# How was the rest of the world "ripping us off"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [April 7, 2025, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757 "2025-04-07T20:28:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/son_of_a_rich/32/5439_2.png) [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/1 "2025-04-07T20:28:14Z")
That trump guy is making the US sound like the biggest bunch of losers on the planet. Everybody is taking advantage of us and hurting our feelings. But trump is talking about buying and selling. What does he know about that? Which countries are forcing US companies to buy their goods? AIUI, the taxes/tariffs other countries impose are just the cost of doing business with them. Don’t like it, buy somewhere else. I refuse to study economics just to figure this shit out. ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/2 "2025-04-07T20:31:38Z")
They stole our freedom! Obviously there is only so much freedom that can be had in the world, and we helped show the world how to be free. Ipsofacto, they ripped ours off. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/3 "2025-04-07T20:52:44Z")
The rest of the world was ripping us off in _precisely_ the same way that your grocery store is ripping you off by not buying as many dollars’ worth of products from you as you buy from them. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/4 "2025-04-07T20:58:13Z")
It’s think I understand it; picture Canada and America as neighbours, Canada, a much smaller population, builds some low rise buildings. America with a much bigger population, builds a high tower. Over time the people in the tower, begins to believe their neighbours OWE them! Why? Because they have been ‘protecting’ them from too much sun, rain, AND providing endless shade. It’s clear, to those in the tower, that Canada is hugely in their eternal debt. Effectively, they’re ripping them off. Getting free unpaid protection from the sun and rain! In fact, very soon the tower people begin to believe they should just absorb the neighbour, they’re very much bigger, and therefore clearly deserving of whatever they can take. And their neighbour should thank them for it too! Did I get it right? ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2025, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/5 "2025-04-07T21:38:33Z")
Everyone knows that Americans are addicted to Conspicuous Consumption, and like an Evil Drug Dealer, we keep selling them shit until they run out of money and end up living under a bridge. We can only cure this by making Americans go cold turkey on buying stuff. If no American ever buys anything again, within months, the whole problem will go away forever! ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/6 "2025-04-08T00:14:10Z")
> [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](#): > > But trump is talking about buying and selling. What does he know about that? Which countries are forcing US companies to buy their goods? AIUI, the taxes/tariffs other countries impose are just the cost of doing business with them. Don’t like it, buy somewhere else. I refuse to study economics just to figure this shit out. Various countries are charging various tariffs on various US goods to enter their country. Whereas the US is not charging similar tariffs on similar goods from those countries for them to sell in our country. Ergo, in Trump’s little mind, “America” is paying those countries for the privilege to sell to them, while “those countries” are not paying for the privilege to sell here. A more accurate description is that tariffs are entry fees that goods manufactured in another country to be sold in ours. Technically, the tariffs do pay into the country’s government coffers, because they are collected at the ports. But they are not paid out by the foreign government. They are paid by the company that owns the goods who is importing them. Those companies aren’t reimbursed by their government, and the citizens of the other country are not paying companies to sell here. Those companies simply raise the cost of supply to include the tariffs. So either the direct consumer or the distributor or retailer or company using those parts to make their product have to pay more to get those items. Tariffs are protectionism. Ideally, they make the cost of imported goods more so that locally produced goods are cheaper and therefore consumers buy local. In our case, it’s more like tariffs compensate partially or ideally wholly for the cheaper fabrication costs in other countries. In other words, Vietnam has a much lower cost of living, and fewer worker protections, and more limited benefits. Ergo, it costs, say, half as much to make something there as here. So even with transportation costs, it’s still like 30% cheaper to make it and import it than make it here. Charging companies that do that an overhead fee is an offset to that cheaper labor cost. But the effect is that it costs consumers here more for those items. Either because the foreign imports now cost more, or because they cost enough more that locally produced items are competitive. The gamble is that manufacturing returns to the US, producing more jobs here so now people have jobs and more money stays in the US instead of going elsewhere for their goods. Ergo, the supposedly stronger economy. But prices will be higher, and will not come down just because more things are made here. And salaries and wages aren’t going up just because things are now being made here. Some people may be better able to find jobs, and the new jobs might be better paying than some current people have access to. But the vast bulk of the population will take a negative hit to their buying power. @Babale’s description is accurate. @elbows’ descriptive of the entitlement felt by the likes of Trump is more in the motivation category than the financial category. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/7 "2025-04-08T00:17:17Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > The gamble is that manufacturing returns to the US, producing more jobs here so now people have jobs and more money stays in the US instead of going elsewhere for their goods. Ergo, the supposedly stronger economy. All the other issues you correctly point out aside, no investor is going to make this gamble, because Trump’s policy is too chaotic and unpredictable, and even if he sticks to tariffs for the whole term, just as your factories come online a Democrat might get elected and drop the tariffs. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/8 "2025-04-08T00:32:01Z")
Here’s a pretty good explanation of tariffs. See **[xkcd: Tariffs](https://xkcd.com/3073/)** for the full page, but here’s the meat of the matter: [![](https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tariffs.png) ](https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tariffs.png) ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/9 "2025-04-08T00:36:37Z")
This is the same guy who regularly doesn’t pay people who do jobs for him. In Trump’s eyes the world is “ripping the US off” because _they expect something in return_ for their goods and services instead of just offering tribute. Trump doesn’t _believe_ in trade. He believes in one sided transactions between “winners” who get everything and “losers” who get nothing. If the other side is getting something that means _they_ are a “winner”, which in turns mean you must be a “loser” and that’s unacceptable. Mutually beneficial arrangements are a concept he is unwilling and unable to accept exists. It’s the same reason he’s blowing up the US’s military and political alliances; since other nations benefit from them, to him that means that _by definition_ they are scams that exploit America. ---
**Author:** ![DavidNRockies](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidnrockies/32/6279_2.png) [@DavidNRockies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DavidNRockies)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/10 "2025-04-08T00:40:08Z")
You know how people who are pathological liars tend to think that everybody _else_ is lying all the time? Yeah. That. This … is that. He’s a crook and a grifter, so he sees crooks and grifters everywhere he looks. [The one place he _doesn’t_ look is the mirror.] And trade _is_ something that probably needed close scrutiny and thoughtful revision. What it did _not_ need is a narcissistic, sociopathic, amoral, insecure, nationalist demagogue to act as a human grenade in a complex, tightly-coupled, global system. Because math. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/11 "2025-04-08T00:42:39Z")
Well I for one am sick and tired of playing in this rigged game. I’m running a chronic trade deficit with my barber and he never buys a damn thing from me. I would charge him reciprocal tariffs, but that would increase my costs by 100%. What a rip-off! ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/12 "2025-04-08T01:08:01Z")
The public radio program The World ran a story today about how Trump’s tariff announcement claimed that Cambodia was “ripping off” the United States and making a “fortune” on the goods it sells to the US. Those goods are largely cheap clothing for which the workers get roughly $230 per month. So how could these jobs return to the US without a massive increase in the cost of the clothes? ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/13 "2025-04-08T01:36:58Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > Various countries are charging various tariffs on various US goods to enter their country. Whereas the US is not charging similar tariffs on similar goods from those countries for them to sell in our country. Just to make sure we’re all on the same page, while some countries do indeed have tariffs on US goods, that’s not what was on Trump’s board was really all about, even if the column with percentages was labelled “Reciprocal Tariffs”. As usually, he was lying through his teeth. He’s just pissed that some countries send us more goods than we send them. The formula is something like: ((US Imports from the country - US Exports to the country) / US Imports from the country) / 2 If you are the country to which the [TFCFFWSG](https://slate.com/culture/2017/02/the-origin-of-the-trump-insult-shitgibbon-revealed.html) owes allegiance, or a most favored nation of said country, you won’t get such tariffs applied. If the calculation ends up returning a value below 10% (0.1), then 10% is your tariff, as far as I know. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/14 "2025-04-08T01:49:00Z")
Do you know why American buys more goods than it sells to others? Because America is the richest nation that ever existed on Earth. We are not poor, or suffering, or being robbed by others. We are rolling in wealth. Much of that wealth comes from, as said above, from exploiting cheap labor. Our companies keep trying to break labor down to those levels, but even our minimum wages far exceed others’ prosperity so returning those jobs here can never ever happen. Oh, BTW, when services are added to goods, much of the trade deficits simply disappear. So even the idiotic premise that is being pushed has no basis in reality. Have a good life. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/15 "2025-04-08T02:09:18Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > The public radio program The World ran a story today about how Trump’s tariff announcement claimed that Cambodia was “ripping off” the United States and making a “fortune” on the goods it sells to the US. Those goods are largely cheap clothing for which the workers get roughly $230 per month. So how could these jobs return to the US without a massive increase in the cost of the clothes? Slavery. Don’t pay the workers at all. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/16 "2025-04-08T02:22:19Z")
Thankfully the Republicans have in no way been trying to, quite literally, whitewash history’s depiction of actual slavery. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/17 "2025-04-08T08:36:18Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > no investor is going to make this gamble, because Trump’s policy is too chaotic and unpredictable, Correct. My comments were more abstract than the way Trump had actually applied them and the political reality in America. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/18 "2025-04-08T11:45:42Z")
I posted this in another thread this mornibg. Sometimes you just have to state the obvious > **[HE REALLY IS THAT STUPID](https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/4/7/2315206/-HE-REALLY-IS-THAT-STUPID?utm_campaign=trending)** > > The President of the United States is a fucking moron. I do not know why more media and Democrats do not call him out for his belief on trade deficits. The reason he keeps repeating that other nations are taking advantage of the US is because the... ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/19 "2025-04-08T11:52:34Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Here’s a pretty good explanation of tariffs. See **[xkcd: Tariffs](https://xkcd.com/3073/)** for the full page, but here’s the meat of the matter: > [https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tariffs.png](https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/tariffs.png) Um, unless I’m missing something that image _is_ the whole page. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [April 8, 2025, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757/20 "2025-04-08T12:03:20Z")
All his comics include a coda that is a pop-up triggered by hoverover. You won’t get that from my direct link to the png. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-was-the-rest-of-the-world-ripping-us-off/1016757.md?page=2)