It isn't just the middle class bearing the bulk of the burden though, is it? The wide-ranging tariffs applies pretty much to everything, so it affects everybody in society regardless of their social or economic class. It's just that the wealthy people and the big corps have the money and resources to weather the storm a lot better.
The middle class consumes too, but they don't have the resources to absorb the financial blow as if the tariff isn't there. So they get hit the hardest.
The poor gets fxxked bcos percentage-wise, their spending power take the biggest hit, and they can't not spend money on the essentials -- eg. food, shelter, etc. And they end up consuming less, which means they are getting deprived even more than they did before.
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Originally Posted by pastarocket
However, he chooses not to use a corporate tax on American corporations that outsource manufacturing because he doesn't want to anger his rich Republican support base.
The additional cost of thousands of dollars, about an extra $3000 US per year for each American family according to CNN, is put on the middle class instead of the rich.
When you think about it, Cheeto's tariffs protect his rich voter base and raise the cost of living on the middle class in the U.S. and other countries.
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Personally, I don't blame the big corps for moving manufacturing overseas to reap record profits. Maximizing profits is what businesses are supposed to do. And in the process of moving manufacturing capabilities overseas, they have helped to keep inflation at a very low level for the past 30+ years, which in turn allowed American consumers to consume more. (And in economics, you generally associate consumption with happiness.) Shifting the low profit manufacturing sector overseas also frees up the US labour forces to allow them to pursue higher profit sectors, and there is a tremendous amount of merit in that.
What is lacking is -- bcos corporations are given the opportunity to reap all these economic benefits, they should also bear the social responsibility to contribute a larger share of their profits back into society. Of course, it is naive to expect them to do so willingly.
Extreme wealth disparity is never a good thing, but it is exactly what we are having now.