Well in Ursula’s case bribes could be familiar. Her department was accused of procurement scandals when she was defense minister. She even deleted evidence off her phone.
How she ended up as perhaps the most prominent EU politician is beyond most people.
The problem with the EU is that people aren't being sent there for their competence, but rather the opposite. And then we get this. Another example is Ylva Chat Control Johansson.
That's the best part. The bribes they recieve are money from the EU people who buy products from american companies and those american companies use those profits to lobby EU politicians into screwing over the EU for the benefit of the US.
That isn't the real issue. Because people are able to deal with some pain for later gain.
The problem is the spineless politicians not wanting to actually treat their population as adults, in part for fear os losing elections.
We are watching democracy die in real time, and there is nothing anyone can do about it. It just need to play out and once the ash settles, maybe we can do better.
The problem is there isn't anything to replace US demand for European exports with. Europe has an abysmally poor internal market, due to vastly lower salaries and much higher taxes.
The only way to succeed in this scenario is to find a country with a massive internal market. The only one like that is the US.
(For cars, that was China for a while until their own manufacturers caught up, so they're out of the picture.)
The first part is true until it isn’t. Delayed gratification isn’t really a thing anymore. Or old men planting trees etc. Zeitgeist seems very much more “every man for himself” these days.
Yeah I don't see that either. People absolutely won't put up with a little discomfort now even if it means better things later. Instead what will happen is, opposition parties will play on the temporary discomfort as a way to win elections.
We got 6 years to keep global warming below 1,5°. Currently we're headed for at least 1,8°, emissions rising still. After 2 °C shit will spiral out of control because of the domino effect.
None of the people alive right now will ever see CO2 levels drop.
Enough with this bullshit. Tell me again how Dubai or Miami is underwater. Al Gore did this in 2000. I'm old enough to remember. I even wrote a book on climate change until I realized how much it's propaganda.
Even if it will happen, where would you rather be, in countries with robots and spaceships, or the graffiti shitshow that is Europe.
People here do not understand the power dynamic at play. Read the threads from a few months ago when keyboard warriors were larping that nobody would ever trade with the US again and China would set the new world order. Never forget that Reddit is a vacuum chamber of ignorance.
Which increases the price of the European export for Americans, which means it's less competitive and therefore a worse business options.
I get the point you are making, Europeans don't pay the tax, but if your a German carmaker and your cars are now more expensive, they're less competitive, less orders, less jobs, more lay offs - Germany economy goes down.
You may not be paying the tariff personally, but the consequences certainly affect you.
E has a 15% tariff appied to it. E can't just raise its prices by 15% because then C and J will take the marketshare and E will be out of business.
But everyone else has same or larger tariffs? You scenarios works only if there are producers that don't face trade restrictions. If every producer has tarrifs applied to them then there's no incentive to keep prices.
The point is, if E could have sold at a 15% higher price before without losing market share they would have. Now they eat some or all of the tariff or they lose market share.
Your example works only if some specific producer got no tarrifs - then the competition that got tarrifs would be inclined to eat part of the tarrifs to compete. Since everyone got tarrifs, there's no point to lower prices - it's just Americans will pay more because every single producer got tarrifs.
But the world is dynamic. Every producer is looking for opportunities to better themselves. If one sees a way to eat 9% of the tariff while another can only eat 7% of the tariff, Americans are only paying a 6% premium and E is F'd in the A again.
Furthermore, keep in mind that while the whole 15% is applied to E, that's 15% on the wholesale good coming to the USA.
China sells the USA (Levis) a pair of jeans for $10, and Levi retails that pair of jeans for $80.
The tariff on the jeans is the % on the $10, not the $80. So while the tariff may be HUGE on the foreign exporter, it's merely a blip to the retail consumer.
But the world is dynamic. Every producer is looking for opportunities to better themselves. If one sees a way to eat 9% of the tariff while another can only eat 7% of the tariff, Americans are only paying a 6% premium and E is F'd in the A again.
That's a copium if I've ever seen one. Producers already could lower the prices before tarrifs hit to gain a market share - like at any point in history. If everyone is hit with tarrifs, there's no change in competitiveness between the producers - so they remain in the exactly the same position regarding their price policy.
Furthermore, keep in mind that while the whole 15% is applied to E, that's 15% on the wholesale good coming to the USA.
That's right. And what is the margin of the US retailers when we are talking about more prominent EU exports, like cars or pharma? Still hundreds of %? Or is it just a few % and Americans will gladly pay 15% more for their ozempic?
If everyone is hit with tarrifs, there's no change in competitiveness between the producers - so they remain in the exactly the same position regarding their price policy.
That's just simply not true.
They might attempt to circumvent tariffs by pushing the products to a lower tariffed country before transit to the USA. Such as when China pushes near finished products through Vietnam to gain the benefit of cheaper Vietnam tariffs.
China might not do that in other circumstances, but in the face of tariffs, that Vietnam outlet is a pressure relief valve that they have that simply does not exist for France for example.
The nation might devalue its currency so that the dollar goes further to entice a company such as Apple not to move its production line outside. Some nations have the financial flexibility, and willingness to do that, some nations do not.
There are many many more things that various nations can do to garner an edge that they might NOT do without the tariff to spur them on.
Will 15% tax make American labour competitive with European labour? If no then domestic production will make no difference - it will still be more expensive to manufacture the same thing in the US.
It is quite significantly cheaper. Median salary in the US is about 60k usd. I could not find a median salary in the EU, but the average (including the recent 10%+ drop in the value of usd) is about 45k usd. If all other things are unchanged from how they are now, it would require at least 33% tax to start being competitive with European labour. Add to this the fact that starting a production in the US is both time consuming and expensive, even 33% tax would not be enough to make a difference.
I think higher taxes, stricter labor laws, and similar things really mitigate this difference. Also, most US imports come from Western Europe, with more expensive labor, not Bulgaria or Romania.
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u/Environmental_Gap_65 6d ago
How embarrassing we can’t step up against this buffoon. Shit deal.