Trump crumbles in disaster Q&A - Brian Tyler Cohen

let's take a look at a few responses
that Trump gave on Sunday evening that
betray just how much further south
things are about to go with Trump at the
helm of the economy any movement on
China
a little bit look a little bit they want
to make a deal obviously right now
they're not doing business with us you
know people talk about going cold turkey
with China meaning just forget about it
we were losing hundreds of billions of
dollars a year with China and now
they're not doing any business with us
you know because not because of them
because of me because at 145% you can't
do business but uh something's going to
happen that's going to be possible are
you convinced yet trump was asked if
there was any movement on China in terms
of striking a deal and his response was
a little bit consider this even when
there is literally no hope of a deal
still Donald Trump lies and says that
he's whipping up the strongest most
powerful deal you've ever seen so what
does it mean when even the fake bluster
is gone most likely that there is
nothing on the horizon and that there
won't be anything on the horizon and
look here is my objective take because
while I would love to say that America
has the strong hand to play the reality
is that we don't first of all the US
needs China a lot more than China needs
the US the whole world imports from
China without the US China will be okay
however I would challenge anybody
watching to imagine their house without
any goods from China probably not too
easy the harsh reality is that we are
not going to reshore jobs that were lost
to China american manufacturing has been
declining for nearly a century since it
peaked just after World War II our labor
laws and our wages make it impossible
literally impossible for us to compete
in that sector that's not me complaining
about our labor laws and wages i support
them but with that comes some realities
like the fact that we will seed that
ground so the notion that Trump thinks
that we're suddenly going to manufacture
everything here in the US and that
Americans will actually pay the prices
that American manufacturing requires
betrays a fundamental and dangerous
misunderstanding of consumer behavior
and our economy more broadly second of
all another reason that China is likely
not sprinting to the negotiating table
is that they aren't subject to the same
political pressure that Donald Trump and
Republicans are based on our system of
government they don't have midterms
coming up next year she is president for
life he's not going anywhere and China
is a communist country that can suppress
critical media and punish dissent if
they need to the US at least for now
can't do that meaning political gravity
still exists china can afford to hold
out hell they can afford to hold out for
a decade if they need to the United
States well judging by Trump's very
quickly tanking approval ratings not so
much the likely resolution here is that
Donald Trump caves like we all know he's
going to do like he's done multiple
times in the past and we'll all go back
to pre-tariff rates only the rest of the
world will be much less reliant on the
US because they've now recognized that
we are an unreliable trade partner
countries will import fewer goods from
American farmers for example by going to
places like Brazil for soybeans and
Australia for beef why because their
countries are not led by a manic
egoomaniac who will turn the switch on
and off on a whim so even if the rates
do go back to normal our country is
already as of right now going to be
worse off which is why what he says here
is such nonsense 4 and 1/2 years ago I
left and I'll tell you what we didn't
have any of these problems the good news
is costs are way down groceries are down
eggs are down gasoline is way down
it's all coming down it's all looking
good the tariffs are strong it's uh
we're taking in a lot of money from
tariffs we were losing a lot before I
got here we were losing billions of
dollars a day and now we're doing great
and we haven't even kicked in yet and
eventually we'll be reducing taxes very
substantially for the people of our
country because the money is so great
coming in from tariffs that I'll be able
to reduce taxes to to a very large
extent and maybe almost completely okay
I want to be clear what Trump is saying
is absolute fiction first of all when he
says that we're taking in all this money
from tariffs what he means is that he is
taxing Americans foreign countries do
not pay tariffs american consumers pay
tariffs period no other way around it we
can't tax other countries we don't give
them tax bills from our IRS we have no
way of charging them we impose import
tariffs that are paid by the importing
companies which those companies then
pass on to the consumer meaning us in
fact the whole basis for this trade war
is based on Donald Trump's fundamental
misunderstanding of very basic economics
here's economist Jeffrey Saxs explaining
as much here if you take your credit
card and you go shopping and you run up
a large credit card debt you're running
a trade deficit with all those
shops now it would be pretty strange if
you then blamed all the shop owners for
having sold you all those things you're
ripping me off you're ripping me off
you're ripping me off i'm running a
trade deficit that is the level of
understanding of the president of the
United
States the trade deficit does not
represent at
all trade
policies it represents
spending relative to production or
earnings we call that an identity i
teach it in the second day of my course
in international monetary economics
trump never made it to the second
day so he says "You're running a trade
deficit look they're all cheating me."
But all that's happening is the United
States is
outspending its national income so
either Donald Trump truly truly does not
have the slightest clue what he
is talking about which is very possible
or he's got a more self-serving plan in
mind and we're going to make a lot of
money and we're going to cut taxes for
the people of this country it'll take a
little while be before we do that but
we're going to be cutting taxes and
possible we'll do a complete tax cut
because I think the tariffs will be
enough to cut all of the income tax now
we have a lot of debt that's been left
to us you know unfortunately over many
years we'll take care of that but the
tariffs
uh when if people only understood the
tariffs we're going to be giving people
a of this country a tremendous tax cut
and we're going to start with people
making less than $200,000 a year and
there it is he wants to eliminate
personal income tax these tariffs are
his way of shifting the tax burden from
people like him to workingclass
Americans remember the top 1% paid 42%
of income taxes in 2020 while the bottom
50% paid just 2.3% why because those top
1% earners make the majority of the
money in this country so it's
commensurate but Donald Trump wants
people like him meaning ultra wealthy
people to keep all of their money to
hoard all of their money and rely on
regular consumers workingclass Americans
to shoulder the tax burden in this
country if greed was a policy this would
be it in fact one Twitter user explained
it perfectly the US collects $4.5
trillion of income tax per year the US
imports $3.8 trillion per year we'd have
to self-t tax our imports at 120% to
replace income tax with tariffs would
you prefer your cost of living double in
order to not pay any more income tax
trump knows that he could never replace
income taxes with tariffs without
wreaking havoc on the working class but
he doesn't care because he isn't working
class the biggest con in the United
States is a billionaire funded by other
billionaires getting into office with
empty promises of bringing down the cost
of eggs and housing only to immediately
crash the economy because he starts
implementing a long-term plan to
eliminate his own tax burden while
seeking to more than double the price of
everything for regular Americans look
I'm not here to relitigate anybody's
vote from 2024 but I will say this i
hope that Americans left right and
center can disabuse yourselves of this
notion that Republicans will ever ever
ever help the working class will ever
help regular people the last time the
Republicans had full control of
government they promised you a cheaper
and more comprehensive health care plan
they promised you a middle-ass tax cut
they promised you an infrastructure
upgrade they promised you a
manufacturing renaissance literally none
of those things happened they passed a
tax cut for the ultra wealthy where 83%
of the benefits went to millionaires and
billionaires and now they're doing the
exact same thing promising you the sun
and the moon that the prices of housing
and rent and groceries and eggs are all
going to plummet and instead you are
paying more for literally everything the
stock market has crashed we're likely in
a recession your 401k is gutted i don't
know how many times Lucy has to pull the
football away from Charlie Brown before
we finally get the picture but my job is
to show you in as clear terms as humanly
possible what is happening we are being
lied to by somebody whose only goal is
to help himself and the wealthy donors
who he surrounds himself with