on the Senate's plan will allow Republicans to enter the next step of crafting policy.

But fiscal hawks have raised concerns about the differences in minimum mandatory spending cuts, which they hope will offset the cost of new federal investments and start a path to reducing the deficit.

The Senate's version calls for at least $4 billion in spending cuts, while the House baseline begins at $1.5 trillion — a significant gap.

Conservatives have demanded extra guarantees from the Senate GOP that it is committed to pursuing deeper spending cuts in line with the House package.

"They don't have a plan that I've seen. So until I see that, I'm a no," Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., told Fox News Digital.

SENATE GOP PUSHES TRUMP BUDGET FRAMEWORK THROUGH AFTER MARATHON VOTE SERIES

Trump himself worked to persuade holdouts both in a smaller-scale White House meeting on Tuesday and in public remarks at the National Republican Congressional Committee.

He also fired off multiple Truth Social posts pushing House Republicans to support the measure, even as conservatives argue it would not go far enough in fulfilling Trump's agenda.

"Republicans, it is more important now, than ever, that we pass THE ONE, BIG, BEAUTIFUL BILL. The USA will Soar like never before!!!" one of the posts read.

X54 from bbc

Trump-backed budget bill approved in US House

The US House of Representatives has passed a budget bill that includes trillions of dollars in cuts to both taxes and government spending, despite opposition from Democrats and Republican hard-liners.

The spending plan is a key plank in Donald Trump's legislative agenda and he has called it a "big, beautiful bill".

After the 216-214 vote on Thursday, Trump posted on social media: "Congratulations to the House on the passage of a Bill that sets the stage for one of the Greatest and Most Important Signings in the History of our Country."

However the House bill has deeper spending cuts than the one passed by the Senate, and the two versions must be merged into one bill for Trump to sign into law.

The merger process is called "reconciliation" - and further legislation will be needed to enact the bigger tax cuts that Trump has asked for.

The House plan, currently a broad blueprint with many details still to be worked out, would cut taxes by about $5 trillion (£3.9 trillion).

Over the next decade, it would also add $5.7 trillion to the US government's debt, according to Reuters. The Treasury reports that US debt currently stands at around $36 trillion.

The possibility of ballooning government debt led a number of Republican hard-liners to initially oppose the bill and demand deeper spending cuts.

Earlier in the week, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, a Republican, had to push off a vote on the bill for fear that it would not pass in a chamber that is only narrowly controlled by his party.

On Thursday the Republican "no" votes had been whittled down to two: Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Victoria Spartz of Indiana.

The Senate version of the bill was passed on Saturday and calls for a minimum of $4bn (£3.1bn) in spending cuts - a fraction of the $1.5 trillion in cuts that the House has demanded.

Republican leaders in the Senate have described the $4bn figure as a minimum.

"We'll certainly do everything we can to be as aggressive as possible," said John Thune, the party's leader in the chamber.

The scale of the spending cuts laid out in the bill would be many times greater than those already made under Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency - which claims to have saved $150bn so far, although that figure has been disputed.

The budget measure will also slash the money coming into the US federal government. If it eventually passes, the bill will extend tax cuts that were passed during Trump's first term in 2017.

President Trump has also asked for additional tax cuts on tips – to make good on a campaign promise to end income taxes on tips for service-industry workers – as well as on overtime wages and Social Security retirement benefits.

Those tax cuts, if passed, would further increase US government debt.

The White House has said that money collected through tariffs will help plug the gap, however that plan is far from certain as Trump's tariff plans continue to evolve with changing rates and dates for taking effect. There is also the possibility that high tariffs may lead to lower imports and, in turn, fewer goods to tax.

· Is the US making $2bn a day from tariffs?

In a statement after the House vote, the Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said: "This vote is more than a budget win; it's a statement of purpose and strength, which affirms the Trump administration's commitment to delivering growth and opportunity."

A rise in federal borrowing requires another vote by Congress to increase the debt ceiling. Although such measures have been contentious, Bessent said during a cabinet meeting on Thursday that he was confident that Congress would raise the ceiling again later this year.

However the leader of the House Democrats, Hakeem Jeffries, called the budget bill a "disgrace" and criticised potential cuts to Medicaid, the US government program that funds health care for low-income Americans.

"House Democrats are going to aggressively push back every day, every week, every month, so we bury this reckless Republican budget resolution in the ground, never to rise again," he told reporters.

X55 from reuters

Republican budget plan passes but hurdles ahead to extend Trump tax cuts

By Bo Erickson and Richard Cowan

April 10, 20253:09 PM EDTUpdated a day ago

· Summary

· Companies

· House vote starts negotiation on tax cuts

· Bill could add $5.7 trillion to federal debt over a decade

· Debt ceiling raise included in budget blueprint to avoid default

WASHINGTON, April 10 (Reuters) - The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday passed a budget plan that lays the groundwork for extending President Donald Trump's 2017 tax cuts, overcoming opposition from Republican hardliners who worried that it does not cut spending sufficiently.

The 216-214 House vote is a preliminary step that would enable Republicans to bypass Democratic opposition in the Senate and pass tax cut legislation along party lines later this year.

The legislation is a broad budget blueprint, which includes few details, and Republicans will fashion their tax cuts over the coming months. The bill will also accomplish other parts of the Trump agenda, including tightening border security and seeking to boost U.S. energy production.

It would cut taxes by about $5 trillion and add approximately $5.7 trillion to the federal government's debt over the next decade.

House Speaker Mike Johnson had hoped to pass it on Wednesday, but postponed action when some of his Republicans objected that it does not cut spending enough. Two House Republicans voted against it on Thursday.

The legislation, which passed the Senate on Saturday, calls for a minimum of $4 billion in spending cuts. That is far less than a previous version approved by the House that mandates $1.5 trillion in cuts.

Senate Republicans say the $4 billion figure is simply a minimum that does not prevent Congress from passing much larger spending cuts in the months to come.

Trump urged House Republicans to vote yes, and after passage, declared on social media that the vote "sets the stage for one of the Greatest and Most Important Signings in the History of our Country."

FISCAL FIGHT AHEAD

The intra-party fight comes amid chaos in financial markets set off by Trump's imposition of tariffs on imported goods. Prospects of a shrinking U.S. economy as a result of a world trade war, as some economists have projected, spilled over into Congress' budget debates because of the possibility of falling revenue in an economic downturn.

The Treasury on Thursday reported that gross customs duties in March totaled $8.75 billion, up by about $2 billion from a year earlier and the highest since September 2022. The increase is partly due to Trump's tariff increases since February, a Treasury official said.

But the figures suggest that tariff revenue is running far short of what would be needed to offset the effects of the extended tax cuts.

The bill would extend the 2017 tax cuts that were Trump's primary first-term legislative achievement. Johnson said this legislative step forward is a "very strong signal to the markets, to investors, job creators, entrepreneurs and the people that make the economy run."

Republican leaders said that if the tax cuts are not renewed, Americans will face a tax hike of trillions of dollars. It is unclear how much additional stimulus could result from extending already-in-place cuts.

Republicans are also working to pass additional tax breaks for overtime wages, tipped income and Social Security benefits, that Trump promised on the campaign trail. Nonpartisan analysts say that could drive the bill's cost north of $11 trillion.

Even with this Republican legislative detente for now, the hardline tactics of the fiscal hawks in the House Republican conference this week were spurned by some of their colleagues.

"I don't care how philosophically principled you are, I don't care how bold and dramatic the legislation is, if it never makes it to the president's desk, it's never going to become a law," Republican Representative Frank Lucas of Oklahoma said in a Thursday interview.

Before Thursday's vote, Senate Majority Leader John Thune tried to sway the concerns of the House hardliners, pledging, "we'll certainly do everything we can to be as aggressive as possible" with spending cuts.

Johnson, twice in the past 24 hours, held hour-meetings with the hardliners near the House chamber, signaling he took their concerns seriously.

Looking ahead, higher spending cuts could put key Senate votes in jeopardy. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries argued the Republicans' budget "will set in motion some of the most extreme cuts to health care, nutritional assistance and the things that matter to everyday Americans in our nation's 250-year history."

Some moderate Republican senators have said they also worry about deep cuts to the Medicaid healthcare system for low-income, elderly and disabled Americans.

Johnson on Thursday pushed for work requirements for able-bodied young men who "play video games all day" and said the rest of the cuts would come from a clearing away of waste, fraud, and abuse in the system.

Senator Susan Collins, a moderate Republican from Maine, expressed skepticism about that idea.

"I'm sure there's some fraud, and we certainly should go after that, but I don't see how you get to $880 billion," Collins said, referencing the top-line spending cuts number for the House committee that oversees the healthcare program.

Congressional Republicans also intend to use the budget blueprint to raise the federal government's debt ceiling, which they must do by sometime this summer or risk default on the nation's $36.6 trillion in debt.

“What they’re doing in reality is giving billionaires the national credit card and telling them to go hog wild,” said Representative Angie Craig, a Minnesota Democrat, during the legislative debate.

Reporting by Bo Erickson and Richard Cowan, additonal reporting by David Lawder, writing by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Scott Malone, Mark Porter and Alistair Bell

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

X54

X55

X58 X58 from USA TODAY

Trump's agenda kickstarted by Congress. What happens next?

Riley Beggin

WASHINGTON – Congress has cleared the first major hurdle in their efforts to pass a sweeping party-line bill to enact President Donald Trump's agenda.

Now the work begins.

The resolution approved Thursday in the GOP-controlled House of Representatives outlines how much lawmakers can spend and how much they must cut spending in the final package. That sets up weeks of debate on the details of new tax cuts and how much to spend on each program, as lawmakers flesh out the bare-bones resolution.

Republicans aim to pack the bill with policies that Trump promised on the campaign trail, from strengthening border security to extending the tax cuts Trump signed in his first term, which are set to expire at the end of the year.

They plan to pass it without the help of Democrats by using a process known as "reconciliation," which allows them to skirt the Senate filibuster and its challenging 60-vote threshold.

Here's what you need to know about the path ahead.

Tax breaks

Lawmakers want to make the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act permanent, extending lower income tax rates for individuals and corporations and a higher exemption from the estate tax.

Trump also wants to create new tax breaks, such as eliminating tax on overtime, tips and Social Security benefits. He campaigned for the White House in 2024 on ending taxes on tips and highlighted the promise during visits in critical battleground states with major service economies like Nevada.

A handful of key Republicans from high-tax states like New York and California are also going to push to end − or at least raise − the cap on state and local tax deductions known as SALT that Trump's tax bill created.

All told, nonpartisan analysts estimate the tax cuts will cost between $5 trillion and $11 trillion over the next decade.

These expensive priorities are likely to put House Republicans on a collision course with some in their conference who are uncomfortable with increasing federal debt.

"This is just the beginning. We have to now go draft the reconciliation package," said Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, on Thursday as he explained why he supported the resolution. The final bill "will not actually increase deficits. That is our key driving factor. We got a commitment on that and that's why we're here."

SPENDING CUTS TO BENEFIT PROGRAMS

To appease those House Republicans who are concerned about running up the tab, Republican leaders are pledging to find at least $1.5 trillion in spending cuts as part of the package.

Experts say that is likely going to hit Medicaid, the healthcare program serving 72 million low-income Americans, as well as food benefits and other programs.

Cutting other major programs like Medicare and Social Security is off the table, as Trump has said repeatedly, leaving few options to find big savings.

Republican leaders say it is possible to cut hundreds of billions of dollars without impacting benefits by targeting "waste, fraud and abuse."

But several Republicans (and congressional Democrats) have said they will not vote for the package if it does result in cuts to Medicaid benefits. Sen. Susan Collins, a moderate Republican from Maine, expressed skepticism about the idea that there is enough fat to be cut without impacting benefits.

"I'm sure there's some fraud, and we certainly should go after that, but I don't see how you get to $880 billion," Collins said, referencing the top-line spending cuts number designated for the House committee that oversees the healthcare program.

Congressional Republicans also plan to use the budget blueprint to raise the federal government's debt ceiling, which they must do by this summer or risk default on the nation's $36.6 trillion in debt.

The resolution would raise the debt ceiling by $5 trillion, which would avoid a looming default on the federal debt and help Republicans avoid negotiating on the extension with Democrats.

“What they’re doing, in reality, is giving billionaires the national credit card and telling them to go hog wild,” said Rep. Angie Craig, a Minnesota Democrat, during the floor debate over the resolution.

While Republicans want to pass the legislation as soon as possible, a potential default will provide the practical deadline for lawmakers to get the bill to Trump's desk.

Contributing: Reuters

TARIFFS

HISTORY

X23 X23 FROM HKS.HARVARD.ORG

Explainer: How do tariffs work and how will they impact the American and global economy?

HKS international trade expert Robert Lawrence on what higher tariffs will mean for the United States and the world.

By the Explainer April 09, 2025

Over the past week, President Donald Trump announced, and then largely paused, a new tariff regime more severe than anything seen in more than a century, and certainly out of step with the United States’ role as the creator and guarantor of an international system of free trade. (On April 9, hours after they had gone into effect, Trump announced a 90-day postponement on some tariffs to many countries, though not China.) Questions around these policies remain. Will tariffs help the U.S. economy, as the president has said? And what effect will the uncertainty and turmoil have on the United States’ role as an anchor of the international economic system? We sat down, before the latest pause was announced, to speak with international trade expert Robert Lawrence, the Albert L. Williams Professor of International Trade and Investment at HKS and author of “Behind the Curve: Can Manufacturing Still Provide Inclusive Growth?”

Q: How do you understand the economic and political arguments behind the Trump administration's tariff policy?

President Donald Trump has told us that tariffs are a wonderful word, and I think he sees them as a multipurpose tool that can advance the variety of concerns which he has and the number of goals which he'd like to achieve. Tariffs firstly raise revenue and there's a debate over who will actually pay the money. The evidence suggests that, by and large, tariffs are likely to be passed through to American consumers who purchase the products on which the tariffs have been levied. But there's also evidence that in some cases foreigners might lower their prices and therefore implicitly pay some of the tariffs.

Although the president has proposed using the tariffs to help raise revenue for the government, he's proposed using tariffs to obtain leverage from foreign governments, for example, with Canada and Mexico over smuggling of fentanyl and immigration. There's also an idea that tariffs can level the playing field because there's a perception that is widely held that Americans have been taken advantage of, our market being more open than those of the rest of the world. So they are viewed as a multipurpose tool.

Q: Does the president have a point when he argues that the United States has been taken advantage of—that it has played by the rules but other countries have not?

I think if you look historically, the United States has typically had lower tariffs than other countries, and the U.S. is a very open society as well as economy and easier for foreigners to enter than many other places. But whether this is unfair or not really depends on whether you think this openness is a cost to the United States or a benefit.

The fact that the U.S. has low tariffs actually means that Americans can buy imports more cheaply, which I see as a benefit. The fact the U.S. is a rules-based, open society likewise brings strong advantages.

In any case, what the president believes is that a trade deficit tells us that foreigners are unfairly taking advantage of us. However, there's another, and perhaps more relevant, way to look at a trade deficit. A country borrowing from the rest of the world can be a very good thing if it allows you to invest to build a plant or equipment, for example. You can actually enjoy an advantage from having a trade deficit.

Just as individuals who go to Harvard have student loans, we wouldn't say they're being taken advantage of. We'd actually say they're going to derive some benefit in the future. Most economists would say that the reason the United States has had prolonged deficits has little to do with whether foreigners are fair or unfair or whether American tariffs are lower or higher than those in other parts of the world. It is much more a reflection of American spending patterns.

Ironically, with the current policies of the Trump administration, on the one hand they're trying to close the deficit by raising tariffs, but on the other hand, they're trying to use the money to give tax cuts, which will mean that the U.S. government is saving less. So, our left hand is at odds with what our right hand is doing, and unless we change our spending patterns and either save more or invest less in the United States and borrow less, the trade deficit isn't going to change at all.

“It’s important to realize and recognize that only just over 8% of Americans work in manufacturing. ... Manufacturing is simply too small to have a significant impact on the American labor force.”

Robert Lawrence

Q: Among the reasons given for tariffs is the need to protect U.S. jobs and reshore or inshore manufacturing. Is there evidence that this will happen?

The central claim is that America can be revitalized and indeed the American middle class can be revitalized; workers without college education can be helped, and left-behind places can be restored if we stimulate manufacturing production in the United States. But at the moment it's important to realize and recognize that only just over 8% of Americans work in manufacturing and even if we were to entirely close the trade deficit that we have in manufactured goods, it's likely that manufacturing employment would increase by somewhere between one or two percentage points. So instead of around 8% of Americans working in manufacturing, 10% of Americans would work in manufacturing.

Manufacturing is simply too small to have a significant impact on the American labor force and both Presidents Biden and Trump have been obsessed with restoring American manufacturing. In my own view, the claims that they make that somehow this is going to have a significant impact on the availability of jobs for the middle class is completely unrealistic.

There are some manufactured products that are very important. We need semiconductors—they're important for artificial intelligence, they're important for national security. We need to decarbonize, and so electric vehicles and solar panels are important. So there are certain kinds of products which can help us meet national goals. But it is unrealistic to see manufacturing as a policy that is going to have a significant impact on the major problems of less educated Americans.

Both Biden and Trump are in a sense appealing to nostalgia for a world that no longer exists, in which manufacturing is a major driver of access to the middle class. They're about 30 to 40 years out of date because, as a result of both automation and the way we spend our money today, manufacturing has shrunk and is a relatively small part of our economy.

Q: Will tariffs help raise revenues, as the administration has claimed?

It's problematic, because the higher the tariffs that you impose, at some point the less revenue you're actually going to receive. The kind of estimates we're seeing from the administration are that they will raise $600 billion. I think that's an extremely optimistic view because as you make products more expensive, consumers will pay less or will be prepared to spend less on those imported products. In addition, one of the purposes of the tariffs is to get foreigners to come and invest in the United States. Well, if they do, they'll no longer be paying the tariff. So ironically, the long run achievement of goals like bringing a lot of investment into the United States to replace the imports is going to undermine the goal of raising revenue, and that's why it's very difficult to know exactly how much is going to be raised.

But it's important to point out that people, as they get richer, spend less and less on goods and more on services, and that means that tariffs have a regressive incidence because they take much more out of the pockets of poor Americans than they do of rich Americans. So to the degree that we now raise revenue using tariffs and use the money we save or the money we raise to reduce the taxes patented after the previous Trump tax cuts, this is an extremely regressive move for American households and the estimates are that the typical household is going to spend an additional $2,000 to $4,000, depending on which economist you believe.

There's also an exaggeration of the employment impact that you're going to get from tariffs. Let's take the example of a tariff on steel. You might create more jobs in the steel industry, but you will also raise input costs for the users of steel, and this in turn affects somewhere between 60 and 80 jobs for every one you save in the steel industry itself. So in the aggregate, the tariffs can be counterproductive, especially if they're put on inputs which are used in producing other products.

Q: Is the United States’ large trade deficit sustainable?

I think firstly there's an obsession with goods that isn't the right measure. What we ought to be looking at is not only our trade in goods, but also our trade in services, and we have a significant surplus in our trade in services. Therefore, when you aggregate the two together, you get a much smaller percentage and a smaller number relative to our GDP.

The second point is that we've been running deficits for 30 or 40 years, and what it means is that the United States is borrowing much more from the rest of the world than we lend, and therefore our net position has been declining over time. But remarkably, Americans earn more from, or earn just about as much from, their total investments abroad as foreigners earn in the United States. So if you look historically, we have felt no additional pressure about sustainability of our position. As long as we borrow the money and use it productively to increase investment in the United States, it is eminently sustainable, as with any investment.

Q: How would U.S. exports be impacted?

One of the effects of the tariffs is going to be over the medium term to strengthen the American dollar because Americans will need less foreign exchange in order to import, and when the dollar gets stronger, this affects all American exporters, whether they are exporting goods or whether they are exporting services.

A second point is that foreigners are not going to take these tariffs lying down. They are going to retaliate. Much of their retaliation can take the form of higher tariffs on American exports of goods, but in addition, foreigners are talking about levying taxes on the sales of American services and indeed some of the information technology company services that are being sold abroad. So there are going to be an adverse impact on exporters virtually any way you look—there are going to be higher input costs, they are going to have to sell into markets which are closing to them because of foreign retaliation, and the currency is going to get stronger and so their products are going to get more expensive.

“One view is that we’re increasingly going to see the United States separate from the rest of the world. The old debate was, do we decouple the West from China? The new debate is going to be, does the rest of the world really need the United States?”

Robert Lawrence

Q: The World Trade Organization was created to oversee international trade. What is its role now?

Since the late 1940s, under American leadership, a rules-based multilateral system has been operating, and its performance has been outstanding. It has been associated with increasing trade liberalization. It has allowed millions of people living in Asia and other poor countries to rise out of poverty, and by and large countries have respected its rules. This is how the WTO operated, I would say, until 2015 or so.

Since that time, the WTO’s attractiveness and its power have been considerably diminished. The United States, which had led this institution, became, under Donald Trump, its biggest violator. The most important principle is that all nations who belong to the World Trade Organization are “most favored.” That is to say they should all be treated equally. Secondly, America pledged to bind its tariff, as do all WTO members, at particular rates. And on average, these were around 3%. What the Trump moves indicate or represent a complete violation of those principles. It's treating trading partners completely differently, demanding reciprocity, which is a complete violation of the rules and raising tariffs at multiples of the rates which America pledged never to exceed.

In addition, the United States, starting back with President Obama, began to veto appointments to the WTO’s dispute settlement system. Today the appellate body no longer functions because they can't make appointments. So not only is the WTO in trouble because it cannot apply effective negotiations, it's also in trouble because it cannot enforce its rules.

Additionally, we’ve seen many regional trade agreements created in the past couple of decades. Some argued these were substitutes for the WTO, others that they were complementary, but they showed that the WTO no longer had a monopoly on where the rules were being written. There are certain regional agreements—in Asia in particular, but also in Africa—that are thriving today.

Another huge problem that has confronted the trading system is how we absorb a country that operates by different rules and is the largest exporter in the world: China. How can the more market-oriented western countries coexist in a single framework with China, particularly as Chinese exports have become increasingly disruptive of labor markets around the world. This has become a very salient issue. People are calling for different solutions, but it's widely recognized that the WTO is subject to huge stress because of the different views on how the system should operate.

Q: Are we in a global trade war? What does economic tell us will happen next?

At the moment, nobody knows. One view is that we're increasingly going to see the United States separate from the rest of the world. The old debate was, do we decouple the West from China? The new debate is going to be, does the rest of the world really need the United States?

We are, after all, only about 12% of world trade. And so, can the 88% just simply get along without us? What we can expect is that if these tariffs remain in place for a long time, the goods that would have come here from China and elsewhere are going to go to third markets, and this trade deflection could in turn give rise to protectionist pressures in those other countries. That's the great danger of whether the impact spreads to the rest of the world. Moreover, there are many countries, most notably our neighbors, Canada and Mexico, who are very dependent on the American market, and they're going to experience a slowdown and perhaps recessions, and in turn, their sluggishness can be spread to the rest of the world. So, in the long run, there are negative consequences that are likely to result from these measures.

Q: How would tariffs impact the dollar?

There are kind of two effects at play. If you ask what happens when you put on tariffs, generally the answer will be the exchange rate will strengthen. So, you would expect, as I said earlier, that the dollar will strengthen. On the other hand, if this is like a big supply shock and if we have a weak American economy, that in turn could cause an increase in the price level in the United States and could feed into wages so that the Federal Reserve has to slow down the economy. And investors may find the U.S. a less attractive place, and dollars become a less attractive currency to purchase. So, it's a very tricky thing to forecast over the medium term.

There's another question. The administration's position is to acknowledge that there may well be a slowdown and there may well be inflation, but this is short-term pain for a long-term gain because eventually these high tariffs are going to spur foreigners to come and set up their production facilities in the United States.

Firstly, even if this works, it will take a long time to plan a factory, to find the location, to get the permits, to find the workers. And it can be a very lengthy process—on the order of two to four years—before you start to see the fruits. And I don't think we would see significant effects before Donald Trump has left office.

Secondly, in order to make those investments, foreigners have to be convinced that these policies will remain permanent, but the way they've been rolled out and the kind of disruption they're going to cause is going to lead to a political reaction that is going to cause a lot of uncertainty. And with uncertainty, foreign investors are going to be unlikely to sink their capital into investments that are premised on the idea that the market will remain permanently protected.

Q: Are there concerns at all about the role of the dollar as the global reserve currency?

Yes, we have an amazing privilege in the United States. Traditionally, as soon as there's any trouble in the world, people flee to the safe haven of the U.S. dollar. Even after the 2008 financial crisis, despite the fact we caused it in our own housing market, the dollar strengthened. All of this is based on foreign faith that the United States is a strong economy and is governed by the rule of law. And what we're seeing today in a variety of places is that Americans are starting to question the validity of rulings by courts, and I think this is a significant impact. A second danger is that foreigners sometimes see their currency holdings used against them in the form of economic sanctions, and this undermines their willingness to hold the dollar as a reserve currency.

The full faith and credit of the United States is vital in sustaining our position as the central reserve currency of the world, and the kind of instability that we're seeing today stands as a threat. In addition, picking on our allies and taking these steps is severely undermining the goodwill that foreigners have towards the United States and their faith in the United States as an economy that is a model for them. The long run undermining of our soft power, as our colleague Joe Nye refers to it, will take its toll, and that in turn will impact people's confidence in the United States as a secure and safe haven.

Note: Harvard defunded 4/15

DECLINE and REVIVAL

DECLINE

REVIVAL

X06 X06 from WASHPOST

Trump pushes aides to go bigger on tariffs as key deadline nears

The president privately tells advisers that import duties represent a generational opportunity to transform the U.S. economy.

By Jeff Stein and Theodoric Meyer March 29, 2025 at 8:27 p.m. EDTyesterday at 8:27 p.m. EDT

President Donald Trump is pushing senior advisers to go bigger on tariff policy as they prepare for what the White House has called “Liberation Day,” the April 2 date he has set for a major escalation in his global trade war, four people familiar with the matter said.

Although many of his allies on Wall Street and Capitol Hill have urged the White House to take a more conciliatory approach, Trump has continued to press for aggressive measures to fundamentally transform the U.S. economy, the people said.

Trump’s advisers are in intensive deliberations about the exact scope of the import duties to be imposed, which officials have described as affecting trillions of dollars’ worth of trade.

The option viewed as most likely, publicly outlined by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent this month, would set tariffs on products from the 15 percent of countries the administration deems the worst U.S. trading partners, which account for almost 90 percent of imports. Trump has also moved forward with other tariffs that apply to imports from every country, but only on specific sectors. Trump applied 25 percent tariffs to all automobile imports on Wednesday and has suggested similar measures for the pharmaceutical and lumber industries, among others.

These proposals have led to a drop in the stock market and, economists say, raised the risks of a U.S. recession.

But Trump continues to muse to advisers that his administration should continue to escalate the trade measures and has in recent days revived the idea of a universal tariff that would apply to most imports, regardless of their country of origin, the people said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe private discussions.

In public and private, the president has said tariffs represent a win-win that will bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States and fill federal coffers with trillions of dollars in new revenue. He has also said he thinks he made a mistake in allowing advisers to talk him out of bigger tariffs during his first term, the people said, and that he thinks a single, simple duty on most imports could help prevent exemptions from weakening their impact. It’s unclear how seriously that proposal is being considered.

A White House spokesperson declined to comment.

The discussions reflect the central role Trump thinks tariffs play in cementing his legacy. Trump has publicly discussed the benefits of import taxes, characterizing “tariffs” as the “most beautiful” word in the dictionary and saying 19th-century tariffs led to the peak of the nation’s prosperity. Some allies have even mused about pushing to make the April 2 anniversary of the tariffs a federal holiday next year.

“Instead of Trump’s Birthday, make ‘Liberation Day’ a national holiday to honor the jobs, skills, and trade that returned to America and her workers,” Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist during his first term, told The Washington Post.

The deliberations come as concerns deepen among congressional Republicans, foreign allies and investors about Trump’s global trade wars. All three major stock indexes fell sharply Friday, which many analysts attributed in part to tariff escalation and in part to related inflation fears.

Trump has said April 2 will bring “reciprocal” trade tariffs, which he and his advisers have largely described as having the U.S. match the tariff rates trading partners charge on U.S. exports.

“There’s still a lot of options still on the table. They are considering everything and trying very hard to make the idea of a reciprocal tariff both understandable to the American public and effective,” said Wilbur Ross, Trump’s commerce secretary during his first term. “They are quite correctly exploring every alternative in the hope they come to the best possible solution.”

The discussions reflect the inherent contradictions in some of Trump’s trade promises — and have revealed the tensions among his allies over his economic policy priorities.

Traditional conservatives who have aligned themselves with Trump have been happy to applaud the tariffs as a bargaining chip — designed to force concessions from allies or trading partners, and then removed. This is the approach many congressional Republicans, whose top priority is extending the 2017 tax cuts, want the president to take. It also reflects a pattern Trump frequently followed in his first term.

Trump, however, has repeatedly said that tariffs should be an ongoing source of federal revenue — which would require them to be permanent, not subject to broader negotiations that could wipe them away. Other Trump allies want him to use tariffs to create long-term incentives for companies to onshore domestic production, regardless of the trade deals he reaches with overseas partners. Luring companies to move supply chains and factories to the United States, which would involve significant investments and big changes to their logistics, also probably requires the tariffs to be permanent, but might lead to a major downturn on Wall Street.

During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump spoke broadly enough about his intentions that each of these camps were able to believe he would ultimately do what they hoped. But as his ambitions begin to become reality, the differences between these visions are becoming clearer.

“At some point they’re going to have to choose a strategy, because several of these stated goals are in contradiction with each other,” said Erica York, an economist with the Tax Foundation, a center-right think tank. “You can’t have a tariff for everything and everyone — in time, they will have to reveal what the real purpose is.”

Trump, for now at least, appears to be trying to demonstrate that tariffs can accomplish several goals simultaneously. He said on Wednesday that new tariffs on automobile imports would last the duration of his term, and the White House said they would raise $100 billion. On Friday, speaking to reporters, he expressed openness to cutting deals with trading partners that fall under the tariffs. Advisers say he views either outcome — a permanent tariff, or a deal in which the U.S. extracts concessions — as a victory.

In an interview with NBC posted on Saturday, Trump said he “couldn’t care less” if carmakers raised prices as a result of the tariffs. “I hope they raise their prices, because if they do, people are going to buy American-made cars. We have plenty,” Trump said.

He also insisted that the new duties would be permanent. “The world has been ripping off the United States for the last 40 years and more. And all we’re doing is being fair, and frankly, I’m being very generous,” Trump said.

But some Republican lawmakers have grown particularly uneasy about projections that suggest growth will be lower in the second quarter of this year because of tariffs, according to three people who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations with members of Congress. Others are wary that the tariffs risk complicating the GOP’s focus on quickly passing an extension of Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, most of which will expire at the end of this year if no action is taken.

“We’re trying to steer Trump away from some of these protectionist tariffs — the steel and aluminum tariffs, for example, are not very effective. If you want to save manufacturing jobs, this is not the way to do it,” said Stephen Moore, a longtime ally of Trump’s who is co-founder of the Committee to Unleash Prosperity, which supports the tax cuts. “There’s danger all the tariff stuff is drowning out the tax stuff.”

Republicans in Congress remain loyal to the president but are growing increasingly concerned about the economic fallout. Some Republican senators expressed concerns during a lunch Tuesday with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer about the uncertainty over the tariffs, according to Sen. John Hoeven (R-North Dakota). Greer responded that he thought there would be more certainty after April 2 and that Trump’s approach was based on reciprocity and fairness, Hoeven said.

North Dakota farmers have not been hurt by the tariffs Trump has imposed to date, Hoeven said, but they are concerned about the potential effect of new ones. When Trump put tariffs on Chinese imports during his first term, his administration sent $23 billion to farmers hurt by the ensuing trade war — and Hoeven said he had already spoken with Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins about getting more aid if needed.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisconsin) said he was highly concerned about next week’s tariffs. He has heard from manufacturers and other constituents worried about them and has conveyed those concerns to the White House, he said. He described the tariffs as a double-edged sword: “They have a purpose, but they can do some great harm as well.”

“There’s a level of unease, but I think generally giving this president the benefit of the doubt because he’s done some pretty good things,” Johnson added.

Republicans are more likely to view tariffs as a temporary cudgel to force other countries to change their trade policies than as a way to pay for tax cuts and other Trump priorities.

“I don’t see it as a revenue-raiser,” Sen. Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota) said. “But I do see it as a way to bring jobs back into the U.S. economy.”

But some trade skeptics see a negotiated outcome that results in lower tariffs as reminiscent of the conventional trade liberalization approach that they blame for hollowing out American manufacturing communities. Instead of getting other nations to lower their trade barriers, these groups want the U.S. to protect its manufacturers by raising tariffs and discouraging imports. The nonpartisan Coalition for a Prosperous America, for instance, has called on the White House to impose an across-the-board 18 percent tariff on most goods.

“A reciprocal tariff system presented as a temporary negotiating tool to encourage other countries to lower their barriers runs directly counter to the president’s desire to rebuild America’s industrial base,” said Nick Iacovella, the group’s executive vice president.

Trump appears to be sympathetic to this approach, at least in part. He has talked about tariffs as causing short-term pain for the U.S. economy, suggesting they will not be quickly removed as part of a broader negotiation. But to what extent that view gets incorporated into policy remains to be seen.

“LIBERATION DAY IN AMERICA IS COMING, SOON,” the president posted on Truth Social at 1:39 a.m. Thursday. “FOR YEARS WE HAVE BEEN RIPPED OFF BY VIRTUALLY EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD, BOTH FRIEND AND FOE. BUT THOSE DAYS ARE OVER.”

RIPOFFS

X04 X04 from USA TODAY

Trump’s biggest round of tariffs is coming next week. Here is how it could shake up the economy

By Joey Garrison

WASHINGTON ― President Donald Trump's long-promised plan to shake up the economy arrives Wednesday as he prepares to unleash his most significant round of tariffs yet. He already has slapped duties on imports that have roiled markets and ignited a global trade war.

Two months into his White House return, Trump has imposed tariffs on goods from neighboring Canada and Mexico as well as China, all steel and aluminum imports, and foreign cars and auto parts. He's threatened several other countries including traditional allies in the European Union with other steep tariffs ‒ even on European wine.

Yet Trump has circled April 2 as the true culmination of his "American first" trade policy as he seeks to boost domestic manufacturing by making it more expensive for companies to ship products into the U.S.

That's when Trump is set to announce his reciprocal tariffs, which will apply to countries that are the largest contributors to the $1.2 trillion U.S. trade deficit. It will officially go into effect Thursday.

Here's what to know ahead of what Trump has called "the big one."

What are reciprocal tariffs?

Trump has said his administration's suite of reciprocal tariffs will apply to nations that charge fees on U.S. exports, promising to match those countries' duties with tariffs of the same rate.

On Feb. 13, Trump signed a memorandum that directed U.S. trade officials to go country by country and put together a slate of tailored counter measures.

WHY IS TRUMP PUSHING RECIPROCAL TARIFFS?

Trump has said the reciprocal tariffs will offset trade practices of other nations that his administration deems unfair, while encouraging companies to make products in the U.S. to avoiding having to pay the new fees.

In 2024, the U.S. imported $1.2 trillion more in goods than than it exported, a record trade deficit that Trump is aiming to shrink with his action.

Trump has complained the U.S. has allowed other nations to levy tariffs on U.S. exports without any consequences.

More: Trump says no need to speed car purchases to avoid tariffs because economy will ‘boom’

WHAT IS THE 'DIRTY 15?'

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent last week said the Trump administration beginning April 2 will apply a reciprocal tariff number to each country based on what they charge on U.S. exports.

He said the countries most impacted will be the 15% of nations that contribute most significantly to the U.S. trade deficit and impose the largest tariffs.

"There's what we would call the 'Dirty 15,'" Bessent said on Fox Business, adding they have substantial tariffs and other unfair trade barriers. "It's 15% of the countries, but it's a huge amount of our trading volume."

The White House has not released a list of the "Dirty 15" countries. But the countries with the largest trade deficits with the U.S. are China, the EU, Mexico, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Canada, India, Thailand, Switzerland, Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia and South Africa, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Bessent's remarks suggests the Trump administration could be narrowing the scope of the reciprocal tariffs from what Trump originally proposed.

And although Trump this week imposed tariffs on the auto industry, his administration is likely to exclude other sector-specific tariffs that Trump has previously discussed, according to recent reports from Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal.

More: Trump announces 25% auto tariffs amid rattled markets and a global trade war

This includes 25% tariffs on all semiconductor, microchips and pharmaceutical imports that Trump has said he intends to impose but has yet to carry out.

Asked on Friday if he expected to put any exemptions in place for life-saving medicines, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One while flying to South Florida, "Well, we'll be announcing it soon. But we have to bring pharmaceuticals, drugs and pharmaceuticals, back into our country."

The uncertainty continues a whiplash pattern when it comes to Trump’s aggressive use of tariffs, which he’s frequently threatened, only to quickly pull back, in multiple instances.

WHY IS TRUMP SUDDENLY CHANGING HIS TONE?

Amid growing economic anxieties at home and abroad, Trump this week downplayed the scale of the tariff rates in store for other nations ‒ a noticeable change in his tone after building the tariffs up for weeks.

"We’re going to make it very lenient," Trump reporters Wednesday in the Oval Office after signing the new auto tariffs. "I think people are going to be very surprised. It’ll be, in many cases, less than the tariff that they’ve been charging us for decades."

More: Auto tariffs can't realistically stick, even as Trump calls them permanent, say analysts

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt echoed that sentiment Thursday, telling reporters, “He thinks that some of these numbers would be more conservative than many people are expecting.”

COULD THE TARIFFS PUSH THE US INTO A RECESSION?

Economists worry large-scale reciprocal tariffs could further hurt a weakening economy and lead to higher prices for consumers. Tariffs are taxes on imports that companies typically pass down to customers.

More: Trump announces 25% auto tariffs. What it means for your next car purchase

He pointed to several consequences of the new levies: higher costs for low- and middle-income earners, a new tariff tax for U.S. businesses, retaliatory tariffs from other nations, and stock market struggles that would wipe out significant wealth of high-income earners critical to consumer spending.

"If I'm right, as that becomes evident, I do think it's likely there will be a pivot and backtrack on the tariffs and a declaration of victory," Zandi said. "So I don't know that we'll ultimately ever get to a recession, but we're going to get awfully darn close."

At the same time, Zandi said it's hard to speculate too much given the uncertainty from Trump's on-and-off again record with tariffs.

HOW IS WALL STREET REACTING TO A TARIFF PLAN THAT TRUMP CALLS 'LIBERATION DAY'?

Ahead of what Trump is calling "Liberation Day," the stock market plummeted Friday as investors sold off in response to Trump's trade policy and concerns about inflation.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped more than 700 points, or about 1.7%., its largest drop since March 10. The S&P 500 was down more than 100 points.

More: Stock market plunges on inflation, tariff uncertainty. Dow sheds 700 pts, Nasdaq 480 pts

Stock market gains that followed Trump's November election victory have been wiped out as Trump executes his trade policy.

Friday's selloffs came after news that inflation in February was 2.5% higher than a year ago, according to the Personal Consumption Expenditures Price Index, The Fed's preferred inflation measure. While that was in line with economists' forecasts, the important so-called core PCE, which excludes the volatile food and energy sectors, rose 2.8%, more than expectations for 2.7%.

HOW WILL OTHER COUNTRIES RESPOND TO THE TARIFFS?

Trump's reciprocal tariffs are likely to escalate a global trade war that is already building even before the announcement.

Canada and China hit back at Trump's recently imposed tariffs with retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports, while the European Union has threatened to do the same next month.

And Canadian Prime Minister Mike Carney responded to Trump's 25% tariffs on automobiles this week by saying the U.S. is "no longer a reliable partner" and vowing his nation will seek to do more business with other countries.

Automobiles that fall under the umbrella of imports protected in the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement ‒ a trade deal orchestrated by Trump in his first term ‒ won’t be subject to the full tariff rate. Instead, the U.S will only levy tariffs on the foreign parts that make up vehicles imported from Canada and Mexico.

More: Car-carrying ships send added cargo to US ahead of Trump's looming tariffs

Despite those carve-outs, Carney said Canada will announce new retaliatory tariffs next week, saying, “Nothing is off the table as we defend our workers and our country."

Leaders of Germany and France have also urged the EU to respond with retaliatory tariffs.

WHAT WILL TRUMP DO IF COUNTRIES RETALIATE?

Trump said Friday the U.S. will "absolutely" respond to any additional tariffs from Canada with more retaliatory tarrifs.

"Many countries have taken advantage of us ‒ the likes of which nobody even thought was possible, for many, many decades," Trump said. "That has to stop."

More: Trump's tariffs, trade war with China could worsen prescription drug shortages in US

Still, Trump said he had a "very good" phone call with Carney Friday.

Trump also told reporters many leaders of other nations agree with his argument on tariffs. "Many of them actually apologize. They said, 'Look, we have taken advantage (of the United States).'"

Trump did not identify the names of these leaders.

THE WORLD

X02 X02 also from TIME

Trump’s Promised ‘Liberation Day’ of Tariffs Is Upon Us. Here’s What It Could Mean for You

By JOSH BOAK / AP

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump says Wednesday will be “Liberation Day" — a moment when he plans to roll out a set of tariffs that he promises will free the United States from foreign goods.

The details of Trump's next round of import taxes are still sketchy. Most economic analyses say average U.S. families would have to absorb the cost of his tariffs in the form of higher prices and lower incomes. But an undeterred Trump is inviting CEOs to the White House to say they are investing hundreds of billions of dollars in new projects to avoid the import taxes.

It is also possible that the tariffs are short-lived if Trump feels he can cut a deal after imposing them.

“I’m certainly open to it, if we can do something," Trump told reporters. "We’ll get something for it.”

At stake are family budgets, America's prominence as the world's leading financial power and the structure of the global economy.

Here's what you should know about the impending trade penalties:

What exactly does Trump plan to do?

He wants to announce import taxes, including “reciprocal” tariffs that would match the rates charged by other countries and account for other subsidies. Trump has talked about taxing the European Union, South Korea, Brazil and India, among other countries.

As he announced 25% auto tariffs last week, he alleged that America has been ripped off because it imports more goods than it exports.

“This is the beginning of Liberation Day in America,” Trump said. “We’re going to charge countries for doing business in our country and taking our jobs, taking our wealth, taking a lot of things that they’ve been taking over the years. They’ve taken so much out of our country, friend and foe. And, frankly, friend has been oftentimes much worse than foe.”

In an interview Saturday with NBC News, Trump said it did not bother him if tariffs caused vehicle prices to rise because autos with more U.S. content could possibly be more competitively priced.

"I hope they raise their prices, because if they do, people are gonna buy American-made cars," Trump said. “I couldn’t care less because if the prices on foreign cars go up, they’re going to buy American cars.”

Trump has also suggested that he will be flexible with his tariffs, saying he will treat other nations better than they treated the United States. But he still has plenty of other taxes coming on imports.

The Republican president plans to tax imported pharmaceutical drugs, copper and lumber. He has put forth a 25% tariff on any country that imports oil from Venezuela, even though the United States also does so. Imports from China are being charged an additional 20% tax because of its role in fentanyl production. Trump has imposed separate tariffs on goods from Canada and Mexico for the stated reason of stopping drug smuggling and illegal immigration. Trump also expanded his 2018 steel and aluminum tariffs to 25% on all imports.

Some aides suggest the tariffs are tools for negotiation on trade and border security; others say the revenues will help reduce the federal budget deficit. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick says they will force other nations to show Trump “respect.”

What could tariffs do to the U.S. economy?

Nothing good, according to most economists. They say the tariffs would get passed along to consumers in the form of higher prices for autos, groceries, housing and other goods. Corporate profits could be lower and growth more sluggish. Trump maintains that more companies would open factories to avoid the taxes, though that process could take three years or more.

Economist Art Laffer estimates the tariffs on autos, if fully implemented, could increase per vehicle costs by $4,711, though he said he views Trump as a smart and savvy negotiator. The investment bank Goldman Sachs estimates the economy will grow this quarter at an annual rate of just 0.6%, down from a rate of 2.4% at the end of last year.

Mayor Andrew Ginther of Columbus, Ohio, said on Friday that tariffs could increase the median cost of a home by $21,000, making affordability more of an obstacle because building materials would cost more.

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro told “Fox News Sunday” that the auto tariffs would raise $100 billion annually and the other tariffs would bring in about $600 million per year, or about $6 trillion over 10 years. As a share of the economy, that would be the largest tax increase since World War II, according to Jessica Riedl, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has suggested that tariffs would be a one-time price adjustment, rather than the start of an inflationary spiral. But Bessent's conclusion rests on tariffs being brief or contained, rather than leading other countries to retaliate with their own tariffs or seeping into other sectors of the economy.

“There is a chance tariffs on goods begin to filter through to the pricing of services,” said Samuel Rines, a strategist at WisdomTree. “Auto parts get move expensive, then auto repair gets more expensive, then auto insurance feels the pressure. While goods are the focus, tariffs could have a longer-term effect on inflation.”

HOW ARE OTHER NATIONS THINKING ABOUT THE NEW TARIFFS?

Most foreign leaders see the tariffs as destructive for the global economy, even if they are prepared to impose their own countermeasures.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Trump's tariff threats had ended the partnership between his country and the United States, even as the president on Friday talked about his phone call with Carney in relatively positive terms. Canada already has announced retaliatory tariffs.

French President Emmanuel Macron said the tariffs were “not coherent” and would mean "breaking value chains, creating inflation in the short term and destroying jobs. It’s not good for the American economy, nor for the European, Canadian or Mexican economies.” Yet Macron said his nation would defend itself with the goal of dismantling the tariffs.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has avoided the tit-for-tat responses on tariffs, but she sees it as critical to defend jobs in her country.

The Chinese government said Trump's tariffs would harm the global trading system and would not fix the economic challenges identified by Trump.

“There are no winners in trade wars or tariff wars, and no country’s development and prosperity are achieved through imposing tariffs,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said.

HOW DID TRUMP LAND ON IT BEING CALLED "LIBERATION DAY"?

Based off Trump's public statements, April 2 is at least the third “liberation day” that he has identified.

At a rally last year in Nevada, he said the day of the presidential election, Nov. 5, would be “Liberation Day in America.” He later gave his inauguration the same label, declaring in his address: “For American citizens, Jan. 20, 2025, is Liberation Day.”

His repeated designation of the term is a sign of just how much importance Trump places on tariffs, an obsession of his since the 1980s. Dozens of other countries recognize their own form of liberation days to recognize events such as overcoming Nazi Germany or the end of a previous political regime deemed oppressive.

@alphebetize, excerpt and sort by region

X19 X19 from time

‘Nothing Is Certain but Uncertainty’: How the World Is Reacting to Trump’s Tariff Reversal

By Miranda Jeyaretnam

Hours after Donald Trump’s sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs—which were announced with much fanfare last week, jolting world leaders and roiling global markets—kicked in on Wednesday, the U.S. President pulled a 180.

Trump announced a 90-day pause on countries that have not retaliated, temporarily lowering the high tariffs on nearly all trading partners to a baseline 10%, while raising the tax rate on imports from China, which had retaliated with tit-for-tat hikes on U.S. imports, to 125%.

“I thought that people were jumping a little bit out of line, they were getting yippy,” Trump told reporters on Wednesday after the reversal. Although, he added, “nothing’s over yet.”

But while Trump allies like Bill Ackman praised the move, which stoked stock gains after a week of volatility, as “textbook, Art of the Deal,” others say the abrupt climbdown has only made things more confusing.

Here’s what to know about how countries around the world have begun responding to the whiplash.

Bangladesh

Muhammad Yunus, Bangladesh’s interim leader, thanked Trump for “responding positively to our request” for a pause. The U.S. is the biggest export market for Bangladesh, which had been hit hard by a 37% tariff. “We will continue to work with your administration in support of your trade agenda,” Yunus added.

China

Wang Wentao, China’s commerce minister, said at Thursday’s Special Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Economic Ministers’ meeting that China “firmly opposes” the U.S. tariffs and vowed to continue with countermeasures.

“If the United States is bent on waging a tariff war or trade war, China is ready to fight to the end,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian said at a Wednesday briefing, according to state-run newspaper People’s Daily.

Wang added that China is ready to strengthen its ties with ASEAN trading partners. Wang also reportedly spoke with E.U. Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security Maroš Šefčovič on Tuesday about the tariffs.

Lin also said at a Thursday press briefing that China “will not flinch” when a trade war comes, according to state news agency Xinhua. The Chinese government on Wednesday announced additional tariffs on the U.S., bringing the total baseline tariff rate on U.S. products up to 84%. The government also added six U.S. firms to its “unreliable entities list” and 12 U.S. firms to its “export control list.”

China has also filed a complaint against the U.S. with the World Trade Organization, according to People’s Daily.

“If the United States really seeks to resolve the issue through dialogue and negotiation, it should demonstrate an attitude of equality, respect and reciprocity,” Lin said.

Chinese State Media Rebuke Trump’s Tariffs With AI Song and Videos

uropean Union

President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen welcomed the tariff pause in a Thursday statement, calling it an “important step towards stabilising the global economy.”

Trump’s pause came hours after the European Union voted to approve retaliatory tariffs on $23 billion in goods, starting April 15, in response to Trump’s previously announced 25% tariffs on steel and aluminum—which remain in effect. The E.U. had also faced a 20% “reciprocal” tariff—which is now a baseline 10% tariff—on top of the metals tariff and a separate 25% tariff on cars and car parts.

“Tariffs are taxes that only hurt businesses and consumers,” von der Leyen added. “That’s why I’ve consistently advocated for a zero-for-zero tariff agreement between the European Union and the United States.”

The E.U. will diversify its trade partnerships with countries that “share our commitment to a free and open exchange of goods, services, and ideas,” even as it continues to seek negotiations with the U.S., von der Leyen said.

Von der Leyen added that the E.U. will also focus on lifting barriers in its own single market. “This crisis has made one thing clear: in times of uncertainty, the single market is our anchor of stability and resilience,” she said.

Germany

Germany’s chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz said Trump’s move is a “response to the determination of the Europeans.”

In an interview with broadcaster RTL Direkt, Merz said, “We are determined to defend ourselves,” echoing von der Leyen’s statement last week. “Unity helps,” Merz added.

Merz said a “trade conflict” would not benefit anyone. “Trump is currently seeing the problems of his tariff policy at home. The inflation rate is rising, imports are collapsing, and exports are experiencing major difficulties,” he added.

“The best thing is for us all to work together to achieve zero percent tariffs in transatlantic trade. And then the problem will be solved,” he said.

Greece

“There is a European message and then there is a Greek message,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis of Greece, which is a member of the E.U., told American conservative news network Breitbart on Wednesday. “On the European front there is a possibility of finding a win-win solution when it comes to trade, a solution which will be mutually beneficial.”

“As far as Greece is concerned, we have a strategic partnership with the U.S.,” he added. “I have worked with President Trump before and I can work very well with him again addressing regional challenges.”

India

An unnamed Indian government official told Reuters on Thursday that the country wants to move swiftly on a trade deal with the U.S., after Trump temporarily reduced a 27% “reciprocal” tariff on the country to 10%.

“India is one of the first nations to start talks over a deal with the United States and to have jointly agreed to a deadline to conclude it,” the official said.

Ireland

Simon Harris, the Tánaiste or second-ranking government leader of Ireland, a member of the E.U., said in a Wednesday statement that Trump’s pause “will come as a relief to many businesses in Ireland,” adding that “further engagement and clarification” is needed.

Harris’s comments came after a meeting the same day with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in Washington, D.C. Prior to the meeting, Harris said in a statement that “direct bilateral engagement with the United States is one of my priorities.”

He added that the meeting demonstrated “an openness on the part of the U.S. to engage” with negotiations.

In an earlier Wednesday statement prior to the pause, Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin said some Irish exporters had already seen U.S. orders “slowing or even drying up entirely, putting valuable and skilled jobs at risk.” Martin said he stood by the E.U.’s approach to safeguarding its interests while seeking negotiations.

Italy

Economy Minister Giancarlo Giorgetti said Italy, also a member of the E.U., welcomed Trump’s pause on tariffs. He told reporters in Rome on Wednesday: “Within the G7 all of us outside the U.S. spoke to try to calm the situation and find a way to bring the Trump administration to the table and to a reasonable position.”

Japan

Ryosei Akazawa, Japan’s Minister for Economic Revitalization who was hired this week to lead negotiations on U.S. tariffs after Japan was initially hit with a 24% “reciprocal” rate, told Bloomberg News on Thursday that the country’s “position is unchanged.”

“We continue to express our strong concerns and strongly request that they be reviewed,” he said, citing ongoing targeted tariffs on Japan’s metals and automobiles, key exports for the country.

On Wednesday, Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato ruled out using Japan’s U.S. Treasury holdings as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the U.S. Akazawa told Bloomberg that no specific dates have been set yet for a visit to Washington. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he will lead talks with Japan.

Malaysia

Malaysia’s Minister of Investment, Trade and Industry posted on LinkedIn that the country welcomes Trump’s pause on higher tariffs, even as “this volatility creates significant challenges for ASEAN economies.” Malaysia had been hit with a 24% “reciprocal” U.S. tariff, and other members, including Vietnam and Thailand, of ASEAN, which Malaysia holds the rotating chairship this year, also faced significant levies, which had briefly gone into effect on Wednesday after Trump’s initial announcement last week.

“Nothing is certain but uncertainty when it comes to Trump tariffs!” Tengku Zafrul Aziz said, adding that the latest development would be discussed at Thursday’s Special ASEAN Economic Ministers’ meeting. The meeting, which was scheduled prior to the pause, was intended to deliver a coordinated ASEAN response to Trump’s trade policies.

“Malaysia is actively assessing the implications of these changes and remains dedicated to collaborating with ASEAN partners to mitigate disruptions, enhance regional economic resilience, and advocate for balanced and predictable trade relations,” Zafrul wrote. “ASEAN unity and regional economic integration will be more crucial than ever before and we welcome the support of partners that share this vision and want to see us thrive.” Malaysia will continue to diversify its trade and develop new markets as a “hedge against the current uncertainties,” he added.

The 10 ASEAN member states and Timor-Leste agreed at Thursday’s meeting not to retaliate against Trump’s tariffs, which the association said “risk eroding the foundation of fair competition and mutual benefit that multilateralism is built upon,” and added that the 90-day pause will provide “a window of opportunity to find a pragmatic and mutually advantageous solution for ASEAN in a strategic and tactful manner.”

Poland

Prime Minister Donald Tusk of Poland, which is an E.U. member state, posted on X on Wednesday, “let’s make the best of the next 90 days.”

“Maintaining close transatlantic relations is a common responsibility of Europeans and Americans, regardless of temporary turbulences,” Tusk added.

On Monday, Tusk had posted in Polish on X, “The reaction to the tariff war was predictable. The stock market earthquake from Japan through Europe to America must be survived without nervous decisions. The Polish stock market also got a ricochet, but political and economic stability are our assets in this difficult time. We will calmly persevere!”

South Korea

South Korean trade envoy Cheong In-kyo said Thursday that the tariff pause provides room for negotiations. Cheong met with U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Tuesday about lowering tariff rates on South Korea.

The U.S. had imposed a 26% “reciprocal” tariff on South Korea, which is now down to the baseline 10%—although South Korea still faces blanket 25% tariffs on the auto industry, a key export.

Taiwan

Taiwanese Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung said Trump’s pause gives the country breathing room for negotiations. Lin told reporters at parliament on Thursday that during the 90-day pause, the two countries can “discuss Taiwan-U.S. economic and trade cooperation in a more detailed and in-depth manner.”

He added that Taiwan hopes to “take advantage of the huge U.S. market … to form a Taiwan-U.S. coalition, a joint fleet approach.”

On Thursday, Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te wrote in a Bloomberg News op-ed that Taiwan is “committed to strengthening bilateral cooperation in manufacturing and innovation,” in particular by encouraging Taiwanese businesses to expand their footprint in the U.S. and “deepening commercial ties” between Taiwanese and U.S. firms.

Lai emphasized the objective of “reducing all tariffs between Taiwan and the U.S.” He said Taiwan is willing to cut its tariff rate on U.S. products from an average nominal rate of 6% to 0%. Trump had imposed a 32% “reciprocal” tariff on Taiwan based on a calculation that Taiwan imposes 64% tariffs on the U.S., though Trump’s calculation was actually based on the trade deficit.

A bulk of Taiwan’s trade surplus with the U.S. is in its export of semiconductors, which accounts for around 40% of its total exports. The U.S. previously raised the threat of tariffs on the semiconductor industry but waived them when Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC)—the world’s largest chipmaker—pledged a $100 billion investment in the U.S. last month, after having previously already committed $65 billion in investment in April 2024 during the Biden Administration.

“All I did is say, ‘If you don’t build your plant here, you are going to pay a big tax. Twenty-five, maybe 50, maybe 75, maybe 100%,’” Trump said about his tariff threat on the Taiwanese semiconductor industry at a National Republican Congressional Committee dinner on Tuesday.

Taiwan will also increase its imports of U.S. goods, Lai wrote in his op-ed Thursday. “Over the past five years, rising demand for semiconductors and AI-related components has increased our trade surplus. In response to these market trends, Taiwan will seek to narrow the trade imbalance through the procurement of energy, agriculture and other industrial goods from the U.S.”

At the same time, Taiwan’s central bank chief Yang Chin-long warned at a Thursday parliamentary session that uncertainty remained in spite of the pause and that a U.S.-China trade war would still hurt the global economy.

U.K.

The U.K. will continue to “coolly and calmly” approach negotiations with the U.S., a spokesperson for Downing Street said Thursday.

Home Secretary Yvette Cooper told Sky News on Thursday that the government’s position “hasn’t changed.” The U.K.’s tariff rate also didn’t change with the pause, as the country previously already faced the baseline 10% “reciprocal” tariff rate that other countries have been temporarily reduced to.

“What we want to see,” Cooper said, “is a reduction in barriers to trade, so countries can trade effectively.”

Vietnam

The U.S. and Vietnam agreed to begin negotiations for a trade agreement, the Vietnamese government announced hours after Trump’s tariff pause on Wednesday. Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister Ho Duc Phoc said the two countries, which exchanged nearly $150 billion in goods last year, should work towards creating a framework to allow for mutual trade relations, according to the government’s official news channel.

Greer, the U.S. Trade Representative, confirmed that he met with Phoc on Wednesday to “discuss reciprocal trade and the vast economic opportunities in our bilateral relationship.” The U.S. is the biggest export market for Vietnam, which faced a 46% “reciprocal” tariff.

Vietnam had earlier offered to cut its tariff rates on U.S. goods to 0%, Trump said on Truth Social, but White House trade advisor Peter Navarro said the offer was not enough.

X29 X29 from DW

Trump tariffs: EU pauses countermeasures until July

By Srinivas Mazumdaru and Mahima Kapoor with Reuters, AFP, AP Published 15 hours ago

The EU said the bloc would hold off on retaliatory tariffs to allow "time" for negotiations. Meanwhile, Chinese President Xi Jinping said there are "no winners" in trade wars. DW has more.

https://p.dw.com/p/4t5c1

What you need to know

· The EU has confirmed a pause on retaliatory tariffs as negotiations progress

· Chinese President Xi Jinping said "there are no winners in in trade wars" ahead of a visit to Vietnam

· Markets were stable amid tariff exemption announced for some electronics

· Japan says Trump tariffs threaten to disrupt global order

Here are the latest global developments regarding the Trump tariffs on Monday, April 14:

5 hours ago5 hours ago

EU holds back tariff countermeasures as talks progress

Wesley Rahn

The European Commission on Monday said it would hold off on retaliatory tariffs on US goods worth €21 billion until July 14 "to allow time and space for EU-US negotiations."

The EU's pause will "take legal effect" on Tuesday, the European Commission said in a press statement.

EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said the bloc would suspend the countermeasures last week, and Monday's announcement makes it official.

The measures had been in response to US President Donald Trump's tariffs on EU steel and aluminium imports announced in February.

Trump also slapped a 20% universal tariff on EU goods, as part of his sweeping "reciprocal" tariff announcement on April 2.

The EU has not yet announced countermeasures to that planned tariff regime, and has said it prefers to avoid retaliation.

On April 9, hours after the universal tariffs went into effect, Trump said the levies for most countries would be paused for 90 days. This included all universal tariffs impacting the EU.

EU trade commissioner Maros Sefcovic is in Washington Monday for talks with US counterparts to take steps towards hammering out an agreement before the 90 days expire.

"The EU considers US tariffs unjustified and damaging, risking economic harm to both sides, as well as the global economy," the commission said.

US making progress with EU on tariffs, White House adviser says

6 hours ago6 hours ago

US making progress with EU on tariffs, White House adviser says

The United States and the European Union are making enormous progress in trade talks, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett said.

"There have been a lot of discussions with the EU," Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, told Fox Business Network. "We're making enormous progress. It's going to be very good for American workers, especially American auto workers," he added.

US President Donald Trump also targeted the European Union when he announced sweeping tariffs on US trading partners on April 2.

Trump, however, made a climbdown last week and declared a 90-day pause in the implementation of higher duties on many countries, leaving just a global baselines 10% tariff intact.

Following Trump's tariff reprieve, Brussels decided to delay its own retaliation plans, opening the door for talks between the US and the EU.

13 hours ago13 hours ago

China's exports jumped ahead of Trump's 'Liberation Day'

Chinese exports soared higher than expected in March, according to data released on Monday, as businesses rushed to release goods before Trump's staggering tariffs kicked in.

Exports jumped 12.4% when compared to March of 2024. This was more than double the 4.6% rise expected by experts surveyed by Bloomberg.

Meanwhile imports fell 4.3% year-on-year, an improvement on the first two months of the year, which signals that consumption in China may be on a rebound.

"At present, China's exports are indeed facing a complex and severe external situation, but the sky will not fall down," Lyu Daliang, a spokesman for the General Administration of Customs, said in a news conference after the data was released.

However, analysts said the export is likely to take a hit as businesses feel the pressure from the tariffs.

"The strong export data reflect front-loading of trade before the US tariffs were announced," Zhiwei Zhang, head of Pinpoint Asset Management said in a note. "China's exports will likely weaken in coming months as the US tariffs skyrocket," he said, adding that uncertainty was extremely high.

Julian Evans-Pritchard, head of China economics at Capital Economics also expects shipments to "drop back" over the coming months. "It could be years before Chinese exports regain the current levels," he said in a note to investors.

Xi Jinping arrives in Hanoi

Chines leader Xi Jinping has arrived in Vietnam for the first leg of his Southeast Asia tour. With his arrival, came his warning: protectionism "leads nowhere."

A line of well-wishers stood outside the airport waving Chinese flags as Xi gears for a meeting which Beijing says will bear "major importance" for the region.

Upon arrival, Xi said he looked forward to an "in-depth exchange of views with Vietnamese leaders on issues concerning ties between the two parties and countries that have a global impact," Chinese state news agency Xinhua reported.

15 hours ago15 hours ago

Japan PM warns US tariffs could disrupt global economic order

This was the strongest warning the Japanese PM has issued against Trump's tariffs so farImage: Masamine Kawaguchi/Yomiuri Shimbun/AP/picture alliance

Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba told the country's parliament on Monday that US tariffs have the potential to disrupt the world economic order and that the nation must seek common ground with the US.

"I am fully aware that what's happened so far has the potential to disrupt the global economic order," Ishiba told the parliament.

"In negotiating with the United States, we need to understand what's behind Trump's argument both in terms of the logic and the emotional elements behind his views," he said.

The leader added that the government was not looking to issue a supplementary budget at the moment but will remain ready to cushion the economic blow from Trump's tariffs.

On Thursday, Tokyo and Washington will start bilateral trade talks which will also cover tariffs and non-tariff barriers to exchange rates. The talks are likely to happen between Japanese Finance Minister Katsunobu Kato and US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

Economic Revitalization Minister Ryosei Akazawa will also visit Washington for the negotiations this week, Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba told lawmakers.

"As some tariffs have already taken effect, Japanese companies' profits are being cut day by day," Akazawa said in parliament on Monday.

"The sooner (the issue is addressed), the better," he said. "I will do my best, bearing in mind what's best for our national interests and what is most effective," he said.

Japan is facing a 24% tariff on goods exported to the US, along with a 25% tariff on automobiles which took affect in April.

Xi tells Vietnamese media: 'No winners in trade wars'

Chinese President Xi Jinping reiterated China’s position on US President Donald Trump’s trade war, in an article published in Vietnam’s Communist Party newspaper Nhandan on Monday.

"There are no winners in trade wars and tariff wars, and protectionism has no way out," he wrote.

The piece was published ahead of Xi’s arrival in Hanoi, Vietnam as he kicks off a three-nation tour to Southeast Asia.

While the visit has been planned for weeks, it comes as Beijing faces a 145% tariff on its goods exported to the US and has in turn imposed a 125% tariff on the US.

The Chinese President called for stronger ties with Vietnam, a key manufacturing hub in the region which exports a majority of its goods to the US. Hanoi is facing a 46% US customs duty which will come into effect in July, but is in negotiations with Washington for a reduction.

On the other hand, it imports most of its goods from China. Hanoi is working on increasing the added value on imports to justify the ‘Made in Vietnam’ tag, under pressure from Washington.

Vietnam's customs data show a long-term trend in which imports from China closely mirror the value and swing of exports to Washington.

"The two sides should strengthen cooperation in production and supply chains," Xi said, urging more trade and stronger ties with Hanoi on artificial intelligence and the green economy as well.

Asian stocks rebound on electronics tax exemption

Asian stocks rose as investors were partially tempered by Trump's weekend announcement of an exemption of tariffs on electronics.

In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 Index was up 1.6% while in Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index rose 2.4%. The Shanghai Composite Index also rose 0.8% on Monday morning. Stocks in Sydney, Seoul, Singapore, Taipei and Manila also went up.

The slight relief comes after extreme market volatility seen last week in the wake of the US President's tariff flip-flops and counter-tariffs by China.

However, Trump dampened the rebound, saying the exemptions had been misconstrued. He wrote on his Truth Social platform that "NOBODY is getting 'off the hook'... especially not China which, by far, treats us the worst!" He said he would announce new tariffs on semiconductors "over the next week".

The US dollar extended its losses against major currencies with the Euro at a three-year high and the Swiss Franc at its strongest in 10 years.

In a clear sign of ongoing investor trepidation, gold hit a new peak of $3,245.75 on Monday.Gold is a go-to asset in times of uncertainty, but the weak dollar has also helped its rising value.

Boston Federal Reserve's chief Susan Collins told the Financial Times that officials would "absolutely be prepared" to deploy various tools to help stabilize the financial markets if required.

Trump doubles down on keeping US Steel American-owned

US President Donald Trump said he does not think a foreign company should control US Steel, repeating his views on the $15 billion bid by Japan's Nippon Steel to buy the US firm.

He made the comments to reporters on Air Force One late on Sunday as he returned from his Florida estate to the White House.

On Wednesday, Trump had said he did not want to see US Steel "go to Japan," sending the company's shares down 7%.

In February, Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba met in person and discussed the deal.

"The difference between acquisition and investment must be carefully examined in light of the US law, but there must surely be a point where it (US Steel) remains as an American company, and where Japanese interests can also be realized," Ishiba said in a parliament session.

The deal between Nippon Steel and US Steel, first announced in December 2023, has faced headwinds from the beginning. Even former US President Joe Biden asserted that US Steel should remain American-owned.

CANADA and MEXICO

CHINA

X22 X22 from guk

Life in Shanghai, China’s commercial capital, goes on but anti-US sentiment is hardening

Chinese companies are relieved Trump’s wider tariffs have been paused but on social media, posts are full of defiance

Amy Hawkins in Shanghai Fri 11 Apr 2025 00.43 EDT

On Thursday morning in Shanghai, as shoppers filled the luxury malls and delivery drivers whizzed around the winding streets at breakneck speed, financiers breathed a cautious sigh of relief. Overnight, US President Donald Trump had reversed course, announcing a 90-day pause on his so-called “reciprocal tariffs” of up to 50% for dozens of countries. Although China got no such reprieve – instead, the levy on Chinese goods was increased to 145% – the temporary return of normal trade channels showed Chinese businesspeople that all was not lost.

Trump’s announcement of punitive tariffs on countries across south-east Asia had risked closing off the routes that Chinese companies have been using since his first term in office to circumvent his levies.

Since 2017, thanks to tariffs on Chinese goods, the share of China’s exports bound for the US has dropped from about 20% to less than 15%. But much of that trade has simply been re-routed through third countries, as Chinese firms set up shop in places with cheaper labour costs and easier access to the US market.

Chinese foreign direct investment in Asean countries reached $24bn in 2023, up from less than $10bn in 2017. Several of China’s major solar companies have shifted manufacturing to south-east Asia. So despite the fact that “made in China” solar panels are virtually nonexistent in the US market, 80% of the US’s solar panels come from Malaysia, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand. Next week, President Xi Jinping will visit Vietnam, Malaysia and Cambodia, on his first official foreign trip this year.

Hobbling those countries’ ability to export to the US would inflict more true economic pain on Chinese companies than bilateral tariffs ever could. So in Shanghai, China’s commercial capital, a return to a narrowly US-China trade war, while still unwelcome, is some comfort.

But on the ideological front, the mood in China is hardening over Trump’s imposition of 145% tariffs. State media and the foreign ministry have been sharing a clip of the former US president Ronald Reagan decrying tariffs in 1987. On X, foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning has been trolling the US, posting a meme of a Make America Great Again baseball cap increasing in price from $50 to $77.

The most telling propaganda has been the resurfacing of a video clip of former Chinese leader Mao Zedong from 1953. “As to how long this war will last, we are not the ones who can decide,” Mao says. “No matter how long this war is going to last, we will never yield,” he says to applause.

Mao was referring to the Korean war, a conflict which is remembered in China as a time when China successfully stood up to the US through China’s support of North Korea. But in 2025, the combative rhetoric is being applied to the trade war, in which China has vowed to “fight to the end”. With suggestions from influential commentators that China might suspend cooperation with the US on fentanyl control as a retaliation for the tariffs, some are comparing the present moment to the Opium Wars, which were fought over an unsavoury mix of addictive opiates and anger about trade imbalances – just like in 2025.

Ren Yi, an influential commentator who writes under the name Chairman Rabbit, wrote on Thursday: “The trade war is a war of public opinion, public sentiment, and information … China should adopt a ‘wartime’ state of tension in terms of public opinion, and all sectors should move in one direction and one goal. This issue is by no means a joke.”

There is an ominous sense that the US-China relationship could still get worse. On Thursday, in a largely symbolic move, China said it would restrict the import of Hollywood movies. China’s tariffs on US goods were increased on Friday to 125%. Six US companies have been added to Beijing’s list of “unreliable entities”, restricting their ability to do business in China.

Discussion on Chinese social media, massaged by censors to ensure only the most nationalist comments are prominent, are full of defiance and bombast. One meme joked that Trump’s new slogan should be “MCGA” – Making China Great Again.

But some commentators have warned against rampant nationalism on the Chinese side. In a recent essay published in Chinese media, Zheng Yongnian, a professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in Shenzhen, wrote: “We must not underestimate the vitality of American society. The vitality of the United States has never been in the government, but in society and capital.

“There are still a large number of people in domestic media, especially social media, who feel that they have ‘won’,” Zheng wrote. “This is very dangerous. If this happens, we will be confused by the west … and in the end will make strategic mistakes.”

Offline, some fear, that without the linchpin of trade keeping the US and China on co-operative terms, the reasons for avoiding more dangerous conflicts, such as war in the Taiwan Strait or the South China Sea, are becoming less compelling.

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You Think Tariffs Are Bad? Wait Till You See What's Next.

By Adam Michel | ContributorApril 14, 2025, at 4:52 p.m.

The Tax Hike Looming After Tariffs

Trump Is Right About Tariffs on China

Former ambassador to Beijing: Tariffs are a tool to counter China’s unfair industrial policies that threaten us all.

Jorge Guajardo Jan. 28, 2025

What Trump Doesn’t Get About Tariffs

International trade doesn’t work the way the White House thinks it does.

Kimberly Clausing April 8, 2025

Adam N. Michel is director of tax policy studies at the Cato Institute, a nonpartisan think tank supporting individual liberty, limited government, free markets and peace.

Tags: taxes, tax cuts

X27 X27 from reuters

How China went from courting Trump to ‘never yield’ tariff defiance

By Reuters

April 14, 20256:49 AM EDTUpdated 10 hours ago

· Summary

· Companies

· After unsuccessfully courting Trump, Beijing takes hardline stance on trade

· China orders foreign affairs and commerce officials to cancel vacations

· Trump says China has panicked

· China tried to rally international support against tariffs

BEIJING/WASHINGTON, April 13 (Reuters) - China has put civilian government officials in Beijing on “wartime footing” and ordered a diplomatic charm offensive aimed at encouraging other countries to push back against U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs, according to four people familiar with the matter.

Communist Party propaganda officials have played a leading role in framing China’s response, one of the people said, with government spokespeople posting defiant clips on social media featuring former leader Mao Zedong saying “we will never yield.”

As part of the “wartime” posture, the details of which are being reported by Reuters for the first time, bureaucrats in the foreign affairs and commerce ministries have been ordered to cancel vacation plans and keep mobile phones switched on around the clock, two of the people said. Departments covering the U.S. have also been beefed up, including with officials who worked on China’s response to Trump’s first term, they said.

The combative all-of-government approach after Trump’s “Liberation Day" salvo marked a hard turn for Beijing, which had tried to avoid a spiralling trade war. For months, Chinese diplomats had tried to establish a high-level channel of communication with Trump’s administration to defend what China’s cabinet has described in state media campaigns as a “win-win” trading relationship.

Optimistic Chinese observers even held out hope for a grand bargain with Trump over trade, TikTok – and perhaps even Taiwan.

This account of how China shifted from seeking a deal to punching back with retaliatory tariffs and threatening all-out defiance is based on interviews with more than a dozen people, including U.S. and Chinese government officials, as well as other diplomats and scholars briefed on bilateral exchanges.

Four of them also described how Beijing's diplomats have been engaging other governments targeted by Trump tariffs, including sending letters seeking cooperation to several countries. Longstanding U.S. allies in Europe, Japan and South Korea have also been contacted, two people said.

Most of the people spoke on condition of anonymity to describe confidential government deliberations.

"China is a responsible major country. We stand up against hegemony, not only to safeguard our own rightful interests, but also to uphold the common interests of the international community," the Chinese foreign ministry said in a faxed statement.

It added that, "This trade war was started by the U.S. and imposed on China... If the U.S. really wants to resolve the issue through dialogue and negotiations, it should stop applying extreme pressure. Any dialogue should be established on the basis of equality, mutual respect and mutual benefit."

The South Korean and Japanese embassies in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment on talks between their countries and China.

After the initial Chinese retaliation, Trump said: "China played it wrong, they panicked - the one thing they cannot afford to do!” He has also suggested that Beijing wanted to make a deal but “they just don't know how quite to go about it."

U.S. officials have also blamed China for the impasse because its trillion-dollar trade surplus with the world is the result of what they see as abuses of the global commerce system that haven’t been successfully addressed through years of negotiations.

Trump on April 2 stunned the world with massive tariffs that he said would prevent countries like China from “ripping off” the U.S. Chinese leader Xi Jinping ditched official caution and issued a patriotic message casting doubt on whether American voters could bear as much hardship as the Chinese.

The “Liberation Day” levies have since been suspended for all countries except China for 90 days. With some exceptions, trade of goods between China and the U.S. is now largely frozen, and Beijing is starting to crack down on trade of services, while warning its citizens against travel to the U.S. and putting curbs on import of American films.

POLITE START AND A QUICK STALL

Even after Trump was elected on the promise of high tariffs, relations with Beijing got off to a polite start. Trump invited Xi to his inauguration, which was eventually attended by Chinese Vice President Han Zheng.

Things started deteriorating soon after.

During the first Trump administration, Beijing had several high-level channels of communication, most notably between then-ambassador Cui Tiankai and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

There isn’t an equivalent channel this time around, according to a Beijing official familiar with Sino-American ties, adding that China wasn’t sure who spoke for Trump on their relationship.

A Trump administration official said in response to Reuters' questions that the U.S. had "made clear to China that we want working-level contact to continue... but will not engage for the sake of engagement and in dialogues that do not advance American interests."

Chinese ambassador to the U.S. Xie Feng made unsuccessful attempts before the election to reach Trump’s billionaire ally Elon Musk, said a U.S. scholar who recently visited China for unofficial exchanges that Beijing has historically used to communicate with Washington policymakers.

Musk didn’t immediately return a request for comment.

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi tried to meet Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a China hawk who is sanctioned by Beijing, during a February visit to New York to chair a United Nations session but did not secure a meeting. There has been no publicly disclosed exchange between the two sides’ top diplomats beyond a frosty phone call in late January.

Wang was also unsuccessful in his efforts to meet on that trip with National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, said a person familiar with the matter. Wang had held numerous talks with Waltz’s predecessor, Jake Sullivan, including an exchange that led to a rare prisoner swap.

In an interview with ABC News on Sunday, U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said there have been initial discussions through intermediaries between the U.S. and China.

"We all expect that the President of United States and President Xi of China will work this out," Lutnick said.

China's commerce ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Lutnick's remarks.

Trump told reporters this week that he would be willing to meet Xi, whom he also described as a friend. He has not detailed any specifics of a possible deal.

The Trump administration official said the U.S. had repeatedly asked Chinese diplomats if Xi would request a phone call with Trump and “the answer has consistently been ‘no.’”

International relations expert Zhao Minghao at Shanghai’s Fudan University said such outreach “totally doesn’t work in terms of the Chinese policymaking system.”

“For the Chinese side, usually there is agreement and work on the working level and then we can arrange the summit,” he said.

The way “countries which have tried to negotiate have been treated so far this year also certainly has not done much to encourage China to sit down at the table,” said Lynn Song, Chief Economist for Greater China at ING Bank.

There are some ongoing conversations between lower-level officials on both sides, according to one Chinese and three U.S. officials, though some working groups put in place by the Joe Biden administration to deal with commercial disputes, as well as treasury and military issues have been frozen.

LESSONS LEARNED

While many countries were hit by U.S. tariffs this month for the first time, China honed its response during previous bouts of the Sino-American trade war.

Drawing on lessons from Trump’s first term, China created a retaliatory playbook that includes tariffs as well as restrictions on about 60 U.S. companies and curbs on exports of rare earths.

The effort was a result of weeks of preparations by Chinese government officials who had been tasked with studying Trump’s policies and suggesting countermeasures that could be gradually scaled up, according to two people familiar with the situation.

Xi opted for a strong response, hitting back with across-the-board levies even before Trump’s announced tariffs went into effect. The duties were announced shortly before Wall Street opened on April 4 - a public holiday in China. U.S. equities dropped sharply lower.

One Chinese official briefed on the deliberations described the unusually swift response as akin to COVID pandemic-era decision making that was carried out without the customary sign offs by all relevant departments.

Some Chinese opinion leaders appeared to suggest off-ramps in the trade war.

Ren Yi, a political blogger with nearly 2 million followers on the Weibo microblogging platform said in an April 8 post that countermeasures “do not require a broad increase in tariffs on American goods.”

Ren, whose grandfather was a prominent reformist leader in the 1980s, suggested targeted moves like suspension of fentanyl cooperation and further restrictions on agricultural imports and movies.

China’s finance ministry said Friday that with tariffs on U.S. goods now at 125%, it will stop matching any future hikes in duties by Washington, whose tariff strategy it branded a “joke”.

‘NEVER YIELD’

China’s foreign ministry has summoned many of the heads of its overseas missions back to Beijing for a special meeting held this week to coordinate the response, according to two Beijing-based diplomats.

China has also sent formal letters to government officials of other countries pressured by Trump to engage in trade negotiations.

The letters, which were described to Reuters by four people familiar with their contents, outlined the Chinese position as well as the need for multipolarity and for countries to stand together. The messaging also included criticism of U.S. policy that echoed China's public statements.

China has approached some G20 governments with wording for a joint declaration voicing support for the multilateral trading system, an EU diplomat told Reuters.

But the diplomat said that the messaging did not address concerns also held by non-U.S. governments about Chinese overcapacity, its subsidy regime and alleged unfair competition.

Beijing has said those concerns are overblown and that the rise of its high-tech industries is due to its comparative advantages and benefits the world.

China is also heavily focused on the domestic reaction to the tariffs, with social media users this week widely reposting an April 7 editorial in the official People’s Daily warning against panic.

China has also recently started encouraging households to spend more and has dramatically changed its language about domestic consumption. Beijing is aiming to shift the engine of growth from exports to consumers at a time when the economy remains hobbled by a crisis of failed real estate development.

“The real battlefield is on the domestic front, rather than bilateral negotiations,” said Zhao of Fudan University.

Chinese officials also published on Musk’s X platform a clip of Chairman Mao giving a speech in 1953 - the last time the U.S. and China were in direct military conflict during the Korean War.

In the clip, Mao, whose oldest son died in the war, says peace is up to the Americans.

“No matter how long this war is going to last, we’ll never yield,” he said. “We’ll fight until we completely triumph.”

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