General > General Technical Chat

I have the feeling that the whole trade war starts from a pile of nonsense.

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rstofer:

--- Quote from: orion242 on May 23, 2019, 12:27:04 pm ---
--- Quote from: technix on May 23, 2019, 12:05:58 pm ---It is pure capitalist bargaining, you took the deal without calming your heads first, and and you are just having buyer’s regret.
--- End quote ---

Good point.  If these companies don't like it, go elsewhere or quit crying.

--- End quote ---

In effect, that's what we're doing.  If we raise the tariffs high enough, other players will enter the market.  The tariffs don't help the US as much as they create a more profitable environment for second tier players.  If products from China are priced higher, maybe similar products from Viet Nam become more attractive for buyer and manufacturer.

It's true that a high percentage of graduate students are here on a student visa.  Here's the problem I have with that:  Why should we spend taxpayer money, my money, to give foreign students access to PUBLIC universities in preference to our own citizens.  I paid for that university (not literally) and I expect my offspring to get preferential treatment.  That doesn't happen because my offspring pay a lower rate and the universities want more money.  In my view, we shouldn't admit any foreign students until all capable citizens have been accommodated.  As to PRIVATE institutions, well, they can do whatever they want, as long as they don't take federal money to do it.

I'm thinking here about the University of California system.  UC Berkeley, UCLA, or any of the other Cal State or UC campuses.  The taxpayers own those universities and their offspring should get preference.  Stanford and Cal-Tech can do what they want but they do receive a lot of federal funding so maybe there ought to be limits there as well.

So why is it that the US is a target for students?  It's clear from this thread that we are woefully inadequate and yet students keep coming.  Why don't they go to their own universities where their studies will be much more advanced?  I would think universities in the UK would be more attractive.  In a choice between UCLA and Oxford, I would pick Oxford every time.

Trump has tightened up on student visas and particularly the problem of overstaying the visa.  Undergraduate degree holders don't bring much to the dance but post-graduate students need a path to remain in the country.  There are at least 3 such paths but two of them are pretty well known:  The H1B Visa and the ever popular Green Card.  Heck, I had a Green Card when I worked in Singapore.  Stapled to the back of my passport!  Still have it...

There has been some tightening on H1B visas because the companies employing such workers were substantially underpaying them and dragging down wages for the natives.  There have been some prosecutions but not nearly enough.  But you can see why the natives don't want the H1Bs dragging wages down.

I don't know much about the Green Card process but it would seem to me that if the process is begun early enough, there should be a seamless transition.  Much of it depends on the employer doing their part and this is difficult considering that the student is probably not allowed to work on a Student Visa.  It's complicated...

Were it me, I would be heading to every university in the world and slurping up all the STEM post-grads I could find.

We are starting to talk about 'points based' immigration.  We assign a certain score for various attributes (education, age, skills, etc) and if a candidate passes the threshold, they are admitted.  Australia has done this for a very long time.  I looked at their score sheet one time back around '86.  Even with my MS degree, I couldn't make the cut.   So far, it's just talk.  And it's going nowhere as long as we have a flood of illegal immigrants coming over our southern border.

As to taking the deal:  Well, now we want to renegotiate the deal.  Things have changed and we don't like the old deal.  We want to make some changes.  Both sides need to give and take and there is no motivation on the part of the Chinese to give anything.  Why should they?  They can simply wait out the next 6 years and see what happens next.  The long game works for China.  The US messed up when they granted Most Favored Nation status back in the '90s.  We wouldn't be in this mess had we not done that.  Clinton...

Apparently we were able to renegotiate NAFTA to Trump's satisfaction.  A new deal has been signed by the parties but not approved by Congress.  It's dead in the water as a treaty until it is approved and that's not likely given the current state of Congress.

rstofer:

--- Quote from: CatalinaWOW on May 23, 2019, 03:12:16 pm ---One approach has been indirectly mentioned already on this thread.  You do nothing, and the old empire dies, crashing into poverty.  Horrible for the crashing country, and not really pretty for the former big exporters.  Even if it isn't a dominant market the loss of sales hurts.  Tariffs are another approach.  The 1930s proved that they aren't infallible as a solution, but they have worked in other places and times.  Can make for a softer landing.

--- End quote ---

If China thinks the new dominant market is the EU, good luck.  Their economy is healthy as long as the US is healthy.  No country is an island and if we crash, as we did in 2008, we tend to take a lot of other countries along for the ride.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Recession_in_Europe

I read an article a couple of years ago where a small town in Finland was going bankrupt because they had invested in US Mortgage Backed Securities.  Somehow you don't imagine a quaint village in Finland being a victim of our housing crisis but there you have it.

As to scrapping NATO and letting the new and improved EU Army handle things, well, that works for me!  Of course you need to think of the new and improved EU Army as the newly reconstituted German Army but that's just a scary detail.

And how is it that the EU charges 10% tariff on US auto imports and we only charge 2.5% on German cars?  That doesn't seem fair as in Fair Trade.

https://money.cnn.com/2018/05/24/news/car-auto-tariffs-us-germany-japan-toyota-volkswagen/index.html

Mr. Scram:

--- Quote from: rstofer on May 23, 2019, 03:26:30 pm ---If China thinks the new dominant market is the EU, good luck.  Their economy is healthy as long as the US is healthy.  No country is an island and if we crash, as we did in 2008, we tend to take a lot of other countries along for the ride.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Recession_in_Europe

I read an article a couple of years ago where a small town in Finland was going bankrupt because they had invested in US Mortgage Backed Securities.  Somehow you don't imagine a quaint village in Finland being a victim of our housing crisis but there you have it.

As to scrapping NATO and letting the new and improved EU Army handle things, well, that works for me!  Of course you need to think of the new and improved EU Army as the newly reconstituted German Army but that's just a scary detail.

And how is it that the EU charges 10% tariff on US auto imports and we only charge 2.5% on German cars?  That doesn't seem fair as in Fair Trade.

https://money.cnn.com/2018/05/24/news/car-auto-tariffs-us-germany-japan-toyota-volkswagen/index.html

--- End quote ---
The EU is China's largest trading partner. One could argue globalization means we all go down if one hurts badly. The US would suffer greatly if either the EU or China runs into serious issues as well, especially considering how much of the US is in Chinese hands.

rstofer:

--- Quote from: Mr. Scram on May 23, 2019, 03:32:38 pm ---The EU is China's largest trading partner. One could argue globalization means we all go down if one hurts badly. The US would suffer greatly if either the EU or China runs into serious issues as well, especially considering how much of the US is in Chinese hands.

--- End quote ---

We had a similar situation with Japan coming here and buying up all kinds of real estate including some premier golf courses.  They got their collective asses handed to them when things slumped.  You don't hear much about Japan any more.  Are they still in business?

And, yes, all the countries are tied together but there are two classes of countries and the effects can be different.  There are net buyers like the US and net sellers like everybody else.  When the net buyers can't buy, net sellers see their markets disappear.  Other net sellers can't help because, well, they are net sellers, not buyers.

Whether you believe in trickle up or trickle down, it's buyers that build the economy.  Consumer Confidence is a seriously important statistic and it is at record highs right now.  That may change if we get very many more days like today.

soldar:
Exactly, the economies of countries are more intertwined than they have ever been and changes should be negotiated, agreed by all and implemented in cooperative ways.

NAFTA has been renegotiated
https://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/26188/who-won-in-the-nafta-renegotiation-a-preliminary-assessment
and it seems it was good for all but Trump is not content with that, he does not want cooperation, he wants triumph and defeat for the other side and that is how he presents it. It is nonsense but his base buys it and that is dangerous. 

It is the same with China. He does not seek fair relations, he seeks to humiliate China. He cannot achieve that but whatever he gets he will present it that way and his base will eat it up whole.

Trump lives in an alternative reality where he is Superman.

China can afford to play a long game which Trump cannot. His time is very limited.

America would be better served by policies of stability and international cooperation. Instead Trump thrives in creating chaos and instability.

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