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Comment by nullhole | Hacker News Reader

The bit I love is that countries with which the US has a trade surplus aren't getting the opposite of a tariff (a grant, I guess) on their imports to the US, they aren't getting zero tariffs on their imports to the US, they're getting 10% tariffs.

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Heard Island and McDonald Islands, two Australian territories inhabited only by penguins, get singled out for a 10% tariff.

Norfolk Island, an Australian community of 3000 with no exports to the US, gets its own 29% tariff. They're expecting a tourism boost from the publicity.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/03/donald-trump...

Once again they proceed far beyond the reach of satirists

You jest, but I wonder if this is to stop shenanigans like claiming your business operates from there just to dodge tariffs.

Nah, they just went down the Wikipedia list of places that trade with the US. This is how Réunion winds up on there, despite being actually part of France.

Oh I was assuming they just asked an LLM but this sounds plausible too.

Whichever took less work, they did that.

That might be the case with places like the UK which has a trade deficit with the US but still gets taxed at 10%. I feel however the penguins put up an obvious non tariff barrier by only accepting fish rather than hard currency.

Norfolk Island is part of Australia. Logically it would be swept up in the 10% tariff on Australia. It has no exports to the US, that being the US government's justification for tariffs over 10%, let alone an individual 29% tariff.

A comparison would be another country putting a 10% tariff on the US, but singling out Rhode Island for its own 29% tariff.

Interestingly enough the census (which I believe is the source the WH used) https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/country.xlsx does show trade with Heard & McDonald. Also reflected on the webpage: https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/index.html#H

Now what the underlying items are that were traded? Not sure. Guessing you can dig it up in AES https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/aes/index.html but have not been able to figure that out. Let me know if you do.

"machinery and electrical". They must be Linux penguins.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/apr/04/revea...

And zero tariff for his dear friend putin. Insane!

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