Dell, HP, Microsoft, Intel Oppose Proposed Tariffs on Laptops, Tablets (reuters.com) 170
Dell, HP, Microsoft and Intel have opposed U.S. President Donald Trump's proposal to include laptop computers and tablets among the Chinese goods targeted for tariffs. From a report: Dell, HP and Microsoft, which together account for 52% of the notebooks and detachable tablets sold in the United States, said the proposed tariffs would increase the cost of laptops in the country. The move would hurt consumers and the industry, and would not address the Chinese trade practices that the Trump administration's office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) seeks to remedy, the four companies said in a joint statement posted online. [...] In a separate statement, Microsoft, along with video game makers Nintendo of America and Sony Interactive Entertainment said the tariffs on video game consoles could stifle innovation, hurt consumers and put thousands of jobs at risk.
Bad news Dell, HP, Microsoft, Intel (Score:2, Interesting)
Bad news guys: if you still expect laptops to be a growth market with a high margin, you need to update your business model. They haven't been for a decade now.
I'm not saying the tariffs are a good idea (they're not) but increasing the cost of laptops and tablets is going to be only a fairly minor speed bump for most people, who are going to get one if they need one and won't if they don't. This would be a lot more troublesome if the market wasn't already saturated.
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"Tarrifs are a good idea" is the Great Depression summed up in five words.
Tarrifs are anti-capitalist, free-trade destroying, wannabe communist, and overall terrible idea. The math is clear: they're bad all around if they're not at minimal levels. They aren't. Every president for the last 50 years has put tarrifs (usually on steel and/or coal, like Obama, Bush Sr, Bush Jr,... or basically everyone who panders to blue collar workers and doesn't want to actually *change things*) immediately, then after losing
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Tariffs is the only way we will get back what we deserve!
The gutter? Check out the history books, which you are obviously ignoring.
Re: There is another way... (Score:1)
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"Tarrifs are a good idea" is the Great Depression summed up in five words.
Tarrifs are anti-capitalist, free-trade destroying, wannabe communist, and overall terrible idea
So you're out there in China, every day, protesting how bad the tarrifs they impose on the US are, right?
Making tariffs work (Score:2)
The tariffs need to be implemented right. For starters
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Except that we're not getting manufacturing back to the U.S. - at least not for items that are no longer manufactured here. Laptop manufacture will just go to Vietnam or whatever the next cheap labor country. That doesn't mean free trade hasn't been disastrous for American manufacturing. To say that tarriffs contributed to the Great Depression (as a previous poster did) ignores that the nature of international trade has changed quite a bit in the last hundred years.
The added costs involved in offshore ma
Re: Bad news Dell, HP, Microsoft, Intel (Score:5, Insightful)
And yet, Biden is campaigning on the idea taxing people more. Go figure.
"Tarriffs are bad" or "tarriffs are good" is only true either way when considered in a vacuum.
1. The taxes being passed on will offset other taxes, or decrease our overbearing debt. It doesn't really change how much tax is paid. What it does is change WHO is paying them.
2. The tarriffs will make local products more attractive. Giving jobs to locals. Decreasing the need for welfare programs, and increasing local monetary circulation.
3. These particular tarriffs are aimed at an international actor demonstrating bad behavior that is hurting our country. Curbing the behavior is a benefit to be weighed against the negatives.
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The tarriffs will make local products more attractive. Giving jobs to locals. Decreasing the need for welfare programs, and increasing local monetary circulation.
Imagine the United States, zero trade. No imports, no exports. Full employment.
Now: you start exporting things to China.
To do this, you must labor to produce things, but not consume them. You send them out to China, you get money. Essentially, you have less goods and services, but more dollars.
To reduce this to a simplified, concrete model: the whole workforce produces 1,000 cars per day. Suddenly, we're selling 100 of those cars to China, so there are only 900 cars left for us; but we have mor
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Decreasing the need for welfare programs, and increasing local monetary circulation.
This is not how it works. The first part, "The tarriffs will make local products more attractive. Giving jobs to locals." that part is true, but it also raises the costs of all of these goods to every American buying them (basically every American). And it works out to a net loss.
This is inevitably how protectionist strategies work: they benefit a certain subgroup (local laptop manufacturers in this case), at the cost of everyone else in the country. And the result is always a net negative. The free mark
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Decreasing the need for welfare programs, and increasing local monetary circulation.
This is not how it works. The first part, "The tarriffs will make local products more attractive. Giving jobs to locals." that part is true, but it also raises the costs of all of these goods to every American buying them (basically every American). And it works out to a net loss.
You did not negate what I said. The local employment OFFSETS the consumer cost of the tariff. I did not say it ELIMINATES the cost of the tariff.
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The second part of what you said was that it increases local monetary circulation. This is also not true. I said this above when I called it a "net negative." The additional money put into the economy by keeping the entire supply chain within the country, and
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Nearly 80 percent of 60 economists who answered a question on the tariffs said they would do more harm than good and the rest said it would do nothing or very little. Not one respondent said they would benefit the world’s largest economy.
The reasoning is fairly straightforward. If a country is importing some good
well it's time to make them in the USA! (Score:5, Insightful)
well it's time to make them in the USA!
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What about the situation where the only goal of the tariff is to shift the commerce AWAY from X country, because they are a bad actor? We don't mind dealing with Y country at all and their products are just as cheap?
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Yep. Allow me to break out the world's smallest violin for all of the computer manufacturers who might have to fathom making their computers in the US again.
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Bad news guys: if you still expect laptops to be a growth market with a high margin, you need to update your business model. They haven't been for a decade now.
I'm not saying the tariffs are a good idea (they're not) but increasing the cost of laptops and tablets is going to be only a fairly minor speed bump for most people, who are going to get one if they need one and won't if they don't. This would be a lot more troublesome if the market wasn't already saturated.
That the laptops became a commodity, with low margin, is a very good thing for the consumers. The saturated market too.
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Bad news guys: if you still expect laptops to be a growth market with a high margin, you need to update your business model. They haven't been for a decade now.
I'm not saying the tariffs are a good idea (they're not) but increasing the cost of laptops and tablets is going to be only a fairly minor speed bump for most people, who are going to get one if they need one and won't if they don't. This would be a lot more troublesome if the market wasn't already saturated.
Precisely! Also, if you don't want laptops to be tariffed, build them either in the US, or in a country w/ whom the US doesn't have frosty trade relations. Like Taiwan, which is what it was before things started moving more to China.
As it is, there is a lot less competition in this market: I recall the days in the 90s when there were about a hundred or so PC companies: that market shrunk down to effectively 3 companies today - HP, Dell and Acer. So you already have low competition: there's no need for
Shocking! (Score:4, Funny)
Companies oppose taxes on products that embed their products.
I know, I'm surprised.
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Companies oppose taxes on products that embed their products.
I know, I'm surprised.
Meh. The west has been paying a Microsoft tax on every laptop and desktop sold since the mid-nineties at least. Maybe if people got to deduct the cost of Windows off of a laptop at the till point (and consequently did not have to pay for an MS OS just to install Linux later) I'd feel different.
Turnabout is fair play.
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CNN a non biased enough source oh bigoted one???
https://money.cnn.com/2018/03/05/news/economy/trump-steel-aluminum-tariffs-support/index.html [cnn.com]
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And since when have libtards like yourself been opposed to taxes? Get your TDS checked before your head explodes. The world is more complicated than you can imagine from your mom's basement.
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I wonder if proponents of not imposing tarriffs realize that even before the US-China trade war, China was imposing tarriffs on most, if not all, imported goods including thkse from the US?
I wonder if proponents of the US imposing tariffs realize that what works for developing nations does not necessarily work for developed nations. Developing nations often need tariffs to help their fledgling industries develop instead of being squashed by more established countries. That is not the case with the US.
Re: So what (Score:2)
Plus, the US has plenty of tariffs of its own on corn, sugar, ethanol, alcohol, automobiles, etc. The US ends up with more expensive foreign cars, wines, and HFCS in our... everything.
Because China != USA (Score:1)
I wonder if proponents of not imposing tarriffs realize that even before the US-China trade war, China was imposing tarriffs on most, if not all, imported goods including thkse from the US?
China is communist [wikipedia.org], the USA is not.
Here in the USA the decision to invest in domestic production is not decided by the government, but by wealthy individuals. When you consider that an administration change can (and probably will) undo Trump's tariffs, why would you want to invest in something that's all but guaranteed to lose money?
Sure, established domestic manufacturing industries presently competing with China get a boost from Trump's tariffs, but we all end up paying for it. You may as well just rais
Make them in the United States: No trariffs then (Score:2)
But that is never the answer for people from India. Thank you for calling India... This is Bob from West Texas...
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I'm going to start a factory for building laptops in the USA. We probably will go out of business when the next administration gets rid of the Trump tariffs. Would you like to invest in my factory?
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Almost nothing is 100% built in the US anymore. You may want that to change but tariffs won't actually cause this to change.
Makes sense (Score:2)
Dell, HP and friends are making (for the most part) a very low margin product with a limited potential for growth. The hype of PCs being dead is overrated in my opinion, but it's certainly not going to be something companies want to invest a lot of money in. Consumers have moved on to phones and tablets mostly. At this point the market for PCs is split -- ultra-cheap garbage at the low end produced for the absolute lowest amount of money (the Best Buy consumer junk) and a premium line where they're still ab
Robin Williams: Good Morning, Vietnam! (Score:4, Insightful)
Companies will be looking for cheap labor in other South East Asian countries.
The former East Germany had very good relations with Vietnam, and many folks from Vietnam came there to work. A machinist from the former East Germany told me that the Vietnamese workers excelled in small, precision work.
Sounds like a good fit.
Time to donate (Score:1, Interesting)
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Kick those campaign contributions in high gear.
Seriously. The hidden cost of sending all your manufacturing overseas is supporting the politicians who favor free trade. Time to open up your pocketbooks, Dell, HP, Microsoft, Intel, and write some checks with lots of 0s to the DNC.
An opportunity. (Score:2)
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Why would they do that for a low to zero growth product? What they'll do is pass the tariff off to American consumers. In the end, consumers always pay the tariffs. You might as well just raise income tax. It would be cheaper to administer and have the same effect.
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What they'll do is pass the tariff off to American consumers.
Then the tariffs are not high enough. It should be so high that there is no way to sustain business by passing the buck.
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Not to mention they raise the price floor, which means prices go up higher than the tariff rate.
Frankly, if the objective is to punish China, then redirect money into building American supply chains. But that's getting bizarrely close to communism.
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You might as well just raise income tax. It would be cheaper to administer and have the same effect.
It would also be more fair, since income taxes tax lower earners at proportionally lower percentages, and allow for deductions. Consumption taxes (which is what tariffs ultimately are) hit lower income earners the hardest, since you're essentially taxing someone who makes minimum wage at the same percentage rate as billionaire.
Why are Dems opposed to tariffs? (Score:4, Interesting)
Tariffs are basically flat taxes on the rich and wealthy corporations, you could even say a federal sale tax on imports.
I agree taxes aren't good on the economy in general, Trumps tax cuts increased the tax revenue after all, but Dems have to be honest and apply this to the entirety of the tax code.
Either you're against taxes and tariffs or you're for taxes and tariffs. You can't have a platform that wants to reduce taxes on the poor (domestic income tax) and raise taxes on the rich/corporations and then totally oppose the President when he implements a version of your platform. Now we have Dems like Biden running on raising domestic taxes again (reversing the tax cut) and eliminating tariffs.
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I agree taxes aren't good on the economy in general, Trumps tax cuts increased the tax revenue after all...
Because they weren't cuts you blithering idiot. They were increases. Trump raised taxes on individuals and only lowered them on corporations and rich people who get most of their money from non-earned income. Yeah, tax revenue increased. Of course it did. Federal taxes are higher.
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You must have missed that any cuts for the middle class or poor get phased out over the next few years, but the cuts for the wealthy stay. This is the big problem that many people don't understand, short term cuts to make people think things are good, then two years later, they end up paying more taxes, but at that point, it is too late. You really don't understand that at this point, dislike of Trump has zero to do with Hillary, because half of the Democratic Party disliked her even in 2016, and has ev
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You really don't understand that at this point, dislike of Trump has zero to do with Hillary, because half of the Democratic Party disliked her even in 2016, and has everything to do with Trump being a horrible excuse for a person. Trump looks at third world dictators as great examples of "leadership", even while those dictators have their people killed for voicing their opinions.
Trump has his faults but the status quo wasn't working for far too many people. Keep in mind that Trump winning is more a symptom of a bigger problem. Hating on people who voted for him out of spite or because they had no other voice is missing the point. Looking at what would work for all Americans, instead of just the left coast, would be a better start.
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You're trying to convince people who support and even riot over their slave labor(H1B, Illegal immigration) to not support slave labor in other nations and try to help fellow americans, whom they shit on any chance they get. The talk time is over, were past the red line. Everything is fucked from here on out.
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You're trying to convince people who support and even riot over their slave labor(H1B, Illegal immigration) to not support slave labor in other nations and try to help fellow americans, whom they shit on any chance they get. The talk time is over, were past the red line. Everything is fucked from here on out.
There was some talk of breaking up pieces of the US in 2016 (Calexit, Texit, etc). I'm actually very much in favor of a peaceful breakup of the US and would put my money where my mouth is by moving out of California.
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Here it is again, folks. Tariffs are taxes on the rich and wealthy, not you, so don't worry. When we argue that every other business tax is really a tax on consumers, because consumers pay the cost in the end, we don't mean tariffs. Tariffs are magically different because we want to impose those taxes -- they let the domestic businesses that we own raise prices with the reduced competit
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That's exactly my point though. The 'rich and powerful corporations' are those that sell you stuff for cheap and give you jobs therefore increasing your wealth and eliminating poverty in the US since the early 20th century.
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It's not remotely your point.
Yes, I can. Tariffs are, like sales taxes, regressive. They apply to everything, discretionary and non-discretionary, and with respect to businesses, apply to many of inputs whether the business c
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*woosh*
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You can't have a platform that wants to reduce taxes on the poor (domestic income tax) and raise taxes on the rich/corporations and then totally oppose the President when he implements a version of your platform.
Most of us on the left-ish side want to see the wealthy stop weaseling out of the debt they owe back to the society which enabled them to become wealthy in the first place. It's a bit of a lofty goal, because the wealthy understand this and spend lots of money (because it's still cheaper than being taxed at a higher rate, read up on the Koch brothers sometime) to convince the general public that policy which favors them, is good for everyone.
Tariffs don't target the wealthy - they get passed on as a consum
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Tariffs target corporations that buy large quantities of steel and other resources from China. That's by definition the rich investors and their wealthy corporations.
Any taxes on the rich and corporations will get passed on as consumption tax because you don't get rich just sitting around, you get rich employing people and selling stuff, taking risks and investing. I agree with the premise that taxes will get passed on to the consumer, the question is why the left doesn't see that as a dichotomy within thei
Um... where do I begin.... (Score:2)
Sales Taxes tend to be regressive because they apply to spending, and the poorer you are the more you spend. You can mitigate this by excluding some things (like food, education, shelter, etc). You can also make it worse by doing the opposite and including those thing, excluding luxury items, or setting flat per unit sales taxes. You'
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If you are poor, you spend less, you cannot spend more than a rich person. There are rich persons that spend my entire yearly salary just on food every month and they get a tax rebate from the government because they claim it as a business expense. So the rich will never, ever pay their fair share of taxes unless you have a flat tax on spending.
The problem here is that the left wants to raise corporate taxes up to 90% on these corporations that buy raw products from places like China. Trump raises effective
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The people that pay the tariffs are corporations both big and small like GM, GE, Monsanto, Dole anyone that uses steel, plastics, chemicals etc to produce things. I agree that in the end the consumer ends up paying for it, but that's always the case if you raise taxes on the rich and corporation. That's why my question is about the Democratic platform to raise taxes on the rich and wealthy is now much opposed.
Go off-lease anyway (Score:2)
Perfect time to buy a perfectly good off-lease system, save some money, and side step this whole tariff nonsense.
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The costs are paid by American workers as you can see [pewresearch.org] the wage stagnation the past 40 years.
Well, there's the minimum wage moving from 2/3 of per-capita income to as low as 22% in 2009 [twimg.com], and the relationship of median to minimum wage [twimg.com]. If your alternative is $7/hr, I can probably get you to work for $12; but if your alternative is $15/hr, why would you work for $15? It took $5 over minimum wage to attract adequate labor before; it's going to be more than $0 over minimum wage now.
Really, you think wage stagnation comes from trade in a low-unemployment economy?
China is a problem (Score:2)
Mr. Trump, like a blind pig finding an acorn, is right about China.
The country has experienced tremendous growth over the last 4 decades. They were a developing country so we ignored their currency manipulation. We ignored their human rights abuses. We ignored them selling reactor tech to North Korea. We ignored them trading with Iraq, North Korea, Cuba, and Iran in the face of global embargos.
Because we looked the other way the Chinese government has consistently delivered 6% GDP growth, and the Chines
Chinese people (Score:2)
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I've heard this assertion, but I'm deeply skeptical of it. Are there any statistics to support it?
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Then don't be so d*mn greedy! (Score:2)
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Mexico is too expensive to produce competitively and has major stability issues in various regions, the rest of South America is too communist and unstable for any sane corporation to start business there. China (until now) basically demonstrated to have a communist system that interferes little with private corporations which made it very attractive to go there.