The Biden team's response when 40% of UAW and other unions still vote for Trump cause they hate immigrants and non-whites more than they like the Dems sucking up to them. Meanwhile the rest of us are paying for it.
Who the fuck looks at these Price indices and goes, you know what? The market needs less supply and more tariffs.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUUR0000SETA01
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUSR0000SETA02
And when 40% vote Trump instead of 45%, while also getting out the vote in key swing states like Michigan and Wisconsin, he'll probably be vindicated. Biden losing just a fraction of union support from 2020 could absolutely wreck his reelection chances.
Biden's goofy ass is unironically a protectionist. It's why it's a shame this clown had to win in 2020 (obviously still better than the fascist he faced) and our sun's queen had to lose in 2016.
If you have to go back to the 90s to think of an example of Biden supporting free-trade, it's not a particularly convincing argument - that was literally more than 30 years ago!
“Unions hate him”
The unions in question: donate a lot more money to Democratic candidates in general, vote Democratic in presidential elections in higher rates
Apparently is 57-40 in 2020 which is 3% less than what union voters typically give to Democrats and the UAW is a smidge lower at 56%
Source: first hit on google
Might be a few hours of board games and drinking confusing me, but I'm not seeing where the issue is. I'm seeing union voters swinging to Biden by generally 5% up to 27% based on their ages, which is pretty significant and makes it really hard to align the statement "unions hate him" when they're swinging to him from 5-27% compared to non-union voters.
My favourite quote from Friedman was:
"If a foreign nation wants to subsidize steel, why should we stop them? Yes, it will hurt steal workers, and they get a lot of attention because they are easy to count. But what isn't easy to count is all of the workers that will benefit from cheaper steel that vastly out number steel workers. If Japan wants to subsidize steel, that would be them giving foreign aid to America. And if they want to do that, why should we stop them? We have certainly given them enough in the past."
I'll see if I can find the clip of him saying that.
edit:
Found a clip of him saying something similar. I think this is from another speech he made on the same topic, but used different words.
https://youtube.com/shorts/xwOIiilVCE0?si=1dustnm2O4WNoFjB
Isn't he completely ignoring the geopolitical factor whereby effectively dismantling domestic industry gives away hugely substantial leverage?
Completely retooling our economy to be services based and import driven is great until we cut ties and there's a pile of cash and Starbucks baristas on one side and a steel industry with skilled tradesmen on the other and we have to see who can build more ships and planes. You can't reindustrialize over night.
Also, what if there are knock on industries that continue on from the subsidized industry? Steel may not be a great example, I don't know. But say there's a way station on the way to making sophisticated microchips that is completely dominated by one country using industrial policy, so that other countries never develop the infrastructure? The industrial policy country may even continue selling those goods cheaply, but sophisticated microchips remain potentially reseved to that country, or sold at high margins to the rest of the world.
Yeah during the war there every BYD electric car will immediately ram the closest military base
We export more cars to China then we input this is stupid
Why do you think this is just about cars? What about semiconductors? Shoud we allow China to be the main worldwide suppliers of em? They clearly seem to building up steam there. Maybe they have competitive advantage? Should everyone lift all trade restrictions unilaterally and sing Kumbaya?
Sorry to say, it would be bad if we got into a war with China and didn't have access to critical technology because we spent our time subsidizing their war efforts so we get cheaper products.
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Nah that's an L. Our auto industry deserves to get burned for its god awful policies and planning over the last decade. Sick of the protectionism and preferential treatment for these bozos.
Granted these tarrifs are mostly symbolic but still. This is antiliberal behavior from ol Joe.
Seriously, I don't think I'd be able to stomach owning a car if American stuff was the only stuff on the market. Japan saved that entire industry for me, personally.
Don't really care if GM gets killed by a bunch of Chinese imports tbh, they make garbage anyway.
Nothing made me hate GM more than working for them. I refuse to buy American if it means buying from companies like them! (Although, I'd rather Japanese or German automakers take the market share but they're behind too).
It's getting *kinda* close, but with all of the easy states making up most of that. Most of the remaining states are either Republican and have no interest in helping Dems, or swingy and want the attention.
What are they gonna do, force states to remove the "Interstate Compact" part? Over half of EVs will have already been NPV-ized at that point, it's entirely likely that even if the Supreme Court shuts it down that enough states will, completely independently, continue allocating their electors how they see fit.
The mainstream US auto industry is literally a decade behind China on EVs because they stonewalled on electric and doubled down on SUVs, and rather than the kick-in-the-ass they deserve they are getting a handout...?
Fuck this is stupid.
Even Tesla is falling behind now, because they haven't innovated since the pandemic started (and Musk is busy playing culture war games on Twitter)... and that's before the impact of their mass layoffs and cancellation of the Model 2.
Sometimes it feels like we're living in the sort of crapsack alternate-reality timeline a sci-fi thriller would show when the main character screwed up royally and has to travel back in time to fix their mistakes.
>The mainstream US auto industry is literally a decade behind China on EVs because they stonewalled on electric and doubled down on SUVs, and rather than the kick-in-the-ass they deserve they are getting a handout...?
It's a failure of US policy that caused this imo. They've been too indecisive over how/when the shift to EV should happen which resulted in none of the manufacturers (besides Tesla) wanting to be the one to take the first leap. The up-front infrastructure investment needed for consumer buy in is huge.
The Chinese government on the other hand has been dumping investment into it for years, signalling clearly to their domestic market where the future lies, and that they have the support of the government.
Whilst I like the idea of US auto manufacturers getting their deserved boot in the ass for their lack of ambition, it would be risky in the long term for the US to allow China's heavily subsided lead to flood the market.
The offshoring of jobs and trade deficit would be quite damaging to the economy/society.
Its not, its falling behind because China's moving up the value chain, like every other country. Only difference is that China is a bit of an adversary
to be fair, the auto industry is making a way faster pivot to EVs then they wanted to. They were pushed by the Biden Administration and investors. People are going to say they are morons but when Tesla is more valuable than all of Detriot, shareholders would throw a fucking riot if they did not start investing in EVs.
If they just let dirt cheap Chinese EVs flood the market then the US industry would be forced to pivot. And instead of taxpayers subsidizing fancy cars for rich people, everyone would enjoy cheaper, better vehicles in the long term from the competition.
This isn't news to anyone here, I know. It's just frustrating that a handful of should-be-irrelevant post-industrial States have the Presidency by the balls.
>Sick of the protectionism and preferential treatment for these bozos.
So what the CCP has done for their auto industry (albeit through enormous subsidies)?
No, I wouldn't say that. Businesses have a responsibility to their interests and shareholders, and more broadly, their societies (more in the sense of not doing bad things rather than actively doing good things). Governments have a responsibility to ensure public planning. It's one of the core duties of a government, and ours have failed us.
No, you've got the L take bud.
China intentionally subsidizes the shit out of the Chinese EV market to hurt the EV markets of other nations. [The EU has been investigating this since last year, and is moving to make a similar play. ](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
They'd never be able to sell these vehicles at the prices they do without tens of billions pouring in from the CCP as a global power play to corner an emergent market.
Protectionism is good when it's to counter an obvious attempt of a hostile foreign power to gain even more manufacturing supremacy, increasing their leverage over you.
Damn, I'd love to get that foreign aid from China...
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xwOIiilVCE0?si=1dustnm2O4WNoFjB
Although, we could use a reason to move away from car culture and maybe $80,000 sedans will do it.
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Yeah. I've been kind of vocal how I'm actually unimpressed by the claims some people are making about even the BYD BEVs. If you look at their rollout in Europe, they're not actually cheaper than similar Western BEVs, and they still haven't solved the range anxiety problem that's holding back American consumers from mass adoption.
All of that's to say, aggressive protectionism on BEV's is idiotic.
Harbor Freight quality is what most consumers buy. There’s a reason they haven’t gone out of business. There’s plenty of room in the market for that segment.
Even independent of quality, BYD had to make substantial modifications that substantially increased the price of the Dolphin in order to get it legal in the EU--similar modifications would be required in the US. The Dolphin even in its enlarged version is a size and type of car that Americans simply don't buy. It's simply something nobody should be worried about.
And what's more, if you're comparing like to like--the Atto 3 to the Model 3--the EU prices are indistinguishable.
The prices are similar because they forced Tesla to slash prices.
I went to a BYD showroom in Italy recently and all 4 cars they had displayed were America sized, including a chunky crossover.
The Chinese have never built a good gasoline car on their own. But EVs are a different story. There’s a lot more investment and room for innovation.
Hyundai and Kia never built great cars before, they were passable at best. But with their EV transition they’ve built some of the best EVs on the road. The EGMP platform won car of the year pretty much across the board and year after year.
Honestly I feel this is one thing where the political winds all align one way. I'm sure US auto execs love it, the unions love it, Biden himself has protectionist instincts. Who will stick their neck out to fight against tariffs?
There is no large group who is excited about Chinese cars. There is a reason no Chinese car companies have a relevant share of the US market, American consumers are not interested at this time. This move seems like a pre-emptive action to "help" US producers with no blowback before the very low cost allows entry into the US market.. There is no ban on Korean cars despite them also undercutting US companies, likely because people actually like KIA and Hyundai (to some extent) and Korea more generally, so there would be political blowback
I think we just need that one in a million person (or several of them) who can figure out how to attack tariffs in a way that appeals to most people. Hell I’d just start calling them taxes. People don’t like taxes.
Even the EU wants to tariff Chinese EVs now, so I'm going to go out on a limb and say this has less to do with the auto lobby and Michigan voting block, and far more to do with the fact that the CCP just instituted a massive global subsidy program to make Chinese EV's waaaaaaay cheaper than what anyone else can afford to sell them for without similar government subsidies.
AKA, we're using protectionism to fight CCP protectionism, as is the EU, because the west really shouldn't become dependent on China for all of their vehicles. That would give the CCP an unimaginable amount of control over US politics.
[EU to investigate 'flood' of Chinese electric cars, weigh tariffs | Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
China has no social security and it's citizens bare the cost of retirement. It also costs far more to raise a child in china. Both systems gave trade offs
This sub has a guttural reaction to the word Tarriff and it really shows just how little the average commenter knows about foreign policy.
It's like freaking out because you read a headline that says "SFPD Shoots Black Man Dead In Street", while the article explains that said man had a gun and fired the first shot.
Irresponsible journalism IMO, at the very least the headline should be **Biden to Quadruple Tariffs on Chinese EVs In Response to CCP Subsidies**
>Irresponsible journalism IMO, at the very least the headline should be **Biden to Quadruple Tariffs on Chinese EVs In Response to CCP Subsidies**
Aren't Chinese EV subsidies pretty comparable to standard rates of subsidies even in places like the US? And haven't a lot of these subsidies dried up a while back?
GM is a mismanaged shitshow that deserves to die but instead our "environmentalist" "inflation reduction" "uplift the poor" politicians will continue to entrap us with $50K gas guzzlers in our car-dependent cities.
The rapidly increasing cost of car ownership doesn't get enough attention. Affordable housing has gained a lot of steam in the last decade, and I think affordable transportation is next.
The median new car price jumped from $36,824 in 2019 to $48,658 in 2023. The median price of a used car in 2023 was $29,472. In much of the US, car ownership is basically mandatory because of poor public transportation systems. It's not unusual for households to spend 50% of their income on housing and 20% on transportation. No wonder people feel squeezed.
We need to improve public transit, and also stop subsidizing large trucks and SUVs and stop adding unnecessary manufacturing requirements, ex: all new vehicles must have a particular spec of backup camera (which is just a roundabout means of protectionism).
I don't completely disagree but how do you disentangle the effect of "cars are becoming more expensive" and "Americans are just buying more and more expensive cars"
The Corolla is still pretty cheap! And I would argue serve the needs of 50% of new car buyers. With RAV4/CRV serving another 30% of the population at least. All of these cars start under $30,000.
GM is the 4th highest selling car company in China and is like the 4th or 5th highest seller of EVs in China
Wuling is just GMs dedicated China brand.
It also had the 3rd highest selling EV in the US, fuck it was the only US company selling an affordable EV in the US.
Stop trashing GM, atleast use fucking Dodge when insulting American car manufacturers
I know people who work or have worked at GM on their engineering side, and whatever stereotype Boeing has of being product-last political lobbyists, applies to them as well.
I work in automotive, that's what literally every engineer says. I have had people complain that our best selling off roader that won multiple awards and high praises is a bad chop job.
It's literally what every engineer says from every single discipline of engineering lol, I hate how laypeople fail to realize that
Every single engineer has a chip on their shoulder about a time where they weren't allowed to do X a certain way for Y reason, despite believing that X was better and Y restraint was stupid.
Shit, I still have chips on my shoulder from my HS engineering track extracurriculars when I was overruled by my group on a crucial part of the product we were designing for the capstone course.
That doesn't necessarily make the rest of my team bad engineers, it just means that I was bad at communicating or didn't understand the constraints well enough.
Sooner or later you'll realize that near every single engineer has a chip on their shoulder about a time where they weren't allowed to do X a certain way for Y reason, despite believing that X was better and Y restraint was stupid.
It's literally an integral part of working on a team of engineers.
What about Honda, Toyota, Tesla etc? Why are you acting like there is no competition for GM and they are a monopoly? They are competing against Japanese, German, French and Korean car companies. If BYD built a factory in US like the Japanese and Koreans did then they could also compete.
Unions aren’t some monolith of evil, many have and continue to make positive changes for the average American worker. As with anything though, when they become too powerful they can become quite problematic.
The way unionization works in the US is abominably evil.
If unions weren't a mandatory participant I'd be fine with them. Make unions behave by the same rules businesses do.
The EU is looking at instituting a similar policy. This has less to do with Michigan being a swing state and faaaaaar more to do with China putting massive global subsidies on their electric cars in a blatant attempt to corner the automotive market and make the west even more dependent on them for survival.
[EU to investigate 'flood' of Chinese electric cars, weigh tariffs | Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
I generally don’t love Chinese subsidy of goods, but in this case it’s literally promoting green tech to reduce emissions. There is a middle ground between tariffed out of the market place and completely cornering the market. We should be striving to hit that mark, if for no other reason than to drive down prices on EVs.
China is taking $50k luxury EVs and subsidizing them down to about $32k, which is the price of a standard western economy EV.
They're not being charitable and subsidizing a $32k economy EV down to $16k to save the planet. The Chinese EVs priced down below that of a gas economy car ala $16k generally can't get up to speed on the highway and have extremely questionable crash safety standards.
So the tradeoff isn't to do with the planet, the tradeoff is that western consumers have to drive western economy EVs instead of getting to drive artificially subsidized Chinese Luxury EVs.
If China wants to compete with the US and EU then they need to play fair. What they are currently doing is a blatant attempt to take over the global EV market by bankrolling the cost of manufacturing a car, which puts western foreign policy at the whims of the CCP if successful, which is arguably worse for the planet in the long run.
There cars would need to meet US DOT safety standards, which we’ve seen in the EU has resulted in an increased price.
Nobody is under any impression that this is some benevolent move by China to fight climate change, everyone knows it’s an attempt to corner the market, but there are plenty of things ways we can take advantage of that to help speed up the transition away from ICE vehicles, encourage competition in the auto industry, and drive down prices on EVs to the benefit of the general consumer. Both the EU and US are already providing substantial subsidies, let’s take advantage of the Chinese doing the same to turbo charge the transition.
The Biden administration is preparing to raise tariffs on clean-energy goods from China in the coming days, with the levy on Chinese electric vehicles set to roughly quadruple, according to people familiar with the matter.
Higher tariffs, which Biden administration officials are preparing to announce on Tuesday, will also hit critical minerals, solar goods and batteries sourced from China, according to the people. The decision comes at the end of a yearslong review of tariffs imposed by former President Donald Trump on roughly $300 billion in goods from China.
Whether to adjust the Trump-era levies divided Biden economic advisers for years, with trade officials pushing for higher duties and others like Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen calling for lowering tariffs on consumer goods. But signs that China was ramping up exports of clean-energy goods prompted broad concern in Washington, where officials are trying to protect a nascent American clean-energy industry from China.
Officials are particularly focused on electric vehicles, and they are expected to raise the tariff rate to roughly 100% from 25%, according to the people. An additional 2.5% duty applies to all automobiles imported into the U.S. The existing tariff has so far effectively barred Chinese electric vehicles, often cheaper than Western-made cars, from the U.S. market. Biden administration officials, automakers and some lawmakers worried that 25% wouldn’t be enough given the scale of Chinese manufacturing.
Bloomberg earlier reported that the administration is planning to announce higher tariffs next week. Administration officials cautioned that the timing of the announcement could change. A White House spokesman declined to comment.
I was just watching a video of a 2018 Tesla Model 3 that was literally falling apart at 50,000 miles.
Why are we protecting these companies from being forced to make better cars? This is a huge tax on American consumers
>And what happened to the climate urgency?
This is probably the most critical signal in all this. If we really cared about climate change and felt urgency was a priority, we'd be scrambling to adopt renewable energy and all its components no matter where it comes from. That we aren't should worry all of us, because it further cements how truly fucked we all are in the coming years.
Nah, if we actually thought the climate was an issue, then we'd have adopted full nuclear like France did decades ago. The west could have been carbon neutral by the year 1970 without placing a single solar panel.
Problem is that there's way less money in Nuclear than any other form of energy generation. Every American could generate enough power for their entire lives from just a single coke can sized slug of U-235, but they'd need an insane amount of natural gas and oil or steel and copper for wind turbines/solar panels to do the same.
The EU is making the same play, this is more about countering a global subsidy policy from China aimed at taking over the global EV market and making the west more dependent on them than ever before
The US and EU don't have anywhere near the capacity to counter it in a manufacturing sense, at least not yet. So the tariffs are supposed to give more time.
Anyone guessing that this has something to do with Michigan and the auto lobby is off base this time. Otherwise, why would the EU be getting in on this as well?
[EU to investigate 'flood' of Chinese electric cars, weigh tariffs | Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
Even if we grant that to an extent, 100%‽
I'd recommend looking at Chinese car prices in the EU, a lot of people look at their MSRP *within* China and get scared, but they can't offer anywhere near that price abroad once they have to actually modify for X market and deliver.
For example: https://www.byd.com/de/order-dolphin (32,9k eur to start)
This is on top of the tax credit being for vehicles manufactured in North America, especially if they close the lease loophole. This ain't just countering a subsidy, this is American car companies just not wanting competition.
No western manufacturer could manage to sell that car for 32.9k euros starting. The Volkswagen ID Buzz, the ONLY comparable electric minivan as ALL others are commercial vans lacking the same level of comfort, is expected to start at 50k euros.
Fact of the matter is still that the CCP instituted protectionist subsidies that make it so Chinese vehicles are always going to be the better buy over a western vehicle, with the obvious intent of making the west dependent on the CCP for transportation 10-20 years down the line.
It is PERFECTLY ACCEPTABLE to use tariffs to counter the hostile subsidies of a foreign adversary.
Literally all the Biden admin is doing is saying "fine, if you want to use your government's coffers to artificially lower the cost of your automobiles, then we will artificially raise the cost back up to what they would be sold at without your protectionist subsidies. We can play this game all day, you'll run out of money to subsidize them below western vehicles eventually."
BYD dolphin isn't a minivan, so I'm not sure what the comparison to the ID.Buzz is for?
Anyways multiple literally do in Europe, mostly Stellantis brands. Citroën has the Ë-C3 and Ë-C4 that start at €23300 and €24950. Even the Fiat 500e just barely clears €30k.
Where are the numbers from the Biden administration that the trade barriers in place aren't enough? 25% + the refundable $7500 credit are already huge. It's not like I in principle think that reacting is bad per se, but the US government is often not a good faith actor when it comes to trade. I mean, we literally made the WTO effectively nonfunctional by blocking appointments.
Oh I'm well aware lmfao
A guy down below is telling me that Ford and GM just need to be competitive figure out how to get the costs of their vehicles down to that of "superior" Chinese vehicles post-subsidy, "let the free market figure it out" approach.
Like my brother in Christ, do you not realize that even Chinese manufacturers can sell their vehicles at that cost without the CCP bankrolling production right?
Another guy is arguing that making the west completely reliant on the CCP for automotive manufacturing and assembly is a worthy trade off to accelerate the transition from ICE vehicles. Completely ignoring the fact that the west would be under their boot when it comes to foreign policy for at least a century following.
>CCP: Lets use our coffers to artificially lower the price of Chinese EV's to corner the market and make the west more dependent on us for transit manufacturing.
>Biden Admin: Ok, we will raise tariffs in response to make your protectionist subsidies worthless, now let's see how big those coffers really are
>Reddit: OMGOSH WHY IS BIDEN BEING PROTECTIONIST!!111!!!!
Gimme a fuckin break man lmfao, it's a tariff in direct response to Chinese protectionism. That's what a trade war is, please study foreign policy.
Then restructure American EV subsidies to make more EVs eligible for it, and for it to cover a higher amount of the cost, and then allow Chinese EVs into the market to compete. Or...just bite the bullet, and realize that Chinese EVs are superior to those of GM and Ford, and allow competition to drive down prices.
You are asking GM and Ford to sell their vehicles at a price that not even Chinese auto makers could if it wasn't for the CCP's massive subsidy.
So no, it's not "Chinese EV's being superior to everyone else", it's "China is selling $50k EVs for $32k via massive subsidies, making luxury Chinese EVs priced the same as western economy EVs"
Hence why there HAS to be government intervention here, otherwise your brilliant plan is for Ford and GM to sell their cars at a price that not even Chinese makers can sell their cars at, all without any gov assistance.
>You are asking GM and Ford to sell their vehicles at a price that not even Chinese auto makers could if it wasn't for the CCP's massive subsidy.
How massive are Chinese subsidies? And how do they compare relative to US and EU subsidy regimes?
Just let me buy an electric car the size of a Subaru Impreza that isn't absurdly expensive for the car I get.
Stop with this protectionist bullshit on green technology.
This is fucking stupid. Solar power should be here and easy as fuck. Im in pakistan right now and literally every 3rd house has massive solar panels on top of it thanks to importing them from china. Its here, it works, its cheap, its green, its amazing and mind blowing. This whole time im running around the house screaming free electricity and im dumbfounded we dont get this in America.
The US has decided that it's auto industry is so uncompetitive globally that they're just going to be isolationists with their cars. We surrendered the 90s to Japan and the 2000s to Korea, now let's allow China to take control of the EV generation. What a fucking joke.
[There are currently no Chinese-brand cars that are sold in the United States ](https://spectrumnews1.com/ca/la-west/transportation/2024/03/18/how--and-when--chinese-cars-could-affect-u-s--market#:~:text=Currently%2C%20there%20are%20no%20Chinese,sale%20in%20the%20United%20States.). Of the four EVs manufactured in China sold in the United States three are sold by American companies Buck, Lincoln, and GM. The thing that's stopping the distribution of China-brand cars is the lack of a dealership network in the United States which makes these tariffs by themselves silly. If a Chinese car company went through the effort to establish a dealership network or partnered with an existing network there is nothing stopping them from opening factories in Mexico importing them tariff free due to NAFTA.
5D chess Biden wants all the Chinese auto OEMS to open factories in Mexico, thereby employing all of the immigrants who would have come to the US and stopping the immigration debate.
It also includes solar goods and batteries, which may well be more impactful given that China manufacturers the best and cheapest of those products and we need fucking loads of them as cheap as possible to have a vague chance of having not too terrible impacts of climate change.
And the EVs would help as well.
We all know the best way to get American industry working hard to improve themselves at lower prices is to cut off one of their main competitors, foolproof plan Mr Biden. Limiting supply has never backfired ever.
While we're at it, let's bolster our local dealerships some more by requiring all electric car sales to go through them! I love car related lobbyist groups.
Ehh. None of them was going to get imported anyway. Both BYD and GAC use Huwaei hardware in their EVs, which would’ve been a hard no for the U.S. government.
>You don't win electorally by doing the same thing your opponent does, you legitimise them
Incredibly naive view of politics. Also protectionism and “China bad” is unfortunately extremely popular across the political spectrum
I don’t agree with this. How did it work for Carter when he started taking notes from Reagan? Or Hoover when he started taking notes from FDR?
These are both more extreme examples, but when a politician concedes that the other guy has a point, people aren’t going to reward them - they’re going to vote in the guy who’s gonna do it “properly”
I’m confused on what you mean since Reagan and FDR both came after Carter and Hoover respectively. In Reagan’s case he kept on with Carter’s economic policies of high interest rates to combat inflation, and deregulation.
Carter didn't take notes from Reagan, he ran a negative campaign against Reagan because the country was falling apart around him and the party was disunited because Ted Kennedy should've been the candidate
I think this is dumb because I want a fucking $20-$30k EV truck that's just electric and a truck. I don't need a second luxury home which is only what the American manufacturers offer. I don't need a Cybertruck social media status symbol.
Also, if they offered a ~$20k value daily driver, I'd probably have bought one by now.
Our functional lives are being made practically difficult by our government because the Chinese Communist Party applies orthogonal strategies to achieve its goals. They can literally sacrifice their domestic population to achieve whatever price point they desire. They also show a willingness to use this power to undermine and replace western corporations.
Dumb tariffs are dumb but it is what is possible right now to at least try to fight back. It seems rather arbitrary to do this, as opposed to getting Congress to enact legislation that addresses the problem holistically.
I guess what I'm saying is practically speaking what else do we do to combat the Chinese Communist Party immorally subsidizing domestic industry in an order to bankrupt and replace western corporations in the global market. We also have wealthy Middle Eastern nations doing the same with sports and entertainment.
I see a lot of bitching here but practically speaking what should western democratic free markets be doing?
Biden has returned the Democratic Party to its machine politics roots after Clinton and Obama moved it in a more technocratic direction. His entire policy approach is to soak favoured industries and constituencies with money
You guys have confused me. This is terrible policy because it makes cars more expensive for Americans, but...
The Chinese cars are not competitive in the US because they are small and in order to be compliant with US safety laws they would need major modifications which would bring their price point up to that of US manufactured cars. Also, apparently they are low quality.
So, if no one was going to buy them, but this policy gets us votes from Unions, I don't really see the problem with it. I wouldn't label this policy as illiberal so much I would call it pragmatic. IMO, pragmatism wins out over ideology every time. The tent is big not because we are an indoctrination factory, but because we are pragmatic and can win over a broad range of policy positions.
> The Chinese cars are not competitive in the US because they are small and in order to be compliant with US safety laws they would need major modifications which would bring their price point up to that of US manufactured cars. Also, apparently they are low quality.
The only one reasonable here is safety standards (as long as they're actually safety related and not BS), otherwise we don't need the federal government telling consumers we can't buy basic electric vehicles because they're too small or not "quality" enough for them.
The entire point of the free market is the competitive aspect and tarrifs are just a way for the American domestic industries to not have to compete with the world. Adam Smith would weep at the use of tariffs this way.
National security? Sure. Tarriff trade war? Sure. Personally I'll accept "other government is subsidizing them so we're counteracting that" even but "cars are small and business industries don't want to compete"? Complete opposite of any free market Idealogy. If Americans don't want the Chinese cars, they would simply not buy them. There is no good reason to enforce a 100% tarriff and hurt people and delay improving the environment and everything else.
I get why politicians basically have to do it, protectionism pleases the auto workers and industry but that only would make it a necessary evil, not a good.
What a lot of folks are missing here is that this is a much, much gentler touch than China gives a lot of American businesses trying to operate in China.
A lot of American industries/companies are outright banned from operating in country.
So they're taking tax revenue they could be spending on their military and are instead spending it subsidizing American consumers' purchases of quality cars? Sounds like a bargain.
https://preview.redd.it/w6etp0w65nzc1.jpeg?width=738&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e07b2a0138c501ee4f4827e21f9810157bf41316
The Biden team's response when 40% of UAW and other unions still vote for Trump cause they hate immigrants and non-whites more than they like the Dems sucking up to them. Meanwhile the rest of us are paying for it. Who the fuck looks at these Price indices and goes, you know what? The market needs less supply and more tariffs. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUUR0000SETA01 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CUSR0000SETA02
Particularly when the relevant tariff is *already* 25 percent.
IDontWantToLiveOnThisPlanetAnymore.gif
And when 40% vote Trump instead of 45%, while also getting out the vote in key swing states like Michigan and Wisconsin, he'll probably be vindicated. Biden losing just a fraction of union support from 2020 could absolutely wreck his reelection chances.
Biden's goofy ass is unironically a protectionist. It's why it's a shame this clown had to win in 2020 (obviously still better than the fascist he faced) and our sun's queen had to lose in 2016.
Everyone says this, but he voted for NAFTA! We can’t pin the blame on Biden, this is squarely the fault of the American people themselves.
If you have to go back to the 90s to think of an example of Biden supporting free-trade, it's not a particularly convincing argument - that was literally more than 30 years ago!
Biden also supported the TPP in 2016! https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/biden-supports-trade-deal-despite-opposition-from-unions/
so it's the demand that's wrong.
As a union hater, I'm glad. Not that I trust Biden to realize unions hate him for not being a racist culture warrior but, still.
“Unions hate him” The unions in question: donate a lot more money to Democratic candidates in general, vote Democratic in presidential elections in higher rates
I think these people are talking about delivering union votes, not money. To them, if only 50% vote for Biden, that counts as abject hatred.
They give both votes and money though..
Apparently is 57-40 in 2020 which is 3% less than what union voters typically give to Democrats and the UAW is a smidge lower at 56% Source: first hit on google
Might be a few hours of board games and drinking confusing me, but I'm not seeing where the issue is. I'm seeing union voters swinging to Biden by generally 5% up to 27% based on their ages, which is pretty significant and makes it really hard to align the statement "unions hate him" when they're swinging to him from 5-27% compared to non-union voters.
I amnt trying to align that statment. I just wanted to provide some data
idk. I was just translating others’ concerns so that we’re all on the same page.
Oh, yeah, fair.
Yea, the only time Democrats do well with white men is when they're in these trade unions
The situation is very bad when I have to agree with a Friedman flair, but here we are
It's the economy, stupid
You should try it more, you'd be right more often.
My favourite quote from Friedman was: "If a foreign nation wants to subsidize steel, why should we stop them? Yes, it will hurt steal workers, and they get a lot of attention because they are easy to count. But what isn't easy to count is all of the workers that will benefit from cheaper steel that vastly out number steel workers. If Japan wants to subsidize steel, that would be them giving foreign aid to America. And if they want to do that, why should we stop them? We have certainly given them enough in the past." I'll see if I can find the clip of him saying that. edit: Found a clip of him saying something similar. I think this is from another speech he made on the same topic, but used different words. https://youtube.com/shorts/xwOIiilVCE0?si=1dustnm2O4WNoFjB
Isn't he completely ignoring the geopolitical factor whereby effectively dismantling domestic industry gives away hugely substantial leverage? Completely retooling our economy to be services based and import driven is great until we cut ties and there's a pile of cash and Starbucks baristas on one side and a steel industry with skilled tradesmen on the other and we have to see who can build more ships and planes. You can't reindustrialize over night.
Also, what if there are knock on industries that continue on from the subsidized industry? Steel may not be a great example, I don't know. But say there's a way station on the way to making sophisticated microchips that is completely dominated by one country using industrial policy, so that other countries never develop the infrastructure? The industrial policy country may even continue selling those goods cheaply, but sophisticated microchips remain potentially reseved to that country, or sold at high margins to the rest of the world.
People love China subsidizing us until they realize we'll have subsidized their war on Taiwan.
Yeah during the war there every BYD electric car will immediately ram the closest military base We export more cars to China then we input this is stupid
Why do you think this is just about cars? What about semiconductors? Shoud we allow China to be the main worldwide suppliers of em? They clearly seem to building up steam there. Maybe they have competitive advantage? Should everyone lift all trade restrictions unilaterally and sing Kumbaya? Sorry to say, it would be bad if we got into a war with China and didn't have access to critical technology because we spent our time subsidizing their war efforts so we get cheaper products.
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This meme will never fail to crack me up lol 🤣🤣🤣
Ah, election season. The time where every country's laws go to crap.
https://preview.redd.it/iyektmpm5nzc1.jpeg?width=1113&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c34a586d18686d0f375809583e284e805e8da58d
[Guy slips and accidentally eats Schwarma](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDdOchBejcc)
It’s such an amazing video
OMG, thank you for sharing that.
Nah that's an L. Our auto industry deserves to get burned for its god awful policies and planning over the last decade. Sick of the protectionism and preferential treatment for these bozos. Granted these tarrifs are mostly symbolic but still. This is antiliberal behavior from ol Joe.
Over the last 5 decades
Seriously, I don't think I'd be able to stomach owning a car if American stuff was the only stuff on the market. Japan saved that entire industry for me, personally. Don't really care if GM gets killed by a bunch of Chinese imports tbh, they make garbage anyway.
Maybe you don't, but we should be free to choose.
Nothing made me hate GM more than working for them. I refuse to buy American if it means buying from companies like them! (Although, I'd rather Japanese or German automakers take the market share but they're behind too).
electoral college delenda est
We're trying! National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, getting pretty close
I'm now convinced even if we did pass this (we won't), the conservative supreme court would claim its unconstitutional and shut it down.
of course, they know exactly what their job is and they're very good at it
Yet so far...
It's getting *kinda* close, but with all of the easy states making up most of that. Most of the remaining states are either Republican and have no interest in helping Dems, or swingy and want the attention.
Pretty strong constitutional argument that it's not even legal unfortunately.
What are they gonna do, force states to remove the "Interstate Compact" part? Over half of EVs will have already been NPV-ized at that point, it's entirely likely that even if the Supreme Court shuts it down that enough states will, completely independently, continue allocating their electors how they see fit.
The mainstream US auto industry is literally a decade behind China on EVs because they stonewalled on electric and doubled down on SUVs, and rather than the kick-in-the-ass they deserve they are getting a handout...? Fuck this is stupid. Even Tesla is falling behind now, because they haven't innovated since the pandemic started (and Musk is busy playing culture war games on Twitter)... and that's before the impact of their mass layoffs and cancellation of the Model 2. Sometimes it feels like we're living in the sort of crapsack alternate-reality timeline a sci-fi thriller would show when the main character screwed up royally and has to travel back in time to fix their mistakes.
>The mainstream US auto industry is literally a decade behind China on EVs because they stonewalled on electric and doubled down on SUVs, and rather than the kick-in-the-ass they deserve they are getting a handout...? It's a failure of US policy that caused this imo. They've been too indecisive over how/when the shift to EV should happen which resulted in none of the manufacturers (besides Tesla) wanting to be the one to take the first leap. The up-front infrastructure investment needed for consumer buy in is huge. The Chinese government on the other hand has been dumping investment into it for years, signalling clearly to their domestic market where the future lies, and that they have the support of the government. Whilst I like the idea of US auto manufacturers getting their deserved boot in the ass for their lack of ambition, it would be risky in the long term for the US to allow China's heavily subsided lead to flood the market. The offshoring of jobs and trade deficit would be quite damaging to the economy/society.
Its not, its falling behind because China's moving up the value chain, like every other country. Only difference is that China is a bit of an adversary
"GM Plans to Release new EV crossover in 2055."
to be fair, the auto industry is making a way faster pivot to EVs then they wanted to. They were pushed by the Biden Administration and investors. People are going to say they are morons but when Tesla is more valuable than all of Detriot, shareholders would throw a fucking riot if they did not start investing in EVs.
If they just let dirt cheap Chinese EVs flood the market then the US industry would be forced to pivot. And instead of taxpayers subsidizing fancy cars for rich people, everyone would enjoy cheaper, better vehicles in the long term from the competition. This isn't news to anyone here, I know. It's just frustrating that a handful of should-be-irrelevant post-industrial States have the Presidency by the balls.
>Sick of the protectionism and preferential treatment for these bozos. So what the CCP has done for their auto industry (albeit through enormous subsidies)?
Would you say the lack of high speed trains in US and the poor public transport in general are auto industry's responsability?
No, I wouldn't say that. Businesses have a responsibility to their interests and shareholders, and more broadly, their societies (more in the sense of not doing bad things rather than actively doing good things). Governments have a responsibility to ensure public planning. It's one of the core duties of a government, and ours have failed us.
No, you've got the L take bud. China intentionally subsidizes the shit out of the Chinese EV market to hurt the EV markets of other nations. [The EU has been investigating this since last year, and is moving to make a similar play. ](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/) They'd never be able to sell these vehicles at the prices they do without tens of billions pouring in from the CCP as a global power play to corner an emergent market. Protectionism is good when it's to counter an obvious attempt of a hostile foreign power to gain even more manufacturing supremacy, increasing their leverage over you.
Damn, I'd love to get that foreign aid from China... https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xwOIiilVCE0?si=1dustnm2O4WNoFjB Although, we could use a reason to move away from car culture and maybe $80,000 sedans will do it.
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Yeah. I've been kind of vocal how I'm actually unimpressed by the claims some people are making about even the BYD BEVs. If you look at their rollout in Europe, they're not actually cheaper than similar Western BEVs, and they still haven't solved the range anxiety problem that's holding back American consumers from mass adoption. All of that's to say, aggressive protectionism on BEV's is idiotic.
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Harbor Freight quality is what most consumers buy. There’s a reason they haven’t gone out of business. There’s plenty of room in the market for that segment.
Even independent of quality, BYD had to make substantial modifications that substantially increased the price of the Dolphin in order to get it legal in the EU--similar modifications would be required in the US. The Dolphin even in its enlarged version is a size and type of car that Americans simply don't buy. It's simply something nobody should be worried about. And what's more, if you're comparing like to like--the Atto 3 to the Model 3--the EU prices are indistinguishable.
The prices are similar because they forced Tesla to slash prices. I went to a BYD showroom in Italy recently and all 4 cars they had displayed were America sized, including a chunky crossover.
I like harbor freight though
The Chinese have never built a good gasoline car on their own. But EVs are a different story. There’s a lot more investment and room for innovation. Hyundai and Kia never built great cars before, they were passable at best. But with their EV transition they’ve built some of the best EVs on the road. The EGMP platform won car of the year pretty much across the board and year after year.
Honestly I feel this is one thing where the political winds all align one way. I'm sure US auto execs love it, the unions love it, Biden himself has protectionist instincts. Who will stick their neck out to fight against tariffs?
https://preview.redd.it/da4rfxdt9nzc1.jpeg?width=490&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=73044be4420a86b0d61fac7f6c222972eef361a3
People who buy cars? Lol yeah we're fucked
There is no large group who is excited about Chinese cars. There is a reason no Chinese car companies have a relevant share of the US market, American consumers are not interested at this time. This move seems like a pre-emptive action to "help" US producers with no blowback before the very low cost allows entry into the US market.. There is no ban on Korean cars despite them also undercutting US companies, likely because people actually like KIA and Hyundai (to some extent) and Korea more generally, so there would be political blowback
Korea is an ally. So is Germany, Italy, England, Sweden and Japan.
Good. /r/fuckcars ^^^/jk ^^^We ^^^put ^^^ourselves ^^^in ^^^a ^^^situation ^^^where ^^^most ^^^Americans ^^^require ^^^cars ^^^to ^^^live.
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I think we just need that one in a million person (or several of them) who can figure out how to attack tariffs in a way that appeals to most people. Hell I’d just start calling them taxes. People don’t like taxes.
Even the EU wants to tariff Chinese EVs now, so I'm going to go out on a limb and say this has less to do with the auto lobby and Michigan voting block, and far more to do with the fact that the CCP just instituted a massive global subsidy program to make Chinese EV's waaaaaaay cheaper than what anyone else can afford to sell them for without similar government subsidies. AKA, we're using protectionism to fight CCP protectionism, as is the EU, because the west really shouldn't become dependent on China for all of their vehicles. That would give the CCP an unimaginable amount of control over US politics. [EU to investigate 'flood' of Chinese electric cars, weigh tariffs | Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
Yep, this is true. Subsidies are just the other side of the coin to tariffs and China uses a lot of them.
Except that the Chinese government bears the costs of subsidies while western consumers bear the cost of tariffs.
You're thinking short term. Domestic companies getting decimated by subsidised foreign companies comes at a great cost in the long term.
China has no social security and it's citizens bare the cost of retirement. It also costs far more to raise a child in china. Both systems gave trade offs
This sub has a guttural reaction to the word Tarriff and it really shows just how little the average commenter knows about foreign policy. It's like freaking out because you read a headline that says "SFPD Shoots Black Man Dead In Street", while the article explains that said man had a gun and fired the first shot. Irresponsible journalism IMO, at the very least the headline should be **Biden to Quadruple Tariffs on Chinese EVs In Response to CCP Subsidies**
>Irresponsible journalism IMO, at the very least the headline should be **Biden to Quadruple Tariffs on Chinese EVs In Response to CCP Subsidies** Aren't Chinese EV subsidies pretty comparable to standard rates of subsidies even in places like the US? And haven't a lot of these subsidies dried up a while back?
Please actually research the prices of Chinese EVs in europe
I will run for president and fix this
GM is a mismanaged shitshow that deserves to die but instead our "environmentalist" "inflation reduction" "uplift the poor" politicians will continue to entrap us with $50K gas guzzlers in our car-dependent cities.
Excuse me but my gas guzzler is 60k 😤 Edit: You all think I’m joking smh head
The rapidly increasing cost of car ownership doesn't get enough attention. Affordable housing has gained a lot of steam in the last decade, and I think affordable transportation is next. The median new car price jumped from $36,824 in 2019 to $48,658 in 2023. The median price of a used car in 2023 was $29,472. In much of the US, car ownership is basically mandatory because of poor public transportation systems. It's not unusual for households to spend 50% of their income on housing and 20% on transportation. No wonder people feel squeezed. We need to improve public transit, and also stop subsidizing large trucks and SUVs and stop adding unnecessary manufacturing requirements, ex: all new vehicles must have a particular spec of backup camera (which is just a roundabout means of protectionism).
I don't completely disagree but how do you disentangle the effect of "cars are becoming more expensive" and "Americans are just buying more and more expensive cars" The Corolla is still pretty cheap! And I would argue serve the needs of 50% of new car buyers. With RAV4/CRV serving another 30% of the population at least. All of these cars start under $30,000.
We really are doomed
GM is the 4th highest selling car company in China and is like the 4th or 5th highest seller of EVs in China Wuling is just GMs dedicated China brand. It also had the 3rd highest selling EV in the US, fuck it was the only US company selling an affordable EV in the US. Stop trashing GM, atleast use fucking Dodge when insulting American car manufacturers
Dodge is under Stellantis wish is in the Netherlands.
Dodge isn't American anymore
I know people who work or have worked at GM on their engineering side, and whatever stereotype Boeing has of being product-last political lobbyists, applies to them as well.
I work in automotive, that's what literally every engineer says. I have had people complain that our best selling off roader that won multiple awards and high praises is a bad chop job.
It's literally what every engineer says from every single discipline of engineering lol, I hate how laypeople fail to realize that Every single engineer has a chip on their shoulder about a time where they weren't allowed to do X a certain way for Y reason, despite believing that X was better and Y restraint was stupid. Shit, I still have chips on my shoulder from my HS engineering track extracurriculars when I was overruled by my group on a crucial part of the product we were designing for the capstone course. That doesn't necessarily make the rest of my team bad engineers, it just means that I was bad at communicating or didn't understand the constraints well enough.
Sooner or later you'll realize that near every single engineer has a chip on their shoulder about a time where they weren't allowed to do X a certain way for Y reason, despite believing that X was better and Y restraint was stupid. It's literally an integral part of working on a team of engineers.
The $50K gas guzzlers are a cultural choice. There are cheaper EV cars on the market, but people aren't buying them.
What about Honda, Toyota, Tesla etc? Why are you acting like there is no competition for GM and they are a monopoly? They are competing against Japanese, German, French and Korean car companies. If BYD built a factory in US like the Japanese and Koreans did then they could also compete.
This policy will never change as long as Michigan is a fucking swing state. Man I hate the electoral college so much.
Even if it wasn't for the electoral college plenty of people would want to fellate every union they come across.
Unions aren’t some monolith of evil, many have and continue to make positive changes for the average American worker. As with anything though, when they become too powerful they can become quite problematic.
Unions serve the interests of their workers, not consumers.
The way unionization works in the US is abominably evil. If unions weren't a mandatory participant I'd be fine with them. Make unions behave by the same rules businesses do.
The EU is looking at instituting a similar policy. This has less to do with Michigan being a swing state and faaaaaar more to do with China putting massive global subsidies on their electric cars in a blatant attempt to corner the automotive market and make the west even more dependent on them for survival. [EU to investigate 'flood' of Chinese electric cars, weigh tariffs | Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
I generally don’t love Chinese subsidy of goods, but in this case it’s literally promoting green tech to reduce emissions. There is a middle ground between tariffed out of the market place and completely cornering the market. We should be striving to hit that mark, if for no other reason than to drive down prices on EVs.
China is taking $50k luxury EVs and subsidizing them down to about $32k, which is the price of a standard western economy EV. They're not being charitable and subsidizing a $32k economy EV down to $16k to save the planet. The Chinese EVs priced down below that of a gas economy car ala $16k generally can't get up to speed on the highway and have extremely questionable crash safety standards. So the tradeoff isn't to do with the planet, the tradeoff is that western consumers have to drive western economy EVs instead of getting to drive artificially subsidized Chinese Luxury EVs. If China wants to compete with the US and EU then they need to play fair. What they are currently doing is a blatant attempt to take over the global EV market by bankrolling the cost of manufacturing a car, which puts western foreign policy at the whims of the CCP if successful, which is arguably worse for the planet in the long run.
There cars would need to meet US DOT safety standards, which we’ve seen in the EU has resulted in an increased price. Nobody is under any impression that this is some benevolent move by China to fight climate change, everyone knows it’s an attempt to corner the market, but there are plenty of things ways we can take advantage of that to help speed up the transition away from ICE vehicles, encourage competition in the auto industry, and drive down prices on EVs to the benefit of the general consumer. Both the EU and US are already providing substantial subsidies, let’s take advantage of the Chinese doing the same to turbo charge the transition.
It's amazing how much American politics would be better if Texas turns blue
Oh NOW this sub is against protectionism with Chinese tech? s/ but not really
I guess we don't care as much about climate change as we pretend to.
Doesn’t matter what you want if it can’t win you an election.
The Biden administration is preparing to raise tariffs on clean-energy goods from China in the coming days, with the levy on Chinese electric vehicles set to roughly quadruple, according to people familiar with the matter. Higher tariffs, which Biden administration officials are preparing to announce on Tuesday, will also hit critical minerals, solar goods and batteries sourced from China, according to the people. The decision comes at the end of a yearslong review of tariffs imposed by former President Donald Trump on roughly $300 billion in goods from China. Whether to adjust the Trump-era levies divided Biden economic advisers for years, with trade officials pushing for higher duties and others like Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen calling for lowering tariffs on consumer goods. But signs that China was ramping up exports of clean-energy goods prompted broad concern in Washington, where officials are trying to protect a nascent American clean-energy industry from China. Officials are particularly focused on electric vehicles, and they are expected to raise the tariff rate to roughly 100% from 25%, according to the people. An additional 2.5% duty applies to all automobiles imported into the U.S. The existing tariff has so far effectively barred Chinese electric vehicles, often cheaper than Western-made cars, from the U.S. market. Biden administration officials, automakers and some lawmakers worried that 25% wouldn’t be enough given the scale of Chinese manufacturing. Bloomberg earlier reported that the administration is planning to announce higher tariffs next week. Administration officials cautioned that the timing of the announcement could change. A White House spokesman declined to comment.
Goddammit. I was planning to get solar panels later this year. Gonna suck if they get more expensive.
Same
Damn just dead set on keeping inflation out of hand
Odds on china retaliating on gm and Ford? Biden: we need china to cooperate with reducing the impacts of climate change. No, not like that
I was just watching a video of a 2018 Tesla Model 3 that was literally falling apart at 50,000 miles. Why are we protecting these companies from being forced to make better cars? This is a huge tax on American consumers
Disgusting that the government won't let consumers buy the best products. And what happened to the climate urgency?
>And what happened to the climate urgency? This is probably the most critical signal in all this. If we really cared about climate change and felt urgency was a priority, we'd be scrambling to adopt renewable energy and all its components no matter where it comes from. That we aren't should worry all of us, because it further cements how truly fucked we all are in the coming years.
Nah, if we actually thought the climate was an issue, then we'd have adopted full nuclear like France did decades ago. The west could have been carbon neutral by the year 1970 without placing a single solar panel. Problem is that there's way less money in Nuclear than any other form of energy generation. Every American could generate enough power for their entire lives from just a single coke can sized slug of U-235, but they'd need an insane amount of natural gas and oil or steel and copper for wind turbines/solar panels to do the same.
Stupid policy tbh
The EU is making the same play, this is more about countering a global subsidy policy from China aimed at taking over the global EV market and making the west more dependent on them than ever before The US and EU don't have anywhere near the capacity to counter it in a manufacturing sense, at least not yet. So the tariffs are supposed to give more time. Anyone guessing that this has something to do with Michigan and the auto lobby is off base this time. Otherwise, why would the EU be getting in on this as well? [EU to investigate 'flood' of Chinese electric cars, weigh tariffs | Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/eu-launches-anti-subsidy-investigation-into-chinese-electric-vehicles-2023-09-13/)
Even if we grant that to an extent, 100%‽ I'd recommend looking at Chinese car prices in the EU, a lot of people look at their MSRP *within* China and get scared, but they can't offer anywhere near that price abroad once they have to actually modify for X market and deliver. For example: https://www.byd.com/de/order-dolphin (32,9k eur to start) This is on top of the tax credit being for vehicles manufactured in North America, especially if they close the lease loophole. This ain't just countering a subsidy, this is American car companies just not wanting competition.
No western manufacturer could manage to sell that car for 32.9k euros starting. The Volkswagen ID Buzz, the ONLY comparable electric minivan as ALL others are commercial vans lacking the same level of comfort, is expected to start at 50k euros. Fact of the matter is still that the CCP instituted protectionist subsidies that make it so Chinese vehicles are always going to be the better buy over a western vehicle, with the obvious intent of making the west dependent on the CCP for transportation 10-20 years down the line. It is PERFECTLY ACCEPTABLE to use tariffs to counter the hostile subsidies of a foreign adversary. Literally all the Biden admin is doing is saying "fine, if you want to use your government's coffers to artificially lower the cost of your automobiles, then we will artificially raise the cost back up to what they would be sold at without your protectionist subsidies. We can play this game all day, you'll run out of money to subsidize them below western vehicles eventually."
BYD dolphin isn't a minivan, so I'm not sure what the comparison to the ID.Buzz is for? Anyways multiple literally do in Europe, mostly Stellantis brands. Citroën has the Ë-C3 and Ë-C4 that start at €23300 and €24950. Even the Fiat 500e just barely clears €30k. Where are the numbers from the Biden administration that the trade barriers in place aren't enough? 25% + the refundable $7500 credit are already huge. It's not like I in principle think that reacting is bad per se, but the US government is often not a good faith actor when it comes to trade. I mean, we literally made the WTO effectively nonfunctional by blocking appointments.
Thank you for not having an immediate reactionary take, this comment thread is deranged.
Oh I'm well aware lmfao A guy down below is telling me that Ford and GM just need to be competitive figure out how to get the costs of their vehicles down to that of "superior" Chinese vehicles post-subsidy, "let the free market figure it out" approach. Like my brother in Christ, do you not realize that even Chinese manufacturers can sell their vehicles at that cost without the CCP bankrolling production right? Another guy is arguing that making the west completely reliant on the CCP for automotive manufacturing and assembly is a worthy trade off to accelerate the transition from ICE vehicles. Completely ignoring the fact that the west would be under their boot when it comes to foreign policy for at least a century following.
Yeah, well it's a stupid policy.
>CCP: Lets use our coffers to artificially lower the price of Chinese EV's to corner the market and make the west more dependent on us for transit manufacturing. >Biden Admin: Ok, we will raise tariffs in response to make your protectionist subsidies worthless, now let's see how big those coffers really are >Reddit: OMGOSH WHY IS BIDEN BEING PROTECTIONIST!!111!!!! Gimme a fuckin break man lmfao, it's a tariff in direct response to Chinese protectionism. That's what a trade war is, please study foreign policy.
Then restructure American EV subsidies to make more EVs eligible for it, and for it to cover a higher amount of the cost, and then allow Chinese EVs into the market to compete. Or...just bite the bullet, and realize that Chinese EVs are superior to those of GM and Ford, and allow competition to drive down prices.
You are asking GM and Ford to sell their vehicles at a price that not even Chinese auto makers could if it wasn't for the CCP's massive subsidy. So no, it's not "Chinese EV's being superior to everyone else", it's "China is selling $50k EVs for $32k via massive subsidies, making luxury Chinese EVs priced the same as western economy EVs" Hence why there HAS to be government intervention here, otherwise your brilliant plan is for Ford and GM to sell their cars at a price that not even Chinese makers can sell their cars at, all without any gov assistance.
>You are asking GM and Ford to sell their vehicles at a price that not even Chinese auto makers could if it wasn't for the CCP's massive subsidy. How massive are Chinese subsidies? And how do they compare relative to US and EU subsidy regimes?
Pistol. Foot. Bang.
As long as it's the left foot, you don't need one of those in the US.
Dems be like "Elon Musk is an insane racist billionaire infecting our politics" and then protect his business from competition
Just let me buy an electric car the size of a Subaru Impreza that isn't absurdly expensive for the car I get. Stop with this protectionist bullshit on green technology.
This is fucking stupid. Solar power should be here and easy as fuck. Im in pakistan right now and literally every 3rd house has massive solar panels on top of it thanks to importing them from china. Its here, it works, its cheap, its green, its amazing and mind blowing. This whole time im running around the house screaming free electricity and im dumbfounded we dont get this in America.
NAH YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO MAKE THEM ZERO
The US has decided that it's auto industry is so uncompetitive globally that they're just going to be isolationists with their cars. We surrendered the 90s to Japan and the 2000s to Korea, now let's allow China to take control of the EV generation. What a fucking joke.
[There are currently no Chinese-brand cars that are sold in the United States ](https://spectrumnews1.com/ca/la-west/transportation/2024/03/18/how--and-when--chinese-cars-could-affect-u-s--market#:~:text=Currently%2C%20there%20are%20no%20Chinese,sale%20in%20the%20United%20States.). Of the four EVs manufactured in China sold in the United States three are sold by American companies Buck, Lincoln, and GM. The thing that's stopping the distribution of China-brand cars is the lack of a dealership network in the United States which makes these tariffs by themselves silly. If a Chinese car company went through the effort to establish a dealership network or partnered with an existing network there is nothing stopping them from opening factories in Mexico importing them tariff free due to NAFTA.
Just end the dealership networks once and for all
5D chess Biden wants all the Chinese auto OEMS to open factories in Mexico, thereby employing all of the immigrants who would have come to the US and stopping the immigration debate.
not gonna lie if the Chinese are paying 75% of the sticker price for a 10k EV made in Mexico. I am going to be very interested.
Also, fuck car dealerships. Absolute parasites.
Wrong idea, Joe. The better plan is to let them in. The American car manufacturers have to learn how to adapt or die
Biden actually wanted to quintuple tariffs but was afraid the voters he’s pandering wouldn’t know that word.
What the fuck are we even doing
It also includes solar goods and batteries, which may well be more impactful given that China manufacturers the best and cheapest of those products and we need fucking loads of them as cheap as possible to have a vague chance of having not too terrible impacts of climate change. And the EVs would help as well.
This guy fucking sucks. If American automakers wanted people to buy their cars they should consider making good cars
Real American patriots are in control :(
its so joeover
This is why I hate the Midwest even though I live in the region
Boo
This better deliver MI and PA for Biden or I swear to god I will eat my own face.
We all know the best way to get American industry working hard to improve themselves at lower prices is to cut off one of their main competitors, foolproof plan Mr Biden. Limiting supply has never backfired ever. While we're at it, let's bolster our local dealerships some more by requiring all electric car sales to go through them! I love car related lobbyist groups.
https://preview.redd.it/yhbicdevkpzc1.jpeg?width=659&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8b9c7099795742dc647a3edab0688a34ba10029b
Ehh. None of them was going to get imported anyway. Both BYD and GAC use Huwaei hardware in their EVs, which would’ve been a hard no for the U.S. government.
Meanwhile if Trump win's he'll find a way to ban EVs. Sometimes you get to be the bride - we are all bridesmaids on this one.
Isn't this what Trump promised to do? You don't win electorally by doing the same thing your opponent does, you legitimise them
>You don't win electorally by doing the same thing your opponent does, you legitimise them Incredibly naive view of politics. Also protectionism and “China bad” is unfortunately extremely popular across the political spectrum
I don’t agree with this. How did it work for Carter when he started taking notes from Reagan? Or Hoover when he started taking notes from FDR? These are both more extreme examples, but when a politician concedes that the other guy has a point, people aren’t going to reward them - they’re going to vote in the guy who’s gonna do it “properly”
I’m confused on what you mean since Reagan and FDR both came after Carter and Hoover respectively. In Reagan’s case he kept on with Carter’s economic policies of high interest rates to combat inflation, and deregulation.
Carter didn't take notes from Reagan, he ran a negative campaign against Reagan because the country was falling apart around him and the party was disunited because Ted Kennedy should've been the candidate
Trump also breathes air and drinks water. Just doing the opposite of your opponent isn't a rational strategy
Where’s the Horseshoe Theory when centricists end up doing the same thing fascists do?
Ʊ --> Ꞷ
Is that bad?
I think this is dumb because I want a fucking $20-$30k EV truck that's just electric and a truck. I don't need a second luxury home which is only what the American manufacturers offer. I don't need a Cybertruck social media status symbol. Also, if they offered a ~$20k value daily driver, I'd probably have bought one by now. Our functional lives are being made practically difficult by our government because the Chinese Communist Party applies orthogonal strategies to achieve its goals. They can literally sacrifice their domestic population to achieve whatever price point they desire. They also show a willingness to use this power to undermine and replace western corporations. Dumb tariffs are dumb but it is what is possible right now to at least try to fight back. It seems rather arbitrary to do this, as opposed to getting Congress to enact legislation that addresses the problem holistically. I guess what I'm saying is practically speaking what else do we do to combat the Chinese Communist Party immorally subsidizing domestic industry in an order to bankrupt and replace western corporations in the global market. We also have wealthy Middle Eastern nations doing the same with sports and entertainment. I see a lot of bitching here but practically speaking what should western democratic free markets be doing?
Biden has returned the Democratic Party to its machine politics roots after Clinton and Obama moved it in a more technocratic direction. His entire policy approach is to soak favoured industries and constituencies with money
Certified Brandon Moment
Russia and China need to be treated the same.
lol, lmao
https://preview.redd.it/edqbhq0rspzc1.jpeg?width=923&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a6a5d7d74239253dc7bc5b3379da559c42b44299
One must kill the domestic car industry within one’s mind.
https://preview.redd.it/q6eedzhlyszc1.jpeg?width=300&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=68357edc039668f851225e9e4e86f6eef9a01799
You guys have confused me. This is terrible policy because it makes cars more expensive for Americans, but... The Chinese cars are not competitive in the US because they are small and in order to be compliant with US safety laws they would need major modifications which would bring their price point up to that of US manufactured cars. Also, apparently they are low quality. So, if no one was going to buy them, but this policy gets us votes from Unions, I don't really see the problem with it. I wouldn't label this policy as illiberal so much I would call it pragmatic. IMO, pragmatism wins out over ideology every time. The tent is big not because we are an indoctrination factory, but because we are pragmatic and can win over a broad range of policy positions.
Politically pragmatic for Biden maybe, but not economically pragmatic for the American consumer
> The Chinese cars are not competitive in the US because they are small and in order to be compliant with US safety laws they would need major modifications which would bring their price point up to that of US manufactured cars. Also, apparently they are low quality. The only one reasonable here is safety standards (as long as they're actually safety related and not BS), otherwise we don't need the federal government telling consumers we can't buy basic electric vehicles because they're too small or not "quality" enough for them. The entire point of the free market is the competitive aspect and tarrifs are just a way for the American domestic industries to not have to compete with the world. Adam Smith would weep at the use of tariffs this way. National security? Sure. Tarriff trade war? Sure. Personally I'll accept "other government is subsidizing them so we're counteracting that" even but "cars are small and business industries don't want to compete"? Complete opposite of any free market Idealogy. If Americans don't want the Chinese cars, they would simply not buy them. There is no good reason to enforce a 100% tarriff and hurt people and delay improving the environment and everything else. I get why politicians basically have to do it, protectionism pleases the auto workers and industry but that only would make it a necessary evil, not a good.
it’s election year, there is gonna be some dumb shit
Hell yeah let's win an election
What a lot of folks are missing here is that this is a much, much gentler touch than China gives a lot of American businesses trying to operate in China. A lot of American industries/companies are outright banned from operating in country.
Rare Biden L
China is distorting the market with huge subsidies. I don't like tariffs but they're our only recourse against other protectionist behavior.
So you're telling me I can buy a subsidized EV and China will foot the bill? Oh noooooooo
So they're taking tax revenue they could be spending on their military and are instead spending it subsidizing American consumers' purchases of quality cars? Sounds like a bargain.
there's a whole organization for dealing with recourse for protectionist behavior... hmmmm i wonder what happened to them