I'm gonna have a stroke. The Congressional Budget Office found that consumers paid 70-80% of the tariffs, totaling more than $1000 per household. Where is my refund?
Edit: Sorry autocorrect thought I said moronically,
Most things are never going to be cheaper than they are today. Some things may be cheaper this time next year but not by more than a few percent at the most.
The Chipotle earnings calls were pretty much the prime example of this. CEO more or less expressing amazement at how elastic consumers were on pricing, and that due to the increases not impacting sales volume they planned to continue ramping until it did.
I think plenty of companies were operating off the idea that price competition was far more important than it turned out to be. I note the baskets of those shopping next to me in the grocery store and this rings true. Due to a myriad of reasons - consumer behavior being a large one of those - buying behavior based on price just isn’t as much of a thing as it was 30 years ago. Almost no one is shopping multiple supermarkets, buying cheaper alternatives, buying in-season veggies and fruit when it’s cheap, waiting for sales to stock up, buying in bulk and freezing, using coupons, meal planning based on the latest supermarket Sunday circular, etc. only a tiny minority of people have been doing so.
Couple that learned helplessness with the monopoly situation for many (most?) markets in the US and it’s no surprise to me that once the dam broke there is no going back. The price discovery moving forward is going to be much more aggressive. It will take a generation or three to get back to thrifty consumer behavior unless we see something actually painful to the average person on a scale of the Great Depression.
That is because the extra money in the economy also inflated salaries. Inflation is annoying but it basically has no impact on affordability over the long run. Everyone just assumed that their increases in salary were a well earned recognition of their contributions, but the increases in prices was pure corporate greed and corruption. They were both the same thing. People got more money and prices went up.
I don‘t know where this observation comes from, but here in Austria a majority of people in lower income sectors than IT do all of this?
The observation comes from myself, from a medium to low income background. Think mechanics, janitors, construction laborers, etc. family background. Along with most of my peers and extended family members.
The "old" generation - e.g. my grandparents did all those things. Their kids (for the most parts, exceptions do exist) and my generation (and my kids) do basically none of them. They go to whatever supermarket they go to every week or two, stock up on whatever they usually buy, and that's it. Zero consideration for anything else. It is very surprising to me.
You won't get the money back that you overpaid in the meantime.
Can we have small watchdog programs that deeply study market conditions for critical resources (like peanut butter/eggs/milk/bread/etc.) and produce detailed data on why prices are what they are and what they estimate prices should be? It would be fascinating to see like detailed breakdowns and raw profit margins on different goods instantly.
> except profits would be down and shareholders would be angry.
Right. So when profits turn into losses, you expect shareholders to be OK with the stock price falling to zero and they lose their entire investment? You think this is "fine"?
Effectively closed
was it a tariff you paid,
or a carrier fee related to the tariff?
These are likely to be refunded, because even if you were the purchaser of the product, you were the importer of record and paid the tariff, not a downstream buyer who paid an increased price because of the tariffs.
This should be interesting!
Oh, so it was always only about a money transfer from the customers (who fully and wholly bore the cost otlf the tariffs already) to the companies which will now get the refunds for what their customers already covered?
What a robbery.
I'm not defending that. Just explaining.
I (unknowingly) ordered something on Etsy from another country. UPS delivered the items, then sent me a letter requiring I pay the tariff and an extra tariff handling fee. UPS paid the government, so UPS should get their money back from the government, then refund me. I'm not holding my breath.
> ‘Corporate and industry group political action committees have donated more than $44 million directly to the campaigns and leadership PACs of the 147 members of the Sedition Caucus. Companies and trade associations that pledged to suspend donations have given more than $12 million to the campaign and leadership PACs of the Sedition Caucus.
> Koch Industries ($626,500), American Crystal Sugar ($530,000), Home Depot ($525,000), Boeing ($488,000), and UPS ($479,500) have contributed the most money to members of the Sedition Caucus through their corporate PACs.’
> Tomé’s reconciliation with representatives who legitimized Trump’s attempted presidential coup — and who may control Congress after the November midterm elections — shouldn’t surprise us. Trump lavished huge gifts on UPS and Corporate America that have made them richer.”
> The second Trump presidency has the potential to be even more lucrative for UPS, given that the bulk of UPS’s unionized workers are Teamsters and led by prominent Trump ally Sean O’Brien
https://joeallen-60224.medium.com/big-brown-and-the-fascists...
Looks like they've given a pretty similar amount to both parties[1]. UPS charging a specific "Tariff Fee" is bound to have angered Trump.
[1]https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/united-parcel-service/summa...