- cross-posted to:
- worldnews@lemmy.ml
- news@beehaw.org
- cross-posted to:
- worldnews@lemmy.ml
- news@beehaw.org
Summary
In a virtual speech at the World Economic Forum, Trump suggested Canada could become a U.S. state to avoid his proposed tariffs on imports.
The remark elicited gasps from the audience.
Trump claimed the U.S. does not need Canadian lumber, energy, or vehicles, vastly overstating the trade deficit between the two nations.
He reiterated his intention to impose tariffs, potentially as high as 25%, on imports from Canada and Mexico starting February 1.
Economists warn such tariffs would raise prices for U.S. consumers.
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Ummmm… we’ll take the tariffs. Some offense, Americans. (jk love you guys)
Idk, some offense maybe. Not super pleased about half the US voting for a guy threatening to invade us.
Stern uncomfortable eye contact, then.
Perfect
Reminder that Tariffs dont work as a threat to other nations.
The selling price is the same for the seller, they already give the lowest price they can profit from because the modern era allows international distributors to find a demand anywhere, the buyers are the ones paying the import tax for the same goods.
If you were selling and then the buyer had a tariff you wouldn’t just agree to take less money as a result.
That’s not strictly true, they don’t “pay the tariff” obviously but they do have to balance profit margin and lost sales. Tariffs are likely to decrease number of sales which does hurt their bottom line, the question then is if they just take a loss in sales, cut into their profit margins trying to lower the price to the US (very unlikely the margins are nearly enough for this to be viable let alone preferable) or increase prices further to offset the lower sales. Probably will be mostly the former with raw material type goods and mostly the latter with high end finished goods.
Right, that’s what I was thinking. Surely it hurts the seller. But it also hurts the buyer, so it’s like 🙄 well done, Trump…
Isn’t the point to make the domestic customers choose products from other nations? Why wouldn’t that be a threat to the nation that is selling?
Idk but Trump just tried to threaten Canada with them so clearly some Americans don’t know.
Sorry, you lost me there.
Yeah but it only really works if it’s targeted. Threatening blanket tariffs on countries that represent 60% of all imports (EU, China, Mexico, Canada) takes a bit of the impact away, it’s unlikely domestic production could handle all that. Even if it could, why wouldn’t American companies raise their prices as much as they felt they now could?
Probably true. I don’t know enough to speak further down this line. 😅 But I thank you for joining and sharing that! Interesting!
I think it’s a “threat” but not a very good one.
There might be 3 brands of toothbrush available to buy in the US but maybe all of them are manufactured in China. If you just tariff everything from China then US consumers will just pay more because there’s no incentive for manufacturers to absorb the tariff.
It’s a threat to Chinese toothbrush manufacturers because it creates an incentive for other manufacturers to pop up elsewhere, maybe someone will start manufacturing toothbrushes in the US. These toothbrushes would be cheaper than the tariffed ones for consumers to buy, but obviously more expensive than toothbrushes used to be before the tariffs.
In summary, because consumers are unlikely to buy less toothbrushes, they just end up paying more.
These toothbrushes would be cheaper than the tariffed ones for consumers to buy, but obviously more expensive than toothbrushes used to be before the tariffs.
I think this is my whole point? You’d obviously buy the cheaper one of the products are (fairly) identical. So the Chinese product is disregarded, and thus that market is being hurt.
Sure ok but to make that point you have to skip over all the other significant impediments to this plan.
You need to build, staff, and supply a local manufacturing plant for toothbrushes.
This is no small thing and not something that can be created overnight. It’s not even as simple as “building” a factory… you need the supply chain, and most of the requisite supplies probably come from China - plastic to make the brush head, plastic to make the handles, machines to form the plastic, and technicians to maintain those machines. If you want to invent all these things locally and avoid the retaliatory tariffs from China, that’s going to take decades.
During those decades consumers will be buying the tariffed Chinese toothbrushes wondering why the fuck everything from toothbrushes to shampoo to laundry powder to televisions costs twice as much as it does in any other country.
So my whole point is, there’s a “threat” to Chinese producers but it’s not very likely to materialise because the US will lose the political will to maintain the tariffs long before locally made products appear.
I was thinking more along the lines of choosing other manufacturers that already exist, that don’t have tariffs affecting them, but in case they don’t (exist), you definitely have a good point from what I can understand. 👍😁
Thanks for explaining!
I still remember fondly the Trump speech at the UN when the whole assembly laughed at him.
I suspect that there’s going to be a lot more of that to come.
Now he’s being told to “fuck off” on the floor of the EU parliament.
So much political theater and me without my opera glasses
Cutting off trade with Canada would devastate the US economy overnight
And Canada collectively tells him to go fuck himself. Seriously, he really thinks that will make them want to join him?
There are a lot of MAGA idiots in Canada, weirdly enough, and Canada is about to elect the Conservatives under a MAGA-style populist hate-monger who borrows his promises directly from Republicans. As a Canadian, I don’t wholly trust Canadians to resist this hard enough, especially with almost all Canadian media being right wing and the Conservatives promising to shut down what isn’t.
Yup. America is currently riding the brain rot rollercoaster, and we’re waiting in line holding our ticket.
I’m equally curious and terrified to find out where the line between “we love trump” Conservatives and “we need our own trump” Conservatives lies. Even if, purely for arguments sake, we accept that all his policies are amazing, they’re amazing for a different country and actively detrimental to ours. Assuming we get stuck with PP he’s going to have to make a choice. Which half of his base does he agree with? Will he stand up for our country, or roll over and hope the Yanks have their way with us gently. Unfortunately I feel he’s going to fumble and fail to do either.
Besides this being a distraction, it’s more likely that in this case Canada would end up politically annexing the USA:
- The 2 Senators and 50 something electoral votes for “Canada State” would mean that Canadians would end up controlling US politics. :D
Of course if one assumes that elections remain binding in the Turd Reich.
And why the fuck does orange numbnuts think that Canada’s 10 or so provinces would be one state?
Ha! Even more senators! Or should I say SANEators:D
Because he’s not actually thinking about any of this.
He’s just putting voice to his intrusive thoughts, and doubling down on whatever gets him attention.
I’m just venting.
And if we get any representation.
Here’s the plan. The Northern US states all join Canada. The Southern Half of US states join Mexico. The US is gone. Canada & Mexico join to become 1 huge nation. (putin shits himself!) And then we deport ALL the conservatives out of North America, and live happily ever after. Problem solved. You’re Welcome.
Does this mean the cartels would advance north from mexico?
We should give them safe passage all the way past the bearing straight.
Bering Strait*
Ball bearings… Sorry.
Inuit people wouldn’t appreciate that at all.
It can be a large under ground tunnel. With electric motorcycle service on rail… Directly to ruzzia and China. All local proceeded would go to the Inuit people. We could have little stopping points where stores could be setup.
Deport conservatives to Afghanistan. It’s a perfect match:
- very religious
- hate women
- love guns
- Libertarian paradise. Become a warlord!
- Don’t have to worry about immigrants.
Alternatively, there’s Russia. All those AR-15 lovers can get paid to go kill people!
Deport them to… Where? Space? I hope. Without oxygen.
There are places in the world where we can send them and they can’t hurt others. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/749af21064e34f029bdd53946d9d941a
Yes that sounds good
Russia, duh!
Well, they need people to conscript…
Based
So many people are extremely missing the point here
Trump is purposefully threatening Canada to give his canadian conservative buddy Poilievre something to “fight” against, to make him look good
“Wow Poilievre is standing up against Trump, I’m gonna vote for him!”
That’s the game plan, in reality the two dipshits are best buds and can collude together to fuck over both countries extra hard, after conservatives get a majority over here.
It’s a stunt to get conservatives in charge over here “against” Trump, which is so fucking stupid and yet it’s probably gonna work cuz so many people are gonna fall for it.
I don’t think the liberal party has a good play against it, other than if our new liberal leader challenges Trump and musk to a boxing match and literally bears the shit out of them on live television
I unironically think the Lincoln “I’ll fight you let’s go right now” leader who seriously fucks up Musk or Zuckerberg or any of those dipshits on live television would actually win by a landslide here
It’s fuckin stupid but that’s what works apparently…
He’s done the same with Putin
The Conservative Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, is already doing that. I’ve heard his ads on the radio calling for Ontarioans to give him a majority government so he “can stand up to Trump”. The guy spent his time as Premier standing up to nurses and bike lanes. This new stand up against Trump shtick is just more faux populism.
the other side is not???
The centre to left is against it as much if not more than the conservatives. If anything, PP has been awfully silent on the whole thing. And don’t even look up how Danielle Smith (conservative premier of Alberta) is responding
Sides. But try not to get caught up in the us vs them drama.
The key point is that Mr Ford is using populism to promote populism, with no actual history where he stands up to bullies as much as he stands up to caregivers and citizens; and populism is the schtick of his party and the national cons, but isn’t a common thread in other parties as they campaign on rights and consolidated services instead.
I don’t think the liberal party has a good play against it, other than if our new liberal leader challenges Trump and musk to a boxing match and literally bears the shit out of them on live television
Ahh, well that’s not good. Love him or hate him, I think one thing everyone could agree on about Trudeau is that he’d do pretty well in a politician boxing league.
Trudeau is out, we are voting in a new leader shortly
Hopefully they vote someone in who unironically would challenge dipshits to boxing matches
Is electoral reform still a policy of the liberal party. Will they Lucy football is away once the election is over again?
other than if our new liberal leader challenges Trump and musk to a boxing match and literally bears the shit out of them on live television
That would probably get me to vote liberal for the first time in my life
Trump is purposefully threatening Canada to give his canadian conservative buddy Poilievre something to “fight” against, to make him look good
This theory is predicated on 1) Trump remembering who PP is, 2) caring enough about who is running Canada to have it drive policy.
I don’t think either of these things are true.
They literally have meetings, and Trump obviously cares about conservatives willing to help him grift being in charge…
He’s looking for more bribes. ‘Pay me, or else.’
Trump is purposefully threatening Canada to give his canadian conservative buddy Poilievre something to “fight” against, to make him look good
Except Polierve has been the slowest and the quietest to speak out against this bullshit that Trump is trying to pull.
No, says Canada.
“Go fuck yourself” says Canada.
Just like our Danish friends recently told Trump.
And our Ukraniain friends said to the Russia warship.
“Surrender to my imperialism or I’m going to ruin your economy”
“Surrender to my imperialism or I’m going to ruin
yourmy economy”
Canada please join the EU!!!
We’ve been trying but our current leader is pro-US
Putin hired him to start pointless nonsensical arguments with our nearest and most vital allies and that’s what he’s gonna do.
Otherwise he publishes the pee tapes
I’d like to see MAGA’s cognitive dissonance in trying to conceptualize Trump getting peed on as a power move of his
They’d manage to do it
Soaking in their precious bodily fluids while denying them his essence.
Something along the lines of this
Trump getting peed on
That didn’t happen. Trump is famously a germaphobe.
What allegedly happened:
Trump “hated” Obama so much that when he stayed at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Moscow, he hired the presidential suite (Report 80), but did not stay in it.[233] There he employed “a number of prostitutes to perform a ‘golden showers’ (urination) show in front of him”[127][225][234] in order to defile the bed used by the Obamas on an earlier visit. The alleged incident from 2013 was reportedly filmed and recorded by the FSB[235] as kompromat.
They’d blame Obama for being president while Black
Any taped content wouldn’t sway his cult of loonies. The guy rapes and fantasizes about shooting people on the street. Could be just psycho machismo why they’re colluding
Nobody would give a fuck about pee tapes. Cee-pee tapes, maybe, but even then it might still not be enough to bring him down at this point.
Otherwise, it’s 100% clear Trump is doing this shit because he’s a Putin fanboi and fascist true believer, not because he’s somehow being coerced. Stop giving him the benefit of the doubt.
I’m going to keep posting this every time I see a reference to US tariffs against Canada.
https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/15/beauty-eh/
The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treaty in which Canada agreed to respect US copyright law in exchange for free trade. No free trade? Canada doesn’t need to respect US copyright any longer and can become a flourishing economy of products to compete with US products that are massively overpriced. Think printer ink and other stuff.
That’s amazing. He’s going to absolutely tank the US economy in his first financial quarter of his term.
Sweet. Host all pirate sites in Canada.
I was thinking to host pirate sites of US movies, software, etc. Get the US companies to tell the orange buffoon to behave or better yet, move the companies to Canada.
I really like the article’s reference to manufacturing US DMCA-breaking technologies and forcing devices to host app stores in Canada where the government can declare the 30% Apple tax illegal.
Not pirated, works no longer covered by copyright in Canada.
Idk if it’s just for individuals, but our ISPs generally don’t care about pirating already. I use a VPN to pirate here but just set to another city in Canada. I only even do that because I run jellyfin and have terabytes of downloads a month.
Worst case scenario is the ISP sends you a notice that the media companies are mad, but that’s the end of it. They won’t pursue anything further because they don’t care
It’s not illegal to download something, it’s illegal to host something (seeding)
ISPs are compelled to notify you of copyright notices but they can’t hand your information over so you can only get caught if you respond
And even if you are dumb enough to respond to one of those emails, the liability is limited to something $50 per title. So it’s not worth the money to pay a lawyer to go after anyone. They will however try to trick you into a private settlement.
No no no, you must charge every user with willful commercial infringement and penalize them $250,000 per violation. It is the American way!
The TL;DR is that tariffs would violate the NAFTA / USMCA treat
The treaty that Trump himself negotiated and agreed to.
That’s the treaty he is calling a “bad deal” and threatening to violate.
YES! Thanks for the reminder!
Trump just amended the USMCA on January 17 (takes effect on March 18, 2025)…
This went way over my head. IANAL.
Yes, please, Canadian produced pharmaceuticals + 15% tariff = an order of magnitude cheaper than what we can buy in the States.
That’s why buying drugs across the border is specifically illegal. Can’t have us buying our medicine at a fair value.
Yeah anyone mad at the US government right now should to take it out on the US corporations, not the citizens. Citizens can’t do much about this shitty administration until the next election but the corporations will have their feelings massively hurt every quarter if they don’t meet their profit expectations.
trump will listen to corporations far more than citizens.
Citizens could have done something about it in November. And almost half of them chose to sit on their hands.
Of the ones who actually voted, half of those actively voted for this shitshow.
Sorry to the few who tried to stop it, but the idiots that surround you have brought this on you.
We will try to aim most of our retaliation at the Redhatter morons, but some of you will likely get caught in the crossfire.
Please do whatever you can to fix your country’s shit, so we can get back to being friendly neighbours.
.
Also, please try not to break any more of the firefighting equipment we loaned you (and sent even after agent orange started threatening us).
Why isn’t Canada summoning the US ambassador to demand official explanations?
The situation is embarrassing enough. No need to bring shame to the ambassador that most likely heard about it from some news outlet too.
They don’t need explanation or translation for “he dumb and doesn’t understand money outside of wanting more”.
The Canadian prime Minister went and spoke directly to Trump.
And Trump laughed him off.
And how do you know the ambassador hasn’t already had those meetings?
Canadian officials have been in communication with American governers, senators, congressmen and even mayors to discuss the situation and what sort of response they might expect.
A big part of the problem is that Trump doesn’t listen to the advice of anyone once he gets some stupid idea stuck in his head.
But it’s all shit talking and “jokes”. Summoning the ambassador, the Canadian government as an institution can officially demand an official response from the US government as an institution. Sovereign state to sovereign state. This is serious business not a social media exchange.
It would basically demand the US government to produce its formal demands of Canada. Anything else should be ignored as farts and white noise.
