taxing the little things

 The stuff going on in Washington is making me dizzy and on most of it I have no expertise.

Punishing Mexico and Canada with a huge tariff? Well, they started it. Fenanyl and people smuggling by the cartels who run Mexico, and the huge tariffs in Canada on American goods. That last part could hint that tariffs on the EU will come next, since they too put huge tariffs on Yankee goods.

How dare Trumpie boy push back.

But what is the smaller tariff on China about? It isn't big enough to harm them, so what's the deal.

Dilbert explains it in his podcast:

Answer: this is about taxing small packages. E commerce. Both direct sales from China to the US and also when they send parts in small packages to get around the usual taxes.

Conservative Treehouse has the details here.

Trump’s executive orders directing 25% levies on Canada and Mexico — plus a 10% duty on China — specify that the “de minimis” exemption for small packages no longer applies. Under the exemption, products below that dollar amount are able to enter the US without tariffs — a boon for China’s e-commerce retailers who ship often cheaper wares directly to consumers in the US....the impact of the change threatens to fall most squarely on China, affecting retailers including Alibaba, JD.com Inc., PDD Holdings Inc.’s Temu and fashion-focused Shein. American shoppers and companies imported about $48 billion worth of shipments from the world under that loophole in the first nine months of last year, according to US Customs and Border Protection estimates.

more details from the Financial Post

translation: they are undermining Amazon.

And local businesses of course.

China dumping cheap goods on third world countries undermines local businesses, both manufacturing stuff and now the retail stores. I wonder if this works if more countries will do the same.

I mainly shop locally, except I have to buy my clothes in the used clothing outlets to find clothing to fit me.

But I see the staff here always buying cheap stuff on line and getting it delivered here. Yes, they could probably find it locally, but that would take time to find where they could get it and the prices would be higher than e commerce.