Amazon CEO Jassy Says Tariffs Have Started To 'Creep' Into Prices (cnbc.com) 104
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said President Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs are starting to be reflected in the price of some items, as sellers weigh how to absorb the shock of the added costs. From a report: Amazon and many of its third-party merchants pre-purchased inventory to try to get ahead of the tariffs and keep prices low for customers, but most of that supply ran out last fall, Jassy said in a Tuesday interview with CNBC's Becky Quick at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
"So you start to see some of the tariffs creep into some of the prices, some of the items, and you see some sellers are deciding that they're passing on those higher costs to consumers in the form of higher prices, some are deciding that they'll absorb it to drive demand and some are doing something in between," Jassy said. "I think you're starting to see more of that impact." The comments are a notable shift from last year, when Jassy said Amazon hadn't seen "prices appreciably go up" a few months after Trump announced wide-ranging tariffs. Further reading: Americans Are the Ones Paying for Tariffs, Study Finds: Americans, not foreigners, are bearing almost the entire cost of U.S. tariffs, according to new research that contradicts a key claim by President Trump and suggests he might have a weaker hand in a reemerging trade war with Europe.
[...] The new research, published Monday by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a well-regarded German think tank, suggests that the impact of tariffs is likely to show up over time in the form of higher U.S. consumer prices. [...] By analyzing $4 trillion of shipments between January 2024 and November 2025, the Kiel Institute researchers found that foreign exporters absorbed only about 4% of the burden of last year's U.S. tariff increases by lowering their prices, while American consumers and importers absorbed 96%.
"So you start to see some of the tariffs creep into some of the prices, some of the items, and you see some sellers are deciding that they're passing on those higher costs to consumers in the form of higher prices, some are deciding that they'll absorb it to drive demand and some are doing something in between," Jassy said. "I think you're starting to see more of that impact." The comments are a notable shift from last year, when Jassy said Amazon hadn't seen "prices appreciably go up" a few months after Trump announced wide-ranging tariffs. Further reading: Americans Are the Ones Paying for Tariffs, Study Finds: Americans, not foreigners, are bearing almost the entire cost of U.S. tariffs, according to new research that contradicts a key claim by President Trump and suggests he might have a weaker hand in a reemerging trade war with Europe.
[...] The new research, published Monday by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a well-regarded German think tank, suggests that the impact of tariffs is likely to show up over time in the form of higher U.S. consumer prices. [...] By analyzing $4 trillion of shipments between January 2024 and November 2025, the Kiel Institute researchers found that foreign exporters absorbed only about 4% of the burden of last year's U.S. tariff increases by lowering their prices, while American consumers and importers absorbed 96%.
Analogy (without cars) (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Analogy (without cars) (Score:5, Insightful)
Moreover, not all tariffs are created the same.
If the tariff fees are spent developing business in your country, i.e. subsidies for industries which are underrepresented, then they might do long-term good.
If the tariff fees go into the pockets of the wealthy because they are instituted in order to pay for a massive tax break for the rich, and those wealthy people do not spend them creating jobs in those industries, they certainly will not improve the economic system in your country.
For anyone out there still confused, we're on the latter plan here. Tariffs aren't automatically bad, even though they usually are, but these tariffs are provably not improving anything for The People.
Re: (Score:1)
There's another issue with tax cuts for the rich, this isn't 1964 when Kennedy tried it with sky high taxes. The increase in wealth of the rich isn't as great in percentage to what they already own or make. Plus, there's no guarantee the rich are going to spend whatever windfall in the country instituting the tax cuts. Markets are now so globalized there a good chance the money will get invested elsewhere. The rich that are greedy will always chase the highest returns.
Re: (Score:2)
Yes absolutely, I am completely against those cuts. I'm speaking only about the tariffs. Trump's tariffs are bad because they are intended to be bad. But if those tax cuts exist, no matter how we pay for them, the poor will wind up paying and not the rich. That's the whole point of the cuts. Even if everything about tariffs was great, and let me be clear that I do not believe that, the tax cuts would still be bad.
Re:Analogy (without cars) (Score:5, Informative)
The first part of your analysis is true.
But Tariffs ARE automatically bad.
Tariffs always:
1) Tax the poor people not the wealthy. The wealthy save their earnings and travel outside the country (where they can buy things without those tariffs) while the poor spend all their earnings and rarely travel.
2) Make things more expensive in your country compared to outside of it. Hurts both the consumer and the industries buying raw materials.
3) Encourage you to buy expensive local products instead of cheaper foreign products. This is anti-Capitalism, creating bad jobs in your country and hurting good workers outside of it.
Re: (Score:2)
Bingo, the truth about tariffs is they are tool but the honest answer is they are economically damaging but the case to make is to accept that damage for matters of economic or national security, the damage is worth it.
Like the tariffs against Chinese EV's, the honest answer is it is straight up protectionism for the US automakers. That is actually OK if we are honest with ourselves and understood that we value the industry and the tariffs are taking a short term hurt to allow the industry time to build up
Re:Analogy (without cars) (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, except for the fact that Trump is very anti-EV in the first place... he wants American EVs to die. So the tariffs against Chinese EVs aren't implemented with the goal of actually protecting anything domestic, they're just capriciously punitive.
Re: (Score:2)
That is true, I was thinking more about the reason they were kept in place while Biden was in office.
There's also the fact that implementing tariffs is way easier then rescinding them as now other countries may have countered and it all has to be negotiated.
It's like starting and quitting smoking, one of them is easier. One of them is way easier.
Re: (Score:2)
The core failure is the USA over estimated how important it was to world trade. With only around 10 to 20% of the world's trade, depending on who's numbers you use, the reset of the world has put the USA in the too hard basket and refocused their trade to with more stable countries.
Re: (Score:2)
Hell I think the number is actually zero technically, most of what i've seen are framework deals and MOUs really "trade agreements" are supposed to be ratified by Congress like Trump's own USMCA deal was so by that metric the number is still zero.
What people didn't want to recognize is a lot of our important with trade was we were the largest importer of goods in the world and we basically cut our own dicks off to spite our face.
Re: (Score:2)
History has proven tariffs are bad. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:3)
Another example is the "Chicken Tax" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax) from the 1960's, that's still in force today. It's what prevents importing small/light trucks from Europe, so we can't have the Toyota Hilux and similar useful vehicles (which American manufactures only grudging produce a few examples of).
Re: (Score:1)
Two examples (yours and the one in the GP comment) of obviously bad tariffs don't prove that tariffs are bad. They prove only that not all tariffs are good, but nobody was arguing that, so it's useful only for making a straw man argument.
As an aside, not relevant to the argument really but of relevance since you brought it up: The Chicken Tax also doesn't prevent us from having anything because it's easily circumvented. To avoid the tax, manufacturers ship the vehicle slightly unfinished and do final assemb
Re:Analogy (without cars) (Score:4, Insightful)
America used to be funded with tariffs and it worked fine. Nobody is happy with paying taxes no matter what kind or where the money comes from. Everyone has to pay a share of them, no matter what kind of taxes you have. Costs are passed on to customers whether you they are import or export tariffs, or corporate taxes.
True, though there is one way to effectively tax business income without taxing consumers, and that is to raise taxes on capital gains and dividends. If capital gains and qualified dividends were taxed as ordinary income beyond some reasonable threshold (say $200k per year), it would have basically zero impact on the poor and middle class, but would massively increase government revenue from the ultra-wealthy.
Re: Analogy (without cars) (Score:2)
I'm not sure even that is true, I don't think the owning class would just give up on their take home pay and they would still raise prices.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm not sure even that is true, I don't think the owning class would just give up on their take home pay and they would still raise prices.
That's the thing about separation of authority. The people getting taxed aren't the ones making the decisions, and the ones making the decisions have a fiduciary duty to the company, not the shareholders, which would generally preclude raising prices, or else they likely already would have done so.
Re: (Score:2)
That's the thing about competition. As long as it exists, there are competitive pressures which limit the tendency.
Pretty sure 2/4 of the items in my dinner are owned by Unilever
Re: Analogy (without cars) (Score:2)
Sometimes it's better to spend more on a local product when it keeps a defense-critical industry alive, and/or when it keeps jobs in your country that are critical to your national prosperity. What you said about them being anti-capitalism is also not a real objection. Allowing capital to control the means of production is EXACTLY how we wound up exporting so many jobs to China that it has harmed our country economically. Worshipping capitalism is empty headed celebration of the destruction of everything we
Re: (Score:2)
This argument is one of those capitalism but not approaches that never really work very well but seem to be very popular in the US.
If an industry is important for national security then just subsidize that industry. That happens a lot. It's why defence contracts are so expensive.
If the goal is to protect "national prosperity" then forcing your consumers to pay more and making your producers less competitive is not a great way to do it. It's much better to cede industries where you can't compete and develop
Re: Analogy (without cars) (Score:2)
"If an industry is important for national security then just subsidize that industry."
That's literally what I said, you have to spend the money subsidizing that industry. Thanks for your support.
Re: (Score:2)
Ah, I thought you were suggesting that taxing consumers was a good way to support critical industries. Instead you were proposing the government paying them to maintain capabilities (subsidizing). Clearly I misunderstood your statement.
Re: (Score:3)
I would say: Tariffs are almost always automatically bad. The only IMO valid use of tariffs is when a foreign country is dumping goods or services on you below cost in order to destroy your domestic industry. Which is actually the business model of a lot of Internet companies, actually... get the people hooked on cheap or free producs/services and then when there's no competition, raise prices.
Re: (Score:2)
e.g. Aliexpress' enormously subsidized shipping. I would buy through an American middleman except the only place to get the same shit without massive markup is from Jeff Bezos, and fuck him.
Re: (Score:2)
Moreover, not all tariffs are created the same.
If the tariff fees are spent developing business in your country, i.e. subsidies for industries which are underrepresented, then they might do long-term good.
If the tariff fees go into the pockets of the wealthy because they are instituted in order to pay for a massive tax break for the rich, and those wealthy people do not spend them creating jobs in those industries, they certainly will not improve the economic system in your country.
For anyone out there still confused, we're on the latter plan here. Tariffs aren't automatically bad, even though they usually are, but these tariffs are provably not improving anything for The People.
99 times out of 100 it doesn't do anything to help local industry. All it does is make everything more expensive (as it also removes the impetus to local industry to compete) and reduces consumer choice. Even if you're putting in tariffs and import restrictions to help a local industry, they almost never compensate for the amount that the subsidies are costing (I.E. the now dead Australian car industry). Subsidies only make sense on an economic level if you're a mass exporter, meaning you're making money by
Re: (Score:2)
99 times out of 100 it doesn't do anything to help local industry.
Agreed. That's usually not the goal. It's usually just about revenue production.
All it does is make everything more expensive (as it also removes the impetus to local industry to compete)
That's true as long as you don't enforce antitrust law, like we don't any more. If we did, there would be domestic competition.
If it takes £5 to make a spanner in the UK but you can buy a Chinese made spanner for £2, adding a £5 tariff to the Chinese spanner will not result in them being made in the UK... it just means that a Chinese spanner is now £7
But we do make spanners in the US. I can still buy an adjustable one from Crescent, who invented the best design for them, and they are still made here.
What we don't make here any more is a complete suite of electronics parts, so in a sudden and protracted war we'd be reduced to the fucking iron age in s
Re: (Score:2)
That's true as long as you don't enforce antitrust law, like we don't any more. If we did, there would be domestic competition.
Even if you enforce anti-trust laws, you still end up in a situation where competition is being artificially stifled by artificially high prices. So local manufacturers are in a position where they don't need to offer a better product, they just need to offer a bad product at just below the artificially inflated prices for bad imported products. Cars are a good example. Australia used to make it's own cars, it made 3 models of terrible barges that couldn't be exported because they were too low tech and poo
Re: (Score:2)
The best analogy, I've seen for tariffs is:
"I buy a lot from the local pizza place, they don't buy anything from me. Now I'll start paying 10% more until they learn".
The intent was, "A pizza place just opened close to me that locally sources its ingredients, my kid works there now, and I can buy their pizza for less than it costs me to buy pizza from the place across town." Putting this into practice takes time, is risky, and the actual results are still unknown.
Re: (Score:3)
Regardless of intent, Trump won't be in power for much longer and when he's gone, most businesses feel that saner heads will prevail and this whole tariff nonsense will disappear. If SCOTUS or Congress grows a backbone, maybe sooner.
The boards of companies may say things to placate Trump in the meantime, but they aren't going to do anything serious as long as they are of the opinion that they can ride out the short term effects. They are responsible to their shareholders to act in the best company interest
And then... (Score:5, Informative)
most businesses feel that saner heads will prevail
And then people look at Vance, Hegseth, and Miller amongst others. Trump may go away, but that doesn't mean that MAGA and Project 2025 will.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:And then... (Score:4, Interesting)
I suspect that Vance will be tarnished with Trump's choices in much the same way that Harris was tarnished with Biden's choices. It's far too early to tell for sure, but the independents which helped Trump eek out an electoral victory seem to be pretty solidly against the Republican party at the moment. It's not just saner heads among the politicians, but among the voters. Maybe I'm too hopeful...
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
At what point does the country's interest become the company's interest? If el Bunko drives the U.S. into the ditch, and he's working on it, those companies go down with the ox cart. And the Americans they employ go down with the cart.
Re: (Score:1)
>Trump won't be in power for much longer and when he's gone,
yeah buddy. I have news for you. This was only year one.
And the way it's going, I seriously wonder if there are going to be elections because Mein Trumpfer declares a war and a national emergency to extend it, and so his patsies will keep doing it.
Democracy is about over in the US.
You think people in '33 thought: Oh he's going to be here forever? Nope, they thought it was temporary, at worst. And it would soon pass...
Re: (Score:2)
A president has no authority to cancel elections. The Constitution states elections lie with the states. There has never been a time in this country where an election was cancelled because of war or national emergency.
He can bloviate out of his second ass all he wants, but elections will go on with or witho
Re: (Score:2)
There has never been a time in this country where an election was cancelled because of war or national emergency.
Not yet, anyway. Living in near Minneapolis has made the whole "manufacture a national emergency" thing feel a lot more real for me.
He can bloviate out of his second ass all he wants, but elections will go on with or without him.
I still share your optimism. However the "but, maybe" voice in the back of my head has been getting louder.
Re: (Score:3)
Insurrection Act, ICE at polling stations, straight up cheating if you’re unscrupulous and dead set on keeping your hands on power, and you have access to large amounts of power and no-one is standing in your way, quite a lot becomes possible.
Re:Analogy (without cars) (Score:5, Insightful)
A president has no authority to ...
That has not stopped Trump yet. He has done many things that he lacks legal authority to do. As long as he can get a lawyer to make -any- legal argument for what he does, the result is court cases that take months to resolve. Some he wins, most he loses, all are (wholly or partially) moot by the time the case is adjudicated -in the mean time, he gets to do as he will.
He leads. As long as those who follow continue to do as he says, legal authority is irrelevant. This is why he puts such an emphasis on personal loyalty to him.
TLDR: Whataya gonna do about it?
Re: (Score:2)
It won't be saner heads unless someone more electable is presented.
Its still too early in the cycle for anyone to put their head up. Anyone doing so becomes a target for a bully and the bully's (forced) friends.
Scenario 1 - MAGA nuts romp it in in the midterms: Everyone jockeys to be more important #2 banana. Unless the opposition can come up with a galvanising, charismatic alternative ... crickets.
Scenario 2 - A few seats change hands in the midterms, but not a wholesale rejection - anyone with the resourc
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They're hoping the next president basically undoes everything, which is a totally reasonable bet. If they tear down the mask today, it'll be much harder to rekindle relations.
Re: (Score:2)
The only way to shorten that trust time would be to make changes to the democratic system to bring it inline with the higher quality democracies in other countries that better reflect the will of the people and stop one clown from having total control.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Another feature is that to keep those local sources profitable, you must keep the tariffs on.
Pizza is not a good example. There are myriad small businesses who built their products on cheap-in-price stuff from China. Now they must raise their prices because, being small businesses, they cannot absorb those extra fees. A lot of those small business are exiting. You can see this in the labor stats. Small business hire much more than large businesses across the economy. And hiring has actually decreased for sm
Re:Analogy (without cars) (Score:4, Interesting)
We have specialized production facilities all over the world.. so what is produced in China is a unique product and sold globally, the same for the products we produce in the US and sell globally. I understand the mentality to build where you sell but it just isn't economically feasible for everything. Manufacturing facilities must be built to specialize in a certain thing, flexibility typically comes with higher costs.
Re: (Score:2)
Elasticity of supply and demand. Tax cigarettes and the consumer pays the tax because they're addicted. Tax apples and people will buy oranges instead, so the producer pays the tax. Everything else is somewhere in between.
So if you raise your prices and people keep buying, then your prices were too low.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm not sure this analogy is completely accurate (but generally not bad). I think a better representation of reality in America would be, "I buy a lot from the pizza places that sell this great, imported pizza. They don't really buy anything from me. I'll let government throw an extra 10% tax on imported pizza because they're trying to get people like me to buy more locally made pizza instead."
Of course, as we all know -- the "locally made pizza" in this analogy is sometimes impossible to find, or requires
Want to get fired? This will help (Score:3)
This means every company in America is perpetually on the verge of collapse due to a cash crunch and the first thing they do when they run into problems is try to borrow some money. If interest rates are too high the borrow they start firing people. That's you.
Right now interest rates are set high by the Federal reserve in order to keep inflation under control. Basically the Federal reserve is triggering layoffs through high interest rates in order to force less spending and lower wages.
Tariffs are designed to raise prices. That's just what they do. The goal of the tariff is to increase prices on imported goods so you buy local goods. The problem is nobody is going to make locally in America because other countries have little or no environmental regulations and borderline slave labor. You can't compete with 10,000 Bangladeshi stuffed into a locked building without a fire escape working 70 hours a week for just enough money to buy food and drinking contaminated water downstream of a chemical plant.
And I think it should be painfully obvious that you don't want to compete with those Bangladeshi...
If you're worried about your job you can thank Trump and you can thank his tariffs. On the other hand Trump has apparently been redirecting the tariff money into a slush fund he can use for whatever he wants. So there is that.
Re:Also Trump and Musk are expert at (Score:4, Insightful)
"the real threat is deregulation" The real threat is deregulation period. The alleged administration have been kneecapping the financial regulators (firing them, defunding them, removing regs., etc.) This is how we got the Great Recession. Clinton deregged some, and Bush more. Then the Bush Admin decided they didn't need no stinking regulation. Now el Bunko is doing the same thing, it will end similarly poorly. And the proles will pay, they always do.
And deregulating environmental regs will similarly end poorly, it always does. And the proles will pay again, they always do again.
Re:Want to get fired? This will help (Score:4, Insightful)
Tariffs are designed to raise prices. That's just what they do. The goal of the tariff is to increase prices on imported goods so you buy local goods. The problem is nobody is going to make locally in America because other countries have little or no environmental regulations and borderline slave labor.
That's simply wrong. Switzerland would be a counter example. Germany would be a counter example. Canada would be a counter example - all countries Donald Trump has tried to punish with high tariffs because they export more to the U.S. than vice versa (and he totally ignored services, which are not counted as "exported").
You may restate your argument as soon as the environmental protection and the average wage in the U.S. actually exceeds that of Switzerland.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Should just do what they wanted to before (Score:5, Interesting)
...and that's to show how much of the final price is actually tariffs.
Suck it up Bezos/Jassy, grow a spine and tell people the truth that they're getting fleeced by Trump & his "administration".
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
You would have a point if Amazon set the prices. They don't.
Re: (Score:3)
He is referring to the feature where Amazon broke-out the price and the tariff separately [bbc.com], like how it shows the price, sales tax, and VAT as separate charges. Amazon backed-off from the plan after Trump threatened called it a "hostile and political act."
Re: (Score:2)
We're also pretty sure that Amazon does "dynamic" pricing now based on your location and demographics, so giving that kind of price transparency would probably backfire on them.
But, tariffs are paid by the other countries... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Just like other countries pay for border walls!
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Who pays the tariffs? What was wrong with the economy before all this stupidity?
Re: (Score:1)
The U.S. still has a very low tariff rate.
The current US 10% baseline and 40% transshipment rates are not low.
The rates of current US tariffs for many countries are considerably higher than the current US 10% baseline rate. Look up "US Tariffs by Country". The rate for Canada, for example, is 35%.
A 'low' tariff is 3%, with 0% on low value items. A 'very low' tarriff is 1%.
So Trump's tariffs are more than 3x the 'low' rate - often 5x or worse, and far far beyond the 'very low' rate.
For reference, the weighted mean tariff rate for the world - in o
Re: (Score:3)
The orange shitgibbon says that the US tariffs are very low, but he hasn't uttered a single true word in his whole life. Who would be so brainless to trust his word on anything?
Re: (Score:3)
They are low, compared to the 1820s (~50%), 1860s (~40%) and 1930s (~20%). It's hard to find accurate statistics for the 1800s, but the 1930s in the US were a time of notable economic prosperity, with inflation adjusted GDP per capita falling from ~ $6000 to ~ $4000 with annual growth in the -10% range.
Re:Tariffs only bad when U.S. do them? (Score:4, Insightful)
You seriously want to compare the way the economy worked a century ago with the economy nowadays? The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.
Re: (Score:2)
A foreign country some people apparently seem to think it would be a good idea to get back to. Protectionism is a big part of that "foreign country." Mercantilism is going even further back. Import substitution specifically is something the US did when it was a brand new country but it's also something that broke developing countries like to try. It fails.
Re:Tariffs only bad when U.S. do them? (Score:4, Informative)
The current US average tariff rate is 17%. [taxpolicycenter.org] But go back to 2024, countries were charging small single-digit percentages.
US [wto.org] 2.2%, Japan [wto.org] is 2.8%, EU [wto.org] 2.9%, UK [wto.org] 3.5%, Canada [wto.org] 3.8%
Re: (Score:2)
trump is using them as a blunt stick to try and punish other countries for not submitting to his demands. However the pain he is causing to his own people is far more than it is hurting the countries he is targeting.
No shit (Score:2)
I learned what a tariff was in middle school. MAGA was too fucking dumb and believed that somehow the other country paid the tariffs.
Republicans, Donald Trump raised all our taxes. What are your thoughts on Hillary’s emails?
Re: (Score:2)
My thoughts on Hillary's e-mails are the same as the classified document stash of Trump - or whoever has them now.
Re: (Score:2)
everyone says so.
Everyone? We've told you a million times: Stop exaggerating.
Does Jassy like his job? (Score:2)
Tariffs are always and everywhere good. No one has better tariffs. There are no price increases. Prices have come down. Got it?
If Jassy doesn’t get on-script by the end of the day, he is toast.
No deviations from this world-view are allowed.
I’m shocked he could make such a juvenile error, actually. It definitely calls his judgement into question.
"Amazon" and "creep" (Score:2)
Why do those words fall together so comfortably and effortlessly?
treason charges vs tariffs (Score:1)
offshoring manufacturing, ala clinton/kissinger, should be treated as treason.
what was done to intentionally destroy this country in the interest of international businesses has been so catastrophic that everyone involved should be hanged and any money by those tangentially involved should be seized.
Re: (Score:1)
wut? maduro offshored nearly all of his manufacturing then imported 10s of millions of hostile 3rd world foreigners to replace his native population?
u seem to think i was making an argument against capitalism, when i was making an argument against traitors.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: I am buying less, and I am pretty happy about (Score:2)
I'm glad the circumstances have helped with your obvious shopping addiction. Not sure that makes it a good thing for all the folks without one.
Re: (Score:2)
An alcoholic is looking for a cheaper bar. I guess there's an app for that.
So glad my groceries are so much more expensive! (Score:2)
...I didn't support Trump (ever), but I am actually happy about this.
1. I am spending about 70% less on Amazon. I cancelled Prime already, after so many years. 2. I am decluttering what I do own. We found some unopened boxes of Amazon orders from years ago, in the basement. Sold that NIB stuff on FB Marketplace. 3. I am paying more attention to how I can buy in bulk for the items I do want (whey protein, nitrile gloves, etc). Amazon is too expensive on EVERYTHING, but the convenience seemed "worth it". 4. I don't know what else I might ever actually need from buying online, really.
I used my Ai agent to analyze my Amazon spend over 15 years, and it's ridiculous. I want to cut that spend by 90% in 2026, and put the 10% to relationship vendors I can buy bulk from.
I can't tell if you're a troll, shill, or just really clueless. If Amazon was the only business impacted, your comment would be relevant, but it impacts everyone....from basic grocery staples to essentials like clothing, shoes, cars, etc. Amazon sucks for many reasons, but nothing compared to tariffs. There's no bright side to this. That's like being happy a meteor kills most of us and sends us into a decades long ice age because it killed off some pesky dinosaurs
Re: (Score:1)
American homes are filled with cheap Chinese junk. Plastics everywhere. If anything the tariffs will slow down the destruction of the planet and reduce consumption of throw away things. Monoprice had a guitar from Indonesia for $62 with a gig bag and strap and shipping was free. This had ro be built by someone for $2. We dont seem to care about living wages when we purchase things only when it affects us personally
Modded into the sub-basement, when as far as I can see what you wrote isn't very far - if at all - off-topic. I guess you touched more than one nerve here...
In response to the meat of your comment, I'm not sure that tariffs will slow down the destruction. People who lose the jobs that those tariffed items used to support may well resort to even less sustainable practices to earn their livings.
When grocery bills double, your logic is stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
American homes are filled with cheap Chinese junk. Plastics everywhere. If anything the tariffs will slow down the destruction of the planet and reduce consumption of throw away things. Monoprice had a guitar from Indonesia for $62 with a gig bag and strap and shipping was free. This had ro be built by someone for $2. We dont seem to care about living wages when we purchase things only when it affects us personally
Modded into the sub-basement, when as far as I can see what you wrote isn't very far - if at all - off-topic. I guess you touched more than one nerve here...
In response to the meat of your comment, I'm not sure that tariffs will slow down the destruction. People who lose the jobs that those tariffed items used to support may well resort to even less sustainable practices to earn their livings.
Yes, please ignore that my grocery bill doubled since Trump first took office and that every single thing I depend on has gotten substantially more expensive and even my lifestyle has had to change. I now rarely eat beef or go the restaurants just to keep costs reasonable...and even formerly cheap staples have increased in price substantially from eggs to pasta to meat...as has clothes & rent & energy & the cost of durable goods....
But hey, monoprice has shitty cheap guitars? Glad this "may" impact this?
No matter what MAGA wants to tell you, tariffs are a mistake. Trump doesn't have the intellectual capacity nor attention span to implement them correctly. He's only using them as leverage for his personal power while wrecking the economy and doing a lot of long-term damage.
Trump isn't long for this world. However the destruction he'll leave behind will take decade to fix. Tariffs are a great example. He's changed policy 100s of time. American and multinational companies want to open more factories in the USA, but they can't predict the costs. Most want to diversify from China, if not leave entirely. It gets more expensive every year to build in China and the risks due to Taiwan or IP theft or CCP meddling gets worse every year.
OK, so you know you need to leave China. The USA is your top market. Advances in automation as well as rising costs in Asia means it may make financial sense to build in the USA...then Trump fucks it up....
You can't predict the cost of building materials, like steel, due to tariffs. You can't predict the cost of the factory tooling you buy from Germany...due to tariffs. You rely on components made in Canada, Mexico, Japan, and China...not sure the tariffs on them. It would be reckless to invest only to find out you're now losing money....that's a shortcut to getting fired if you're working for a big company. Also, he's ordering ICE to round up every brown person they can find, citizen or not apparently. Well, maybe you don't hire undocumented workers, but what about your suppliers? You're certain every contractor and construction company won't be impacted? Let's say you manage to ensure no undocumented workers are in your supply chain....well, every company, including Trump's own businesses, that rely on undocumented labor needs to fill every position vacated by ICE raids.
So even if you're perfectly law abiding, now there's a labor shortage and drastic cost increase...so now you can't predict costs or completion times. If your concrete company has to push back their work a month to refill the shortage, that screws your factory construction initiative.
Tariffs? If done well, are good, like reciprocal tariffs. Trump says he's doing the, but he's clearly not. His tariffs are chaotic and unpredictable, just like him. This hinders jobs, growth, and expansion and makes it safer to build a new factory in Mexico or India than Indiana or Mississippi.
Our concern is not having to pay more for plastic garbage, but having our jobs threatened as well as our basic expenses increasing with no end or relief in sight. You must rely on your wife to do all the grocery shopping or else you would know this...but hey...enjoy your cheap guitar, buddy!
Re: Homes filled with junk (Score:2)
Maybe if companies paid people more they wouldn't have to buy the cheapest crap they can find.
Re: Homes filled with junk (Score:2)
How do you define "too much"? If that person is a student who has to afford living costs and school then it's not enough. Your concept of "too much" just comes from a standard set by corporate leaders that indicates the corporation should get more money than the workers.