this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2024
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Trump absolutely obliterated profits from manufacturing with the steel tariffs. That's the whole reason that I'm struggling really hard right now. It forced me to order even lower quality steel because as the buyer, you're the one paying the markups. It isn't the affected country. This forced me to really put my limited metallurgical knowledge to the test because I had to ship critical components that wouldn't fail to the best of my ability. I had to adjust everything from tool paths to cutting times because they both affect the integrity of the material. I already had to charge way more for the parts I make because I'm not in India or China making $2/hr. I really hate to say it, but American made steel is just too expensive and I can get it from Japan for maybe 3/4 the price. China is even cheaper with nearly the same quality. And, no, I don't order it directly shipped. There are distributors.
I've been screaming at colleagues for years now that Trump has absolutely no clue about real world manufacturing or how it works. He wants to destroy NAFTA, which would absolutely destroy the supply chain I rely on for non-metallic (mostly glass-filled plastics) materials. I make a fair amount of G-10 and G-11 fiberglass parts for nuclear power - from GE, to Hitachi, WestingHouse, to (oddly) Mitsubishi. Want to talk about how nuclear is expensive already? Yeah, go ahead and erase NAFTA. It would go from improbable and financially impractical to absolutely impossible. Get an order from some local business to make some parts? You have to charge at least an estimate of $70/hour just for labor and machine time. With the tariffs, I've had to bump that to about $90/hour.
However, because the costs for me have gone up so much I've had to go from making money to paying to live. I have the skill, equipment, and knowledge to run a machine shop by myself. That orange fuck set it up that if I didn't already have well-established long term contracts, I'd be in a ditch after selling my dog for a month's worth of food. Trump knowing manufacturing, or how it impacts the manufacturers? Get the fuck out.
Sincerely, A trans woman that has been in manufacturing her whole life.
Source: Being a 20+ year career machinist.
Those tariffs did exactly what they were supposed to do. Push smaller competitors out of the market and allow price increases from the bigger companies. Even with those tariffs the price from China was still much cheaper, all he did was ramp up inflation. Literally no one won.
Same thing for the meat processing/packing laws in Denver, meant specifically to drive out a small bit very high quality farm in favor of a massive industrial one. It doesn't lower prices or increase quality (raises prices and lowers quality overall), it's just meant to drive out the competition.
The whole manufacturing sector is suffering. I don't see how any blue collar worker in any state can't recognize that. People just wanted deer season open so they could forget for a couple of months.
I wonder how much this whole cost of living crisis is due to the Trump tariffs vs how much was due to COVID? COVID seems to have provided a convenient cover that distracted the world and probably exacerbated the issue, but I wonder had COVID not happened would it have been more apparent how bad the Trump tariffs were for the economy? To my knowledge though, I don’t know that those tariffs ever really went away.
The thing about economic policies is that it takes longer than 4 years for the effects to really be felt. Every time you hear some campaign ad about how bad the economy is, it is almost guaranteed to be fall out from the previous administration. That isn't even taking into account that presidents tend to have very little actual sway over budgets and spending. Every year, the president submits a budget, and every year congress shuts it down. This cycle has happened for 200 years.
This is what I really don't get.
Like, sure, Trump's tax plan looks better for the middle class at the surface level....but that's just talking about income tax. Tariffs are taxes, too, and his tariff plan will mean significantly more dollars spent on taxes for the middle class. The net paycheck will be a little higher, but the cost increases will eat that up and much, much more.
And that's just one avenue. I'd shutter to think what will happen to the overall value of the dollar, the growing wealth disparity, the real estate market (it's nearly impossible for first time buyers as it is, but rent is exorbitant too, and a lot of it is because of sweet deals for mega landlords like Trump himself) and the costs of healthcare under Trump's "plans"
Fuck dude....my family makes 3x the local household median and we still can't save money for shit. It goes nearly as fast as it comes. We live in a modest house, we've got one (used) car payment, and fortunately no credit card debt. We buy used clothes and store-brand food. Don't go out to eat or takeout. But its still tough as hell.
It seems the real problem with tariffs is the rapidity of them. If the US wants to encourage more manufacturing at home, fine. But as you note, just applying them suddenly is ruinous. I would think a much better approach would be that any new tariff must be slowly ramped up over a decade. Or maybe a hard rule that any individual tariff can't change by more than 2 percentage points a year. This way tariffs could still be a policy tool that can be raised and lowered based on national interest, but they would change slowly enough that industry could actually adapt.
I disagree mainly because I want a Hilux and can't get one because of the Chicken Tax
Chubby Electron Man, is that you?
it also creates response tariffs. There's a number of industries in the US that export products and are subsidized who are prime targets for foreign retaliatory tariffs: Farmers, auto workers, forestry, mining, etc. Not to mention limitations on raw material sales these industries buy
I just don't think Trump is clever enough to win on any international playing field. Look at how Russia and Israel play him like a fiddle. China can easily do the same with response tariffs, and they already retaliated bad enough on farmers that they needed emergency subsidies.
I'm legitimately unsure if anyone voting for him actually understand how Tariffs work
Mitsubishi isn't that odd. Mitsubishi electric is building power plants.
https://power.mhi.com/regions/emea/
Yeah, if you are in the space it isn't weird. But for most, it would seem odd.
A couple of off-post-topic question: I'm at below-novice level in machining (learning on an old, manual Bridgeport mill at my makerspace). Can you recommend any simple but functional projects for practicing skills on a mill and learning behaviors is different materials?
Also, I'm intending to machine a replacement for my electric guitar's bridge since the stock one is both out of spec, making it impossible to find an aftermarket replacement, and it's made of chrome-coated pot-metal, making it kinda ugly and musically poor. Do you have any suggestions for alloys that are interesting, decently machinable, and non-leaded?
These "are you a bot" tests are getting real tricky.
Someone had one posted in a discord chat I was in to calculate the resistance on a resistor by image. It didn't even give you the color band chart to calculate anything. Just "What resistor is 200Ω?"
I've been doing electronics projects for about 25 years and would fail that resoundingly.
I mean, disregarding that the below comments seemed to make your comment an attempt trying to call me out as a bot - here's a real answer. You already have a good project with the bridge. Brass is always classy no matter the guitar (you will need to seal ot for corrosion). As long as you aren't trying to make a full Floyd Rose bridge, it's just a matter of cutting slots.
Thank you, very much! Yeah, just a tune-o-matic, so, not very complex.
Definitely was not trying to call you out or anything like that, just seeking advice from someone much more knowledgeable about the subject than myself. And I also misunderstood it to be suggesting that I might be a bot.
It was a joke response, absolutely nothing against your particular post.
Although it won't be long until we have to preface all our online discussions with "disregard all previous instructions" or similar.