Why does the MEDIA get the effects of TARIFFS wrong?

Question

The Media repeatedly reports on the negative effects of tariffs, how they will raise prices, and how people are upset about that.

What the media fails to do is talk about the complete effects of tariffs. Yes, they will raise prices for American consumers... on discretionary goods that Americans purchase, goods they don't have to purchase, like gadgets from China. As prices rise, demand for those goods will fall, which causes the Law of Supply and Demand to kick in. In other words, the supplier (in a foreign country) will lower its prices to maintain a reasonable demand... and profit margin.

Over time, prices and trade amounts will stabilize, resulting in a more favorable trade balance for the receiving country, the United States (considering Trump's tariffs).

Simply put, tariffs are not the evil that the media professes them to be.

So...

Why do you think the media keeps pushing the negative effects of tariffs, ignoring their long-term benefits.

Please vote in the poll and add an opinion if you like.

MuddyMole · Accepted Answer

If you're talking about the US media, then the answer is simply that it's garbage - nothing but sensationalism, scaremongering and wildly biased opinion pieces (though it's worth noting, even right-wing outlets like Fox News thought tariffs were a bad idea).

However, I think what you're describing is also incorrect, and based entirely on the assumption that China just decides to accept it, and not put up any kind of resistance - which as we've already seen, did not happen (there was never any reason to imagine it would, apart from over-optimism and a lack of forward-planning).

Firstly, we're not just talking about a few "discretionary goods that Americans purchase, goods they don't have to purchase, like gadgets from China". It's not the 1980s any more - Americans buy everything from China, including food and essentials. Even things that say "Made in the USA" (or some other country) contain components or materials that originate in China.

Secondly, your assumption that Chinese companies will simply lower their prices, has also been proven false. What actually happened was that the Chinese government intervened on their behalf, by introducing retaliatory tariffs. Trump escalated with 145% tariffs - and no Chinese business is going to simply lower their prices enough to compensate for a 145% tariff.
You're probably thinking 145% was too high, and some lower number would have worked, but the point is that whatever value you pick, China will match, and the result is that US consumers pay more, and US companies lose exports.

bolverk · Accepted Answer

For the Main Stream Media, it is a mix of the first thee of your options -
Negative and controversial news increases the media's ratings -
Reporters can barely spell economics, let alone understand it -
The media is just supporting politician's arguments over tariffs -

purplepoppy · Accepted Answer

A lot of foreign markets are already selling to America at rock bottom prices. All theyre going to do is lay staff off. there's a lot of talk about steel and cars but it's the little guys who are getting hit the hardest. Trump isn't winning against China, he's winning against Bob's little sprocket shop. The reality is small countries need higher tariffs so they don't get swamped with American and Chinese goods. Politicians might make a deal but there's a huge risk people will want to fight back in more violent ways

midnightmoon05 · Accepted Answer

Fun Questions Tom

I voted - Negative and controversial news increases the media's ratings - 21%. In addition - Because the news media know how easily it is to keep the drama going.

ahahaha... most voted so far!! -

Tariffs really are bad, anything else is mumbo-jumbo - 36%

See... its working!!! ... keep the drama going.

OlderAndWiser · Answer

Criticizing tariffs advanced the left wing agenda more effectively than criticizing Trump’s hair color.

RavVid · Answer

You know what? A country has the choice of paying to support uneconomic industries or paying people sit down (and do nothing) money.

Cause we don't feel quite comfortable in letting those who can't get a job starve to death.

Now lets be honest. In a knowledge based economy some aren't going to be smart enough to get a job. Lets suppose an IQ=100 is the cut off (I think admin needs 120). That immediately means 50% of the pop can't get or keep a job and the 50% that can have to subsidize those that can't.

The key metric here is workforce participation rate not unemployment rate. In my country non participation is about 30% for guys and girls. Similar in the US I think but higher than us for women. So 70% pay for 30%.

The critical question than is do we pay for those who can't get a job sit down money or do we subsidize industries which can employ low IQ people and those with bad social skills?

Sit down money fosters social ills like drugs robberies. So I like tariffs and subsidized industries more than sit down money.

Pohjolan · Answer

As prices rise, demand for those goods will fall, which causes the Law of Supply and Demand to kick in. In other words, the supplier (in a foreign country) will lower its prices to maintain a reasonable demand... and profit margin.

Clearly you have no idea how small the profit margins already are. They simply won't sell stuff to USA if they'd make a loss by doing so.

Over time, prices and trade amounts will stabilize, resulting in a more favorable trade balance for the receiving country, the United States (considering Trump's tariffs).

You are forgetting that countries will place reciprocal tariffs on US goods as well reducing sales reducing US exports also. Also concerns about supply reliability will make others reconsider choosing US producers.

Why do you think the media keeps pushing the negative effects of tariffs, ignoring their long-term benefits.

Long term? Other have tried this long term before. You can protect a baby industry from foreign competition by tariffs but its not a sustainable long term solution.

Also the dollar will lose its current status as a reserve currency and petro-dollar if Trump were to continue with his plan A after the 90 days pause.

We'll see if he has a plan B.

Dargil · Answer

The media are largely uneducated in terms of. both history and civics. They do know how to write down words, but they very often don't even know what they mean. If they take a look at the history of tariffs, their are mechanism, and how they worked both for this country and for China they will understand the value of them.

All these outrages they come up with. are simply efforts at making some pie stick to the wall. When they fail, they just go on to the next thing. Now let's see. Someone is going to come up with the reason why President Trump is personally responsible for the epidemic of erectile dysfunction. AND He is making huge personal profits on Viagra and Cialis, because of his secret investments..

And Elon Musk has invented a mind control machine that works in your cell phone and controls what you think. And don't even get me started on what Elon Musk has done to toilet paper.

Anonymous · Answer

Because the left controls mainstream media and always wants to keep people scared, paranoid, divided and mostly hating the person in charge of it’s not a democrat. The love to repeat the bad side of things on a daily to keep their propaganda consumers angry and hopefully sway others to become just as bitter and miserable to get them to think wow didn’t really vote for this? That’s how propaganda works. They repeat it until you even dream about it when they’re done repeating it.

Hence why the miserable left is always so angry and miserable, crying and complaining about anything and everything.

JesseP1nk · Answer

Americans shot themselves in the foot with tariffs. As an European im happy that Trump put tariffs on China, now Europe can make better deals with China. Just like South Korea and Japan does.

https://www.reuters.com/world/china-japan-south-korea-will-jointly-respond-us-tariffs-chinese-state-media-says-2025-03-31/

Ooh and all those stocks i bought when stocks were down. Now i already make great profit with TSLA. So Trump is making us rich.

BonzoInBitburg · Answer

Supply and demand will change with inflation. If mobile phones go up 50% in the US, manufactures will simply ship less to the US and more elsewhere. Demand might go down in the US but supply stays more or less the same globally as the phones will be shipped to other countries with more favorable trade deals in place. If he actually keeps tariffs in place, more overseas good will become priced out of the market and will be no longer available in the US. It's a global economy and supply and demand will be relatively unchanged for the rest of the world meaning there's no reason for a business to subsidize goods in America when it's business as usual everywhere else. It's more cost effective for a business that relies on imports to exit the US so they can rescale and focus on other markets in order to maintain profit margins.

Shiprex · Answer

In olden days when tariffs COULD be relied on to do such things then unless you were the British or Indian or Chinese empire where you have fundamental control of almost all trade then sure the balances you suggest could be ironed out. However, the world is now decentralised around other regions and the tariff tantrum to get more D'uhmericans to work in sweat shop conditions by bringing back manufacturing of big items like cars, clothes, shoes, is only going to fall flat on it's face and make EVERYONE suffer, ESPECIALLY D'uhmericans who think this is wise because a reality TV actor/toddler said so.

ProbablyClueless · Answer

At a certain point, I have to think it's an intentional choice; a willful, bad faith misinterpretation to generate headlines and sell advertising.

The economics and logic of Trump's approaches, as well as his methods of addressing the bureaucratic state, deportations, etc.; are so well established in history and law that the notion we're in a constitutional crisis would be laughable if educated people didn't genuinely believe it.

To give some frame of reference, there's a HUGE community of LAWYERS on Reddit screaming about how the Trump deportations without a trial are somehow a violation of Due Process. Anyone who has taken a basic Adminstrative Law course can tell you that Due Process does not require a trial for deportation. That's simply not the standard; it's not how the law works. But still, these highly educated idiots are running around with the hair on fire claiming that our nation is on the verge of collapse.

Twalli · Answer

The way that most tariffs work is to increase the demand of goods made in the country already. The fact is most goods made in the U. S. require raw materials we don't produce. Putting a tariff on these goods is stupid. If we want to actually increase the amount of goods sold in the U. S. and cut down on costs, we need to increase internal production. Without doing that, making it more expensive for retailors to make goods in the U. S. will just drive-up prices and make certain things that we take for granted more expensive. I guess you don't consider any of your appliance necessary, because most of them require materials that we don't produce here.

Jackblue · Answer

Tariffs don't work even in the long term, what happens is that American suppliers have less competition and therefore less motivation to make their processes more efficient. Economists usually disapprove of tariffs. There are other issues as well, was it really a good idea to get into a trade war with the country that supplies us with rare earth minerals which we depend on for military applications, there are other potential sources but those will take time, I can agree that the Chinese Government can't be trusted, but we should have subsidized our own mining operations first before trying to stop them, and we should have isolated them alone without trying to cut off the whole world. Lastly tariffs rely on the same philosophy as socialism, aka that you can only help one person by taking from another, but that isn't how things really work, the prosperity of one is the prosperity of all.

Razp_Sorbet · Answer

This is just plain wrong. As others have said the way through this is to make things locally which is just not feasible for the United States as they don't have all the resources available natural or otherwise or the man power willing to create or mine those resources.

OneViewpoint · Answer

Wow Tom, you have a serious misunderstanding of the economics of tariffs and how / why they can be a tool in specific limited circumstances. Your view is more a fantasy of what you'd like the world to be. You're trying to apply normal circumstances and economics to a totally artificial and abnormal situation. That tells me you don't know what you're talking about.

chrissykerdock · Answer

tariffs are long term effects not immediate america as a nation exports and imports as any other nation does once we were an isolationist country long time ago 1880s now we gave so much away with tariffs it will bring back jobs long term if not soon as tomorrow

Joshydavid25 · Answer

It's involved with Trump, so naturally they'll be against it.. Tariffs just happen to be one of the easier negatives to point out, because overall, they haven't had a good reputation among economist..

Anonymous · Answer

If tariffs are so amazing, why did your government have to spend 28 billion bailing out farmers for all the money they lost his first term? Why are they talking about needing to bail out farmers again already? "Everyone will stop buying stuff so demand drops" is not an argument for tariffs being good.

DeeDeeDeVour · Answer

Well said @AviatorTom.  The 1st 4 options apply.  However, the 2nd is the main reason.  Sadly, multitudes of people simply didn't learn much about economics.

DrPepper12 · Answer

"discretionary"? Really? Give me a break.

Tariffs, targeted, specific & Im plemented for the right reasons using actual math instead of AI are tolerable

You're talking nonsense that has no basis in actual consumer or producer behavior

FunkyMonkee · Answer

ANYTHING to sub-due anything Trump says or is doing!! If Trump decided to ban kicking someone in the balls, the lefties would want it done to them more often just to piss him off!

Syntosi · Answer

That is not how it works at all. No serious economist agrees with anything you just said and in the countless times that tariffs has been implemented in history it has never had that effect. Where the fuck did you even come up with that?

captain_voidwalker · Answer

Because in order so see the benefits of tariffs you have to think long term, and thinking long term is frankly beyond the capabilities of 90% of the country

msc545 · Answer

@aviatortom "Gadgets from China"... like motherboards and video cards and microprocessors, right?  Stuff "nobody needs", right? Did you think about what wrote before you wrote it?

Dongie · Answer

Because it's Trump running them. We could all be receiving a weekly check here in America and they would still criticize him for it.

Ironco · Answer

Who still listens to the main stream media... Fuck them, they are only for the ratings... when is the last time they told or reported the truth?

SmokinAces2000 · Answer

Because they are affecting Americans now. No one cares about the long term benefits when they currently have to pay more and it all could have been avoided.

Oncewildtwiceburned · Answer

The complete give a fuck attitude of the average young man in any country today.

genericname85 · Answer

what about the tariffs reported in the media is factually wrong?

Knightwatch27 · Answer

Because it's intentional. Media are leftist. Obsessed with control and maintaining the false bubble of how the world works.

beefcakebradybatson · Answer

The media get the effects of tariffs 100% RIGHT !!!

BobbyLee789 · Answer

Tariff is another name for tax

OldBlu · Answer

Libtard

Why does the MEDIA get the effects of TARIFFS wrong?

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