{"id":59015,"date":"2025-04-07T11:26:51","date_gmt":"2025-04-07T15:26:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=59015"},"modified":"2025-04-07T11:26:51","modified_gmt":"2025-04-07T15:26:51","slug":"tariffs-good-or-bad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=59015","title":{"rendered":"Tariffs:\u00a0 Good or Bad?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Author:\u00a0 R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D
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Well, President Trump has done it again– kept his campaign promise about tariffs and putting America first.\u00a0 This action, was the most dramatic and far-ranging impactful action by any president in quite some time.\u00a0 Essentially, the whole world will be affected.\u00a0 Before we can answer the question of whether these tariffs will be good or bad, we need to examine what they are intended to do.\u00a0 While we cannot read President Trump\u2019s mind as to his intentions, we can get a pretty good idea from his many comments about the problems facing this country.\u00a0 Let\u2019s check them out.<\/p>\n

First, the national debt, currently at $ 36.8 trillion, which amounts to $93,500 for every man, woman, and child in this country, is clearly unsustainable and growing.\u00a0 No country has ever survived that much debt without a total economic collapse.\u00a0 How long do we have to address the debt crisis?\u00a0 Based on their lack of action, according to most of our elected officials, there is no urgency.\u00a0 Common sense, which is the guiding principle of the Trump administration, tells us otherwise.\u00a0 Since the trade deficit with other countries is a major contributor to the national debt, the tariffs are a good place to start, since they directly attack the substantial trade deficit we have with other countries, which is now over $1.2 trillion per year.<\/p>\n

Second is the loss of wealth creation.\u00a0 Until recently, America offered the highest standard of living in the world.\u00a0 How were we able to achieve this?\u00a0 Through industrial manufacturing–that\u2019s how.\u00a0 From the mid- 1800s to the end of World War II, the manufacturing capacity of America was without equal.\u00a0 A cursory examination of what we were able to produce during World War II shows that our label as the \u201cArsenal of Democracy\u201d was based on our manufacturing capacity.\u00a0 Not only did we arm ourselves in record fashion, but we were able to supply our allies, who would have been defeated without our arms supplies.\u00a0 Converting raw materials into usable products using advanced manufacturing processes is the basis of wealth creation in the modern world.\u00a0 Where are we now?\u00a0 Over the past 50 years, we have been losing our manufacturing capacity at an alarming rate.\u00a0 Hundreds of thousands of manufacturing plants have been closed in this country with the loss of millions of good paying jobs.\u00a0 Looking back to the 1950s and 60s, it was typical that the man was the bread winner, and on his salary could support a family and own a home.\u00a0 Now it takes two salaries and the cost of housing is beyond the reach of many.\u00a0 This decline is primarily due to the globalization of the world economy and the policies that encouraged manufacturing to move to other countries where labor is much cheaper.<\/p>\n

Third is national security.\u00a0 In order to defend ourselves, it is necessary to maintain a strong military, which again relies on advanced technology and manufacturing.\u00a0 For instance, we have 4 ship-building facilities in this country.\u00a0 Our most immediate adversary, China, has 24 and leads the world in ship construction, both civilian and military.\u00a0\u00a0 Does China have the natural resources they need for their manufacturing?\u00a0 Of course not–they get them from other countries, including us.\u00a0 Many of the policies of the Left have contributed to the manufacturing demise–such things as excessive regulations, green energy mandates, DEI, etc. have complicated the operation of manufacturing plants, causing them to relocate to other countries to stay in business.\u00a0 As we learned during Covid, obtaining medicines and essential medical supplies from other countries is potential social suicide especially in the case of war.<\/p>\n

Fourth is the demise of the middle class.\u00a0 The discrepancy between the top earners and lower groups has widened considerably.\u00a0 The American Dream of economic advancement through hard work is seriously ill and getting sicker.\u00a0 Excessive wealth disparities can lead to resentment and disillusionment that is not good for the unity of the country.<\/p>\n

Fifth is unfair treatment by other countries.\u00a0 If you were able to watch President Trump\u2019s presentation about tariffs, it was clear that we have allowed ourselves to be taken advantage of by many other countries.\u00a0 The idea of free trade that many economists have been preaching assumes a level of fair play that currently does not exist with many of our trading partners.\u00a0 The have value-added taxes, forbid the import of certain items, and manipulate the value of their currency in order to maintain a trading advantage..\u00a0 They get richer; we get poorer!\u00a0 Pretty dumb on our part, wouldn\u2019t you say?<\/p>\n

There are other problems that President Trump hopes to address through the implementation of this ambitious tariff plan.\u00a0 Obviously, these problems have existed for many years and addressing them is long overdue and will take time to accomplish.\u00a0 Will there be some pain involved?\u00a0 Of course–an omelet cannot be made without cracking the egg.\u00a0\u00a0 As the Left attacks him for his plan, I have not seen any of them present their own plan to solve this economic crisis.\u00a0 The Left is quick to criticize, but presenting effective solutions is not something the Leftists ever do.\u00a0 That is part of the reason we are in this fix.\u00a0 So, let\u2019s give President Trump\u2019s plan a chance to succeed and support his efforts.\u00a0 Doing nothing is not acceptable, and thank God we have a President who is dedicated, courageous, and willing to fight for this country he loves.\u00a0 Many of our other presidents were not.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author:\u00a0 R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D Well, President Trump has done it again– kept his campaign promise about tariffs and putting America first.\u00a0 This action, was the most dramatic and far-ranging impactful action by any president in quite some time.\u00a0 Essentially, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[15654,11742],"class_list":["post-59015","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-r-alan-harrop","tag-tariffs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59015","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=59015"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59015\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":59016,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59015\/revisions\/59016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=59015"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=59015"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=59015"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}