> But they can't do this for much longer, inflation is the first sign, which is why Trump is raising tariffs.
Trump is raising tariffs because he thinks they are a good idea and has since the 1980s:
> “The fact is, you don’t have free trade. We think of it as free trade, but you right now don’t have free trade,” Trump said in a 1987 episode of Larry King Live that’s excerpted in Trump’s Trade War. “A lot of people are tired of watching the other countries ripping off the United States. This is a great country.”
Meanwhile, in the real world, commerce is often non-zero-sum (both parties get something of value, i.e., "win-win"), and you play multiple rounds with each trading partner and reputation matters (rather than one-off, where burning your bridges could be an actual strategy).
Trump is raising tariffs because he thinks they are a good idea and has since the 1980s:
> “The fact is, you don’t have free trade. We think of it as free trade, but you right now don’t have free trade,” Trump said in a 1987 episode of Larry King Live that’s excerpted in Trump’s Trade War. “A lot of people are tired of watching the other countries ripping off the United States. This is a great country.”
* https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/trumps-tariff-str...
Trump's mindset is a 1980s NYC real estate guy (zero-sum, one-off games), which when applied to global trade, is basically mercantilist:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercantilism
Meanwhile, in the real world, commerce is often non-zero-sum (both parties get something of value, i.e., "win-win"), and you play multiple rounds with each trading partner and reputation matters (rather than one-off, where burning your bridges could be an actual strategy).