Australia won’t retaliate against ‘unjustified’ US tariffs on steel and aluminum
Australia won’t retaliate against ‘unjustified’ US tariffs on steel and aluminum
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says U.S. tariffs on Australian steel and aluminum are unjustified, but his government will not retaliate with its own tariffs.
Yeah, fuck this guy.
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Eh, if Australia retaliated with their own tariffs then all that would happen is that Australia’s economy would be damaged more compared to if they had not which only benefits Trump. It is just bait to get Australia to commit to harming their own economy. Australia doesn’t really have much sway in America’s economy as far as I know.
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They're just stabbing the EU and Canada in the back. This is BASIC game theory. You need to retaliate otherwise the game is lost. But they would rather hitch their wagon to the new Nazi regime to help their economy? Disgusting.
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Retaliate by destroying your own economy and gaining Sweet FA out of it? I’d be more willing to agree if you can actually show me how retaliating with own tariffs would disadvantage Trump in any way. No, it is just bait to get Australia to commit to harming their own economy so Trump can buy everything up.
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Why do you think all the other countries have retaliatory tariffs? It's to hurt the US back. If their goods are now more expensive, then competing products are now cheaper in comparison and capitalism does it's thing. This is basic, basic trade war stuff.
Edit: Ahh fuck, you're just a troll. Anyone else reading this, just check their post history. Carry on.
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A tariff is a tax on the country imposing the tariff. The only way it actually hurts the country that the tariff is placed against, is if people stop buying the foreign products. But in the case of a tax on steel or aluminum, that would require people to avoid all products made with foreign steel/aluminum. This is nearly impossible. So it only hurts Australians in this case.
Plus that's not how capitalism works. A real example from Trump's first term was a tariff imposed on washing machines. The tariff made foreign washing machines more expensive than domestic ones. So far, so good. What did American companies do? Raised the price of domestic washing machines to match that of foreign ones in a greedy grab for profits. This meant the incentive to buy American washing machines was nullified. You know what people also buy when they buy a washer in the US? They buy a dryer. So the price of dryers went up as well, even though there was no tariff on those. So in the end all that happened was Americans wound up spending more for washers and dryers. Why would a country want to do that to its own people?
You're screwed no matter what you do. As right wing as Australia has become, I can't believe I'm saying this, but good job Australia.
There are other ways to retaliate. China doesn't mess around. They outright banned certain companies from operating there and denied sales of certain needed elements to the US.
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Tariffs don't hurt the country that they're aimed at. They hurt the country they come from. What aren't you getting?
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Sorry, you think the US putting tariffs on Australian products for instance, doesn't hurt Australia? Huh? Of course they do. Now importers in the US will pay more for those Australian goods, and now there is incentive to look at alternatives. So Australia makes less sales of those products. The ENTIRE point of the tariffs on Canada is to economically strain them to force them to join the US.
Now would these tariffs also hurt the US? Yes, but not symmetrically. Hence all other countries issuing retaliatory tariffs.
Why do you think other countries are doing this?
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And frankly, the US isn't the only trade partner in the world.
It's a large economy but not the only economy. These tariffs from the US are dumb because the end result is that the US will be excluded from world trade just like Iran or North Korea is.
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Yeah, we should definitely hurt Canada economically. I mean screw our best ally and longest lasting friendship.
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Problem is that Australia has a trade deficit with the US and with an election in a couple of months, retaliating only means the right wing opposition has a greater chance of winning and the right wing opposition wants to give rare mineral deposits to America.
Do you see why this is a problem?
Edit: And I am just called a troll because I don’t want Australian MAGA, LOL.
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That's ridiculous. Retaliating has done nothing but strengthen resolve and brought a new level of patriotism to all the countries that retaliated. They now have a shared common enemy. Not to mention the effects on the economy would largely be felt medium to longer term.
Then there's the whole stabbing allies in the back too - that has a cost.
EDIT: Look at this polling data and try and tell me issuing retaliatory measures hurts the party that enacts them:
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Yeah no.
Again, Australia has a trade deficit with the US and what America pays for Australian steel and aluminum makes up just a tiny fraction of Australia’s GDP but on the other hand, Australia import far more from the US than they export.
Meaning people would just look at the increased inflation that retaliation would cause and say that is why you should vote the other side.
Australia has no bargaining chip unlike Canada nor is it as intertwined with American economy like Canada is (whom can actually damage American economy because for example, Canada exports oil and electricity to US).
And it’s not like Australians are just taking punches from America as, “Aussies have vowed to boycott American goods”.
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EDIT: I Goofed
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NumdaQA already pointed out you're utterly wrong, but some additional context might help:
- The opposition says the government should have grovelled more to avoid the tariff, they wouldn't ever retaliate with their own.
- The Australian Steel industry does not give a shit.
So while I get it makes sense in Canada, and we are similar countries in a lot of ways, but on this issue we're just at different political places.
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Canada had the Conservatives with a 30 point lead before the Liberals implemented tariffs against the US and now the Liberals are leading. Canada's Cons are also pretty cozy with the US and the leader is basically a Trump wannabe.
You can try to justify bending the knee to the US, but don't tell me they aren't, and stabbing their allies in the back in the process.
Appreciate the context though.
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Not only do they NOT have a deficit, they had the third largest suplus.
Huh? Your source literally shows that America has a trade surplus with Australia and that Australia runs a significant trade deficit with the US.
If you actually care to look at it, you noticed that US exports more to Australia than they import, that is why
Trade Imbalance (USD Billion) = 17.7
Because exports to Australia (33.6)
Is larger than imports from Australia (15.9)
So 33.6-15.9 is 17.7
The U.S. goods trade surplus with Australia was $17.9 billion in 2024, a 1.6 percent increase ($279.7 million) over 2023.
Nice, you yourself even admit that US has a trade surplus with Australia. LOL
Do you not know what: “Australia has a trade deficit with the US” means?
It means America has a trade surplus with Australia aka Australia imports more from America than they export to America or in other words America exports to Australia more than they import from Australia thus America have a trade surplus with Australia and Australia has a trade deficit with America.
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Fair enough, I goofed on the deficit front. Still stand by my parent point though.
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Retaliatory measures don't have to include taxing your own people. I suggest merely rallying people around the cause of boycotting US products does more good.
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You need the capitalist system to divest from America and tariffs are the way. Then capitalism kicks in and finds either alternative sources, or creates new ones.
It's like asking people to recycle more to help climate change.
A bully just punched you on the face. And all other kids are telling him to fuck off, but Australia would rather take the beating, not say anything and hope it doesn't get any worse. And honestly - it's pathetic. This isn't the time for inaction.
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Probably because you're a Russian troll who blames Ukraine for being invaded...
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who blames Ukraine for being invaded
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“Why did you make me punch you?!? You could have e just gave me your wallet, but noooooo you had to refuse. And then I was forced to punch you in the mouth and take it. Omg then you called the cops? THE COPS?!? You know I hate the cops and won’t allow them in my neighborhood. So then I had to stab you in the neck. Because I hate cops, and you did this. It’s all your fault”
Ok big guy.
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Let us see what happened.
The pro-Maidan movement conducted a false flag operation where pro-maidan snipers shot their own protestors in order to incite public backlash against Yanukovych.
This has been confirmed by several hundred witness testimonies including wounded protestors, 2,000 videos, 6,000 photos, and 30 gigabytes of radio intercepts.
This allowed the coup to succeed and they proceeded to massacre the anti-maidan movement. I will PM you examples of these massacres.
The coup also resulted in a civil war breaking out between the new illegitimate government and those in Eastern Ukraine who supported the legitimate government.
Russia annexed Crimea according to them because they made an agreement with the legitimate government of Ukraine before Maidan to continue their lease over Sevastapol. Russia stated that the formation of this illegimate government threatened military infrastructure in Crimea which they rightfully owned due to an agreement with the previous government. Russia also named the massacres that were being conducted in Eastern Ukraine to annex Crimea to safeguard the lives of people in Crimea.
Oh and the majority of DPR and LPR forces were locals. People like to quote GRU war criminal Girkin who stated that the War in the Donbas would not have happened without him but they forget the rest of the quote. Girkin was stating that the separatists would have been crushed without the intelligence and weapons he provided them naming Mariupol as an example where the anti-Maidan movement got crushed (as the mostly unarmed civilians had no support and got gunned down by the AFU). He never said that he was the one who caused the unrest, only that it would have gotten crushed without his weapons and intelligence. Outside of volunteers from Russia or Crimea, the actual Russian Armed Forces did not participate outside of providing weapons and intelligence in any significant number until 2015 when DPR and LPR forces were being pushed back leading to Russia sending BTGs into Ukraine although they also sent in some forces on August 2014 which resulted in Minsk agreements which was violated by both sides resulting in Minsk II which Ukraine failed to implement.
Instead, Ukraine proceeded to implement new language laws which discriminated against the Russian language (going against the agreement), continued to imprison and torture political dissidents after the agreement was made as per Amnesty International which was also in violation of the Minsk Agreement which explicity stated that Ukraine was not allowed to imprison or punish people due to events related to the war in Donbas. Ukraine also refused to allow local elections in violation of the agreement.
"Ukraine insists that local elections can take place only after a complete ceasefire and withdrawal of all Russian troops and weapons.
Also a clear violation of the agreement as the entire agreement was Ukraine allows local elections, Russia withdraws then everyone’s happy. Russia can’t do its part if Ukraine doesn’t. The agreement specifically stated that elections come first and then withdrawal not the other way around. Ukraine clearly violated the agreement. This would lead to 2022 invasion.
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I'm Aussie, and Albo is a cunt, but I don't want us to retaliate economically yet.
Like others have said it's a minor impact on our industry so far. I'm more concerned about taxing these mining and resources corporations.
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So which is it not doing anything because they basically do no trading with America or it we'll destroy their economy?
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Not mutually exclusive.
Australia has a trade deficit with America.
American tariffs impact Australia's exports to America which frankly aren't much.
If Australia retaliates, this would impact America's exports to Australia which would be far more economically damaging.
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