Current Events > U.S. to Announce New Tariffs on Chinese Electric Vehicles

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/10/us/politics/us-biden-china-tariffs-electric-vehicles.html

"The Biden administration is set to announce new tariffs as high as 100 percent on Chinese electric vehicles and additional import taxes on other Chinese goods, including semiconductors, as early as next week, according to people familiar with the matter."

This will help out the global fight against climate change.

1337toothbrush posted...

"The Biden administration is set to announce new tariffs as high as 100 percent on Chinese electric vehicles and additional import taxes on other Chinese goods, including semiconductors, as early as next week, according to people familiar with the matter."

Good.

1337toothbrush posted...

This will help out the global fight against climate change.

Because apparently there aren't tens of thousands of other electric vehicles not selling right now.

Count_Drachma posted...

Good.

So a trade war against China is good when a Democrat does it? Biden didn't even repel most of the tariffs from Trump's trade war which was largely condemned back in the day.

https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3196821/trade-war-tariffs-have-collapsed-us-imports-chinese-it-hardware-and-consumer-electronics
https://www.ft.com/content/fb775a22-eaa5-44b4-8643-16c3f40a5d02

Count_Drachma posted...

Because apparently there aren't tens of thousands of other electric vehicles not selling right now.

https://www.iea.org/reports/global-ev-outlook-2024/trends-in-electric-cars

Sales would be much higher with affordable EVs.

1337toothbrush posted...

https://www.iea.org/reports/global-ev-outlook-2024/trends-in-electric-cars

Sales would be much higher with affordable EVs.

also the whole lack of charging stations anywhere is an issue

I don't like this move.

Seems bad to continue a trade war

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Because China bad.

DarthAragorn posted...

also the whole lack of charging stations anywhere is an issue

There's a charging station at every house with a driveway.

Musk probably smiling

1337toothbrush posted...

Because China bad.

There's a charging station at every house with a driveway.

"if you can't afford a house go fuck yourself" is not a winning strategy to sell vehicles

1337toothbrush posted...

There's a charging station at every house with a driveway.

People aren't going to want random people charging their EVs at their houses. There needs to be a lot of EV charging stations build around the country. Legislation has been passed to build about 500,000 charging stations, I believe, but we still need them to be built.

How very uncapitalist. Can't compete so we must protect our greedy manufacturers.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]


To be fair, the infrastructure bill, CHIPS and Science Act, and Inflation Reduction Act are all intended to push US products for steel, semiconductors, and solar panels...

I still don't like the idea of increasing prices on Chinese-built products, though.

The actual reason for these tariffs, for those who care, is that we dont want to have critical manufacturing dependent on a current rival and potential future adversary. China is trying to destroy our manufacturing capabilities by subsidizing their own industries; its the same as when a large company lowers prices to destroy competition, then raises prices afterwards. Also, wed have less leverage to stop China from doing things like, say, invading Taiwan, if were dependent on them for keeping our infrastructure stable.

For folks who aren't aware, the Chinese government is currently subsidizing their domestic EV market to bring the prices down to below the manufacturing cost. They're literally undercutting all the competition by having the government make their cars cheaper than it actually cost to make. The tariffs are to keep them from flooding the market and drowning out competition.

If we're going to do tarrifs on China, we really should have even more of a robust free trade with nations that are actually friendly to us. As in, it shouldn't be about it being American made items and protectionism. We should use our allies as allies.

s0nicfan posted...

For folks who aren't aware, the Chinese government is currently subsidizing their domestic EV market to bring the prices down to below the manufacturing cost. They're literally undercutting all the competition by having the government make their cars cheaper than it actually cost to make. The tariffs are to keep them from flooding the market and drowning out competition.

It's the Amazon/Diapers.com undercutting fiasco all over again.

For those that don't know, Diapers.com was, you guessed it, website that sold baby diapers.

Amazon starting selling diapers at a loss basically with the intent of making Diapers.com go out of business and buy their stock of diapers and other baby supplies for pennies on the dollar.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/07/emails-detail-amazons-plan-to-crush-a-startup-rival-with-price-cuts/

s0nicfan posted...

For folks who aren't aware, the Chinese government is currently subsidizing their domestic EV market to bring the prices down to below the manufacturing cost. They're literally undercutting all the competition by having the government make their cars cheaper than it actually cost to make. The tariffs are to keep them from flooding the market and drowning out competition.

Oh no, poor Tesla...maybe if they had some competition they wouldn't be such a shitty company

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1790385220983677016?t=Gc6ouAnRf9-06iY09CVOtg&s=19

This is inflationary

DarthAragorn posted...

"if you can't afford a house go fuck yourself" is not a winning strategy to sell vehicles

Houses aren't the only places where you can find electrical outlets.

CableZL posted...

People aren't going to want random people charging their EVs at their houses. There needs to be a lot of EV charging stations build around the country. Legislation has been passed to build about 500,000 charging stations, I believe, but we still need them to be built.

Sure, but there are plenty of homeowners who do most of their driving near their house for most of the year who haven't bought an EV. The charging stations will get built either way.

radical_rhino posted...

The actual reason for these tariffs, for those who care, is that we dont want to have critical manufacturing dependent on a current rival and potential future adversary. China is trying to destroy our manufacturing capabilities by subsidizing their own industries; its the same as when a large company lowers prices to destroy competition, then raises prices afterwards. Also, wed have less leverage to stop China from doing things like, say, invading Taiwan, if were dependent on them for keeping our infrastructure stable.

Our military manufacturing capabilities are not impacted by China selling cheap EVs.

s0nicfan posted...

For folks who aren't aware, the Chinese government is currently subsidizing their domestic EV market to bring the prices down to below the manufacturing cost. They're literally undercutting all the competition by having the government make their cars cheaper than it actually cost to make. The tariffs are to keep them from flooding the market and drowning out competition.

Is that not the selling point of globalism? Countries export what they're good at making so that they can trade for other goods they're not as proficient in making. It's not China's fault that US auto companies dragged their heels for so long on making EVs and are currently content with keeping prices ridiculously high. These tariffs will do nothing but let domestic auto companies stay complacent and continue price gouging.

Even heavily subsidized, China's EVs are pretty good.

Tariffs make you feel good in a battle you can't win.

Fenriswolf posted...

So a trade war against China is good when a Democrat does it?

You jumped the gun. I know you're compelled to carry water for China, but you should have at least waited to see if more than one poster was going to go to bat for Biden on this.

This just feels like throwing money away

WingsOfGood posted...

Musk probably smiling

His cars will still be more expensive.

creativerealms posted...

His cars will still be more expensive.

This helps the big auto manufacturers more than it helps Tesla right?
His main cars already cost less than theirs

1337toothbrush posted...

s that not the selling point of globalism? Countries export what they're good at making so that they can trade for other goods they're not as proficient in making. It's not China's fault that US auto companies dragged their heels for so long on making EVs and are currently content with keeping prices ridiculously high. These tariffs will do nothing but let domestic auto companies stay complacent and continue price gouging.

There's a significant difference between countries specializing in different things and a country cheating the system by using tax money to artificially deflate the cost of what they're producing until there's nobody else left on the planet that can afford to compete.

What you're talking about is two farmers growing different things and trading produce at the end of the harvest. What China is doing is more like one farmer growing the same produce as the second, but then selling them at half price until the other farmer shuts down and then turning around and charging whatever the hell he wants because there's nobody else growing what he grows.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]


Biden did it, just like it was good when he kept the majority of Trump's wildly unpopular tariffs

s0nicfan posted...

There's a significant difference between countries specializing in different things and a country cheating the system by using tax money to artificially deflate the cost of what they're producing until there's nobody else left on the planet that can afford to compete.

What you're talking about is two farmers growing different things and trading produce at the end of the harvest. What China is doing is more like one farmer growing the same produce as the second, but then selling them at half price until the other farmer shuts down and then turning around and charging whatever the hell he wants because there's nobody else growing what he grows.

Subsidies aren't cheating the system, it's called putting your resources towards your specializations. All governments subsidize their industries (yes, including the US). It's like you're complaining that farmer 1 is cheating by buying more tomato seeds and tomatoes happen to be in far more demand currently than the corn that farmer 2 put more money into. The US also subsidizes their auto industry, it's just that the US auto industry would rather spend that money on fatter executive bonuses and stock buybacks, and they'd rather focus on large-ass gas guzzlers and keeping prices high.

China is able to sell for cheaper because they've made major investments in batteries which make up a huge bulk of the cost of EVs. BYD in particular has a lot of vertical integration which means they don't have to pay extra for a whole bunch of suppliers.

emblem-man posted...

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1790385220983677016?t=Gc6ouAnRf9-06iY09CVOtg&s=19

This is inflationary

So is building out infrastructure, which is what the two big Biden bills do. What happened in the 70s when the Boomers came into their own careers is going to happen to us too very soon. We're just starting to see the initial effects of it.

Shit's gonna suck for awhile.

emblem-man posted...

https://twitter.com/POTUS/status/1790385220983677016?t=Gc6ouAnRf9-06iY09CVOtg&s=19

This is inflationary

Lol wut, at least he gets straight to the point

Xenogears15 posted...

So is building out infrastructure, which is what the two big Biden bills do. What happened in the 70s when the Boomers came into their own careers is going to happen to us too very soon. We're just starting to see the initial effects of it.

Shit's gonna suck for awhile.

Do you mean inflationary in the sense of requiring spending?

While I like the Biden infrastructure bills, my biggest complaint is probably the requirements for US made items such as steel. Seems bad to automatically increase costs by requiring that

crayola555 posted...

Lol wut, at least he gets straight to the point

American voters have shown that they hate inflation, regardless of the reason. They would rather have high unemployment and low inflation than low unemployment and high inflation. These past 4 years have only made that clear from both the left and the right and the moderates.

People were getting mad at increase in freaking McDonald's and groceries.

I understand the national security reasons for the tariffs, I just don't think the average American voters gives a fuck. And the benefits it makes to our manufacturing capabilities won't be seen for a few more years, and it's not as if Biden will get the credit anyway.

Trump doing this is what caused inflation. That and war stuff in Ukraine disrupting supply.

America has relied in China for a long time for cheap labor and products. Are they going to produce this stuff in the Us?

We need you to go EV
US has crazy expensive EV
China makes cheap EV
BAN THEM

_____Cait posted...

Trump doing this is what caused inflation. That and war stuff in Ukraine disrupting supply.

America has relied in China for a long time for cheap labor and products. Are they going to produce this stuff in the Us?

Yeah, some of the goals for the infrastructure bill, inflation reduction act, and CHIPS and Science Act are to build the products in the US.

• Infrastructure bill includes funding for ~500,000 EV charging stations
• CHIPS and Science Act has funding for local chip manufacturing
• Inflation Reduction Act includes funding for local solar panel manufacturing

As some people have mentioned in this topic, though, China is trying to undercut the price of these things to kill competition... So I guess I get why it's happening. I wonder if such high tariff levels are necessary for that, though. I don't have much knowledge in that area.

https://www.youtube.com/live/dvkotYEE0Ik?si=Ve1JxH6UOK4hEwpw

Like, I get it... but still.

Fenriswolf posted...

So a trade war against China is good when a Democrat does it? Biden didn't even repel most of the tariffs from Trump's trade war which was largely condemned back in the day.

https://www.scmp.com/economy/china-economy/article/3196821/trade-war-tariffs-have-collapsed-us-imports-chinese-it-hardware-and-consumer-electronics
https://www.ft.com/content/fb775a22-eaa5-44b4-8643-16c3f40a5d02

I thought that was one of the best things Trump did imo

The most likely outcome of this feels like Americans buying gas-powered vehicles instead

Antifar posted...

The most likely outcome of this feels like Americans buying gas-powered vehicles instead

Best case is probably if this forces China to build companies in countries like Mexico and then ship them to the US from Mexico in order to avoid the tariffs. This at least allows some of these manufacturing businesses to not be based in China

hyperpowder posted...

I thought that was one of the best things Trump did imo

We had to bail out US farmers to the tune of over 20 billion dollars because of Trump's tariffs. Hopefully we don't have to do something similar with these tariffs.

Antifar posted...

The most likely outcome of this feels like Americans buying gas-powered vehicles instead

Absolutely, since none of the other countries have invested as much in electric vehicles. American car companies in particular have almost seemed to sabotage efforts by making them as expensive and unappealing as possible (like introducing paid DLC bullshit and tesla's whole thing).

emblem-man posted...

Best case is probably if this forces China to build companies in countries like Mexico and then ship them to the US from Mexico in order to avoid the tariffs. This at least allows some of these manufacturing businesses to not be based in China

How does that improve anything? Regardless, I've heard that the US is thinking of ways to block China from going the Mexico route, though I'm not sure if that runs afoul of NAFTA (or whatever the fuck dumb trump renamed it).

1337toothbrush posted...

How does that improve anything? Regardless, I've heard that the US is thinking of ways to block China from going the Mexico route, though I'm not sure if that runs afoul of NAFTA (or whatever the fuck dumb trump renamed it).

Allows us to still buy Chinese vehicles but brings the factories outside of China? I guess I don't know if it's beneficial to us to kind of force Chinese factories to also offshore in a sense?

Seems like these are the first viably macro-economic cars to be put out there.

I say "viably macro-economic" because I am almost certainly forgetting a better term, but what I mean to say is that these cars check all the boxes for becoming the new standard. Affordable and functional.

If China's EVs don't brick when they get wet, the tariff will be worth it.

Got to help out Musk.

Biden should have to drive around in the Cyber Truck .