Anti-climate tariffs
this post was submitted on 10 Jun 2024
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Will the components still come from China?
What do you think?
Of course they will ๐คฃ
Tariffs make us all poorer in the long run. Did we learn nothing in the 20th century?
One of the lessons we are learning the hardest way possible is that moving all your industrial base over seas to a country with autocratic tendencies makes you dependent on them, while also removing skill and knoedge from your country resulting in long term risk and damage.
Capital moves easily, supply lines do not. The 0 covid policy showed that this dependence on only china is dangerous for companies. And since companies are generally risk averse they will start spreading across more countries.
Tariffs make us all poorer in the long run. Did we learn nothing in the 20th century?
A bold statement without any economic or political context. It is Tthngs like that which make the foundation of misinformation and disinformation imo, and, in that case, play into the hands of Chinese disinformation campaigns.
And you don't think it will make people poorer to let China do the Amazon thing for everything?
It is impossible to compete when the playing field is not level. If state subsidies, energy production, co2 impact (not bullshit certificates and offsetting) could be equalized, then tariffs wouldn't be so badly needed.
I too would like to have no VAT, import tax etc, and for everyone to get along nicely. The reality is, that we live in a highly competitive world where major powers are fighting for control over critical industries and raw resources.
So let them compete, isn't that the idea? Countries and economies can compete with each other just like companies do. China can subsidize their EVs, America can subsidize its defense industry and corn, Europe can subsidize cheese and wine or whatever it is they make, each country specializes and offers the best product at the cheapest prices for consumers. Or make WTO have more 'stick' and less carrot so we can make countries stop subsidizing their own industries.
Either way, a return to trade tariffs and isolationism doesn't sound great to me. It sounds like everything getting more expensive and less efficient (and therefore, more environmentally wasteful). It also sounds like countries being less dependent on each other, which means less reason to not go to war. We live in a very rare, peaceful time in human history. International trade (and massive technological/scientific breakthroughs) are a major part of that.
@makeasnek, this may be fine if and when all countries apply to the same rules, but this is not the case. China is heavily protecting its market, and they do so much more than the EU or the US. In China, foreign companies can't even run a subsidiary in the country, they need a Chinese parther firm to create a joint venture. Recent Chinese 'security laws' even make simple market research almost impossible as it may be seen as 'espionage' by China, which made many consulting firms close their Chinese offices. And these are just two examples.
Good. But European firms must also stop putting European intellectual property and national security at risk by outsourcing the making of sensitive technology to China or other countries, and Chinese and other foreign companies shouldn't be allowed to take over European companies (the latter being a corresponding rule in China for foreign companies btw).
Volvo already is a Chinese brand because it's owned by Geely. It's not an independent Swedish car maker that just happened to outsource production to China.
It is chinese owned but Volvo is still a thing in Sweden. Geely bought them(Volvo Cars), gave them infinite money, so that Volvo could design and make cars like the 2nd gen xc90. In return Geely acquired the technology and know how on how to make quality cars.
Nowadays, Volvo can combine their world leading car design with Geely's electric vehicle platforms. Thats how you get a car like upcoming volvo ex30, that is cheap and (probably) good.
When Volvo was owned by Ford, it was about to go the way of the Dodo(aka Saab). Geely saved it and made it a competitive car brand.
GM killed off SAAB for no good reason. We could have had Koenigsegg as the owner of SAAB.....
GM almost killed Opel, until Peugeot saved them.
I don't know how GM operates but it doesn't look healthy.
I moved to sweden and this is one of the things i hate. Think of any big swedish company. Its probably not swedish anymore. Skype-sold, volvo(cars)-sold, ikea-registered in another country so they dont pay taxes, etc
Edit: then theres H&M and all the fucked up shit they do...