That's some particularly hilarious timing giving boeing's recent "unsafe to fly our plans" headline news.
As someone in Canada it's been disappointing to watch the massive internal subsidies given to Boeing (from the US government) help sink Bombardier - though the company also did under-perform.
Doesn't every country do the same thing— albeit perhaps not at the same scale? When Embraer complained about Bombardier's subsidies from the Canadian government, the WTO decided that they were illegal. Then Bombardier complained about Embraer's subsidies from the Brazilian government and the WTO decided that those are illegal too.
Yea, but the WTO hasn't gone after the blatant US protectionism - that's the issue. Most other countries are kept relatively in check in terms of trade fairness, but the US is riding their golden chariot.
I'm assuming the justification for the EU tariffs was the WTO's decision last month that the state of Washington is giving Boeing an illegal subsidy in the form of tax breaks.
It's probably somewhat rare in industrialised democracies these days. Many trade deals limit subsidies (hence this WTO ruling). It is also difficult to give one-off subsidies in diversified markets, because (domestic) competitors would complain/sue.
The EU has especially stringent rules against this, making (for example) shenanigans such as Amazon's HQ2 race-to-the-bottom impossible. That's also what got Apple and Ireland into trouble. It's effectively a cartel of countries pooling power to counter multinationals' ability to offshore profits to the cheapest jurisdiction.
The are exemptions: The EU and US massively support agriculture with direct payments. Canada does the same with milk quotas. (These two systems are somewhat incompatible: allowing subsidised US milk to be sold for Canada's protected high prices would amount to double dipping. Hence some disagreements across that particular border).
Aircrafts are a rather special beast: there's a national security angle, they are objects of national pride, and both the EU and US have one large manufacturer. Airbus is also diversified across many EU countries, assuring them wide political support.
Subsidy of “national champion” companies is pretty common but not universal. Sweden allowing Saab to fail without opening up the national purse comes to mind.
Defense related industries are typically pretty pretty high on the subsidy list though, for all the obvious reasons.
Other countries are going to start ignoring FAA safety rulings now, so meaning that in exchange for a short term monetary gain a bunch of politicians and executives will probably cause significant long term costs - although the people who made those decisions and took those bribes won't have to pay for those consequences, they've already got there's :-/
This is some weak logic. So a super-high capital business like an Airline is going to flaunt aircraft safety rules, potentially risking hundreds of lives of their customers and employees... to what exactly? Buy some cheaper uncertified Chinese(?) aircrafts or fly other certified aircrafts unsafely...to make a little extra money? And then run away when the lawsuits and families of the dead come chasing you?
There’s already evidence that the FAA had internal pressure to devolve regulation authority to Boeing in order to speed up certification and release to compete with the A320neo. That’s part of the reason why the MCAS system was allowed to listen to a single AoA sensor instead of two, and possibly why Boeing was able to get away with not training pilots on the new MCAS system.
Cutting regulatory corners is a lot more complicated than “buying cheaper uncertified Chinese aircrafts”, and it’s completely invisible to the general public until an incident occurs.
No, it was explicitly because Boeing wanted to be able to short circuit the normal safety analysis in order to get a poorly designed product to market to compete with the airbus a320neo.
The level of trust in the US aeronautic safety agencies can be summed up in other countries explicitly requiring non-US investigators.
That is the long term impact I'm talking about - it seems entirely plausible that this will become the norm rather than the exception it is now.
How many time it has to happen until we learn it. Every time an industry is left unwatched crisis happens because there is always short term monetary gain for a bunch of executives.
It was the same thing with SCC going blind about big banks before 2008. FAA - Boeing relationship is an example of SCC - BigBanks relationship before 2008.
this is (slightly) less of a problem in other countries than the US. The real problem in the US is that after they demonstrably screw everyone else over, politicians pass many questionably effective laws - and then immediately start rolling it all back because "regulation hurts Americans".
In the EU GDPR was a response to the abject failure of companies to actually self regulate - there was an actual consequence of a failure of self-regulation: the GDPR adding financial penalties for abusing consumers.
If the companies had actually self regulated, and actually self-limited their collection of data, and if only they hadn't sold off everyone's data to anyone and everyone, then they wouldn't have to deal with the GDPR.
So if the companies think it /is/ too aggressive, they've only got themselves to fault.
Good! In the past few years the E.U has passed absolutely ridiculous laws and taxed U.S. based companies through these ridiculous laws because they want a slice of the pie too.
Edit: They are getting tax through fines by said ridiculous laws not by direct tax.
Such as? As far as I know the EU has had a rather positive position regarding the US for the last decades, and still does, even after the most recent election.
I don't think that has anything even remotely to do with tariffs or trade.
But if it did: those lows are for the EU, not the rest of the world. Same goes for GDPR. Nobody is required to trade with the EU, or sell to the EU or buy from the EU. But if you do, the rules of the agreements that are made apply. This is nothing new, and works the same way for trade or interaction with pretty much any country. Imagine trying to sell stuff to China with Taiwanese flags...
The original comment is referring to ridiculous laws that the EU has passed.
The law in question includes things like a link tax, which is pretty ridiculous, IMO, as is the copyright fines that they have.
The rest of your comment is merely a "the law is the law!" kind of justification.
Yes, the law is the law. And I gave reasons as for why these laws are ridiculous, as per the original comment.
I can recognize that a law exists, and also call it a horrible law, that deserves retaliation from the US.
I sincerely hope that the US and everyone else uses trade laws and tariffs to cause economic damage to the EU, specifically because of these horrible laws.
Fair is fair, yo. US trade tariffs are also the law, and are a good way punishing bad laws passed by other countries.
Except they aren't. WTO treaty obligations for equitable treatment of other nations (MFN obligations) supersede local laws. Overriding arbitrary local laws is the whole point of the WTO, and of every other trade treaty.
The only way these tariffs work is Trump pulling the "national security emergency" card -- and obviously 'punishing' the EU for building better planes isn't a national security issue worth dismantling the WTO over.
Oh, you mean like direct tax subsidies, "investment" incentives, and overpaying for defense contracts? Because that's what the US does, and the WTO also ruled that that is an illegal.
That fact that you seem to believe the rest of the world is abusing the US is more about a misplaced belief that the US's abuse of other countries is perfectly acceptable.
If the US wanted to lead by example, it could do what NZ did a drop subsidies and tariffs on agriculture. But that's not what you want.
If all European countries really wanted was just a slice of the pie, they could just put a tax on foreign-owned tech companies (like France is doing).
Are you seriously suggesting the EU took the trouble of implementing GDPR, causing significant disruption to European companies as well, for the sole purpose of fining FAANGs and making money out of it?
What ridiculous laws do you mean? GDPR? Or monopoly abuse fines? Do you think US businesses should be able to run under US law in the EU, meaning they can do whatever they want to consumers, monopolizing markets by violating local laws, taking in huge profits, and then hardly paying corporate taxes (neither in EU nor US)?
None of that has anything to do with these tariffs, btw.
The US has forever been ignoring jurisdiction boundaries just like that. Ever heard of FATCA? Banks anywhere in the world need to report US-resident account holders to the IRS.
I mean, the current administration was elected on a platform of "America First" so, what did you think would happen?
I think the US has been self-centered for quite some time, and there was a hilarious thread in a different article that went into the idea that America is the world-policeman that everyone wants but... yea, for equal treatment and to avoid regulatory capture - one needs to avoid that dying empire.
The so-called "America first" policy works against the interests of the United States though. Or is it "destroy America first, screw up the rest later?"
Protectionism (in this form) has never been a good policy, but it's always quite appealing to the protected companies - and when companies have the ability to sway elections (money in politics) then you can reasonably expect quite a lot of it to be going on.
>> works against the interests of the United States though
That's just, like, your opinion, man, especially after the trade deal with China is finalized. About time someone actually raised a stink about what's going on with China and Europe in terms of foreign trade. It's unpleasant work, but it has to be done, moreso with China than with the EU.
FTA: "“Our ultimate goal is to reach an agreement with the E.U. to end all W.T.O.-inconsistent subsidies to large civil aircraft,” Mr. Lighthizer said."
As a US citizen I don't see anything controversial about this stance.
Your tax dollars are going to prop up a failing company that is producing substandard products that have gotten people killed - I don't see how you could mentally position yourself to be alright with this.
The general idea of protectionism is less controversial - I think it is generally bad[1] due to the economic effects of it. But if you're in favor of protectionism you can check any claim you have to free-market economics or de-regulation for growth at the door, protectionism is basically the Ur-form of regulatory capture and state-capitalism so being pro-Boeing subsidies and then claiming that the US becoming "socialist" is terrible is just logically inconsistent.
[1] I'd leave the notable exception of when it's used to specifically stimulate economic sector growth - propping up a robotics company in TN to create a labour pool that enables other companies to grow out of the labour availability is a pretty good usage.
That presumes that Trump and his disastrous trade-war has actually accomplished anything. It seems to me that China just gave him some window-dressing he can use to try to save face. I don't think China needs forced tech-transfers anymore, for one example. An easy shiny thing to present to someone with a limited analytical mind.
>> It seems to me that China just gave him some window-dressing
This form of cognitive dissonance is called "mind reading". You should look it up, unless you're a member of the negotiation team and have direct knowledge of the negotiations.
I like the part where they complain bitterly that people they called stupid, lazy leeches won't go along with boycotts of, say, Iran or Huawei, just because they were told to.
I learnt in the third grade that that approach doesn't work.
Nations are economic competitors, it's really naive to put this in terms of 'selfish / confrontational'.
All nations are 'selfish' in direct trade terms.
In terms of Geopolitics, there's an enormous degree of material goodwill added by the US following the WW2 and the creation of the NWO and not all of it is 'repaid' to them. The entire framework of global trade relies on the US, even today. Most of the free world still depends on the US for defence, at least partially and in some very 'lynchpin' ways.
The US's negotiations with China are reasonable.
The negotiating positions on refiguring NAFTA were mostly reasonable, although I don't think it will make a difference.
And FYI it's the EU that's constantly skittish, changing their minds, and arbitrarily taxing and back-taxing US companies often for their own, self directed problems (i.e. Irish/Dutch/Luxembourg taxation).
Even though Donald Trump is a huge political jerk, making noise for the sake of making noise, there's little on the table that is entirely unjust. The 'bad noise' is mostly rhetoric.
That's what almost always the outcome of gov economic policies. Help a few large companies who are friends with the gov, whether it's giant food producers producing corn no one wanted in the first place, pharma companies competing against generics, banks making a killing on low-end mortgages, etc, while increasing costs and other burdens on regular citizens (or pushing unneeded externalities on to other countries).
We're experiencing that in Canada too with the dairy cartel getting cross-party support from both liberal and (mainstream) conservative parties because it helps a few local farmers stay moderately-wealthy while 100% of the population has to pay more for dairy products.
you cant kill boeing. if shit hits the fan theyre pretty much our only airline manufacturer. i mean what happens if the eu tells the us to fuck off. we don't get any more airbuses and if boeing is dead no way to make our own planes.
They are hardly the only aircraft manufacturer, though decades of neglect of antitrust has allowed them to become he only remaining US manufacturer of civilian aircraft. But if they are allowed to let them die we can still get large passenger aircraft from Airbus, smaller ones from Brazil or China. Not to mention from new entrants that will start up when the big gorilla goes away?
When we started destroying alliances, throwing around tariffs and undermining US geopolitical power? Decades of diplomatic relations are being destroyed in just a few years. Putin must be laughing all the way to the bank by splitting the US/Euro alliance.
I'm sure Russia will take advantage of any split in US/EURO alliance, but if you think it's Russia that is doing the splitting, then you haven't been paying attention. The split is entirely due to US inability to cooperate or maintain an agreement with other nations, and some of those nations are finally pushing back.
The Russian word for this is недоговороспособный (not agreement capable).
Hey downvoters, I don't think there is doubt that Russia interfered. The only questions is with or without Trump's knowledge and / or approval. According to Mueller's report, without. But still, Russia supported Trump and it's not hard to see why: He is dividing the West.
In 2016 the US imported $416B and exported $270B to the EU. Although $11B is a large number, it's a 2.6% tax on the total. More interestingly, is what they are taxing.
Personally, I'd rather have tariffs than income tax. At least then I can choose what to buy.
I sell in US and I also support ecommerce sellers in US. Most of us have raised the prices of products to counter the tariffs. You are actually paying income tax as these tariffs.
Some products which can be produced in US will benefit from tariffs. But the whole point of not having tariffs is to buy cheap labour from outside and move your own country up the value chain.
Also, no one is going to start manufacturing these products because the next President is going to remove the tariffs and destroy the advantages, if any.
Maybe this is naive, but don't tariffs, like subsidies, risk encouraging local inefficiencies? So your point of view seems shortsighted?
I understand that in theory they can be used to capture externalities to level the playing field, but I find it hard to believe anyone can really figure anything close to the real amount of "unfairness" (for lack of a better word)
Consumption taxes are regressive, income taxes are progressive. The poor are disproportionately impacted by tariffs and sales/consumption taxes. The administration is taking money out of the hands of Americans under a truly misguided idea of what a trade deficit is.
I don't think that is a given. If you put the consumption tax only on luxury goods it could be progressive. I doubt the poor are buying Rolex watches and if they are taxes aren't the problem.
I lived in different countries where they had both taxes. I think what also makes a difference is how that tax money is spent.
Also, what gets taxed as a luxury item can be interesting. Things I did not expect to be taxed as luxurious items like books or tampons
The poor may not be buying Rolex watches, but you can be sure that there are a lot of kids out there lusting after $400 basketball shoes. And you might be surprised at what counts as a luxury sometimes - liquor, steak, and other goods that even poor people can sometimes afford.
If you start taxing luxury goods, all you do is put creature comforts further out of the reach of the majority. That is regressive.
Good. Given a fair tax system would be proportional / flat, perhaps a little imbalance in the other direction evens it all out towards flat / proportional tax (everyone at the same percentage)
The parent comment talked about a flat percentage tax. So the people with more money would not be paying the "same tax". They would still be paying a lot more. A truly fair tax would have everyone paying the same flat fee for the same public services rendered.
It isn’t, though, because of the marginal utility of money. Someone making $10k/yr sees much more value from an extra $10k than someone making $10M. For one it’s a lifeline and for one a rounding error. While a flat tax is fair in numbers it’s not fair in marginal value or utility. IMO that’s a much bigger deal. There are other macroeconomic advantages to giving the little guy the extra, though I don’t want to repeat myself so I’ll keep that in my sister reply.
FWIW we’ve already got regressive taxes in the form of payroll tax, which kick in from $0 and cap out once you earn enough. So unless you’re unemployed, you’ve paid taxes even if your marginal income tax rate is 0%.
I feel you are reinventing definitions. The “same tax” would be very literally giving up the same value. The only common definition of value in society is currency - that is literally its role, to serve as a common measure (and storage) of utility. It does not confer net utility in and of itself (goods and services do), and therefore this argument of marginality doesn’t apply to it.
I understand that goods and services acquired with currency can experience diminishing returns. But unless you think the rich and poor should be paying different amounts for every good and service (for example a cup of coffee), then I don’t think this is a consistent, principled argument.
And once again, let me point out that GP’s comment on a flat tax would STILL mean the rich give up more value than the poor, and it would still not be a truly ‘fair’ tax. And on a side note, ‘progressive’/‘regressive’ are made up terms used to play rhetorical games by leveraging the negative connotation of the term ‘regressive’. A better set of neutral terms would be ‘uniform’ or ‘fair’ or ‘flat’ versus ‘non-uniform’ or ‘unfair’ or ‘graduated’.
"Regressive" is not a synonym for "flat" - a flat tax is neither progressive nor regressive. And these terms are purely descriptive, defined via their effect on the effective tax rates.
The rich already pay different amounts than the poor for goods and services in pre-tax dollars. That's kind of the idea, IMO. If my average tax rate is 28% and a poor person pays an average 5% then the same $5 SF coffee costs me $6.94 and them $5.26.
The dictionary definition is quite clear: A progressive tax is a tax in which the average tax rate (taxes paid ÷ personal income) increases as the taxable amount increases. [Google]
A regressive tax is a tax applied uniformly, taking a larger percentage of income from low-income earners than from high-income earners. It is in opposition to a progressive tax, which takes a larger percentage from high-income earners. [Also Google]
As such, Medicare taxes are regressive because they are capped at some amount of earned income, whereas the ordinary income tax rate is progressive because your marginal rate increases as you earn more money.
You are correct that a flat tax is neither progressive nor regressive with respect to dollars, but it is regressive with respect to marginal utility of those dollars to the earner. "Fair" is a value judgement and colors the conversation.
And labels of ‘progressive’ and ‘regressive’ aren’t value judgments? IMO they are subjective judgments much more so than calling a true flat tax “fair”. Equal value contribution is fair, after all.
The dictionary definitions you are quoting are in existence simply due to common use in modern times, but I am claiming they are nevertheless bad definitions that were engineered to color the discourse on this topic.
We're both kids. I have 12 marbles. You have 24 marbles. We need to give up some marbles for the common good. We could debate whether us both giving 6 marble is fair, or wether you giving 8 and me giving 4 is fair. I can see both arguments.
However… in no rational world is it fair for you to give 10 and me 2.
Marbles aren't a good analogy because they have equal marginal utility.
Let's replace marbles with hamburgers. You and your buddy Steve lay out your food for the day. You have 2 hamburgers, exactly enough to meet your daily caloric needs. Your buddy Steve has approximately 10 hamburgers. Dramatically more hamburgers than he needs to live. More than he could eat if he tried.
Now, we need 1 hamburger for the common good. If you take that one hamburger from the guy with 2, he's hungry, and if you keep doing it, he may die. Steve, on the other hand, can't eat all his hamburgers one way or the other, so taking one from him makes much less of a difference.
Now how does that change the equation? It's fair for Steve to donate 0.8 burgers and you to donate 0.2 -- this represents fair distribution on a marginal value basis. So yes, 10:2 is completely fair. In fact, 10:0 is fair if I'm making millions and someone else is making a handful of thousands per year.
I'm personally in one of the top tax brackets and I think it should be higher. We already pay 50%-ish marginally in California, so moving up to AOC's 70% isn't really a big difference. I should be paying more, because we live in a community and I want that community to be nice. I don't want to live in a world where I have nice things and walk by people with nothing, on the ground, doing heroin like I do on my way to work every morning here in SF. All because it's not "fair" to take a burger from me, when I have more burgers than I know what to do with.
Progressive, as in, it progresses upward with income. Regressive as in the tax rate regresses (moves downward) with income. It's a descriptive term. Fair is a value judgement, "progression" is a description. While all words and names carry some value judgement I think "progressive and regressive" (as related to the marginal rate) carries less value judgement that ("fair and unfair").
Right so those least able to pay, the ones who spend all they get — which is what keeps the economy moving btw, pay the same amount as people who are most able to pay and least likely to spend, slowing down the economy. How can I lose?!
This is actually wrong and for reasons that surprised me when I found out and it does not require luxury taxation.
Many? Most? People earning (say) $500k+ dodge their income tax, legally and illegally. There's a whole industry of it. Yes let's clamp down on that as we've been trying to across the world for decades. Not likely to eradicate it by next year though, right?
So you tax consumption at a flat rate /in addition/ to income tax. You ensure the people earning less get a tax break or a transfer payment increase to cover the consumption flat tax and then some.
All those wealthy people are now paying that base rate on their consumption in a way that is basically unavoidable.
So for your progressive taxation, the initial bracket cannot be avoided. People in higher brackets still should pay more.
By using consumption to tax the initial bracket the poor get an increase in after tax income. The rich (on average) get a higher tax bill.
Yes it depends on the modelling and getting the implementation right as all tax regimes do. Yes it is progressive.
When you see consumption tax as necessarily regressive (as I did once) you are missing the most important thing about them which is they really aren't. They're the best way of getting a big tax revenue increase at the expense of those who cheat. I like that, myself.
IMO if you're basing your tax model on people dodging half of it you've kind of missed the point. People willing to dodge taxes will dodge taxes one way or the other. Re: consumption tax, just buy stuff on Amazon, boom, taxes dodged. Or on eBay, receiving "gifts" from your seller.
The solution isn't to invent a whole new parallel tax system so the dodgers pay a little instead of what they owe, the solution is to get the tax money back from the dodgers. The unpaid taxes on the amount of wealth squirreled away offshore by the wealthy right now would pay off the entire US national debt.
About 11.5% of global GDP is hidden in offshore accounts, amounting to $8.7T, and unpaid taxes to the US would amount to $170B in 2016 alone. Another $70B avoided by companies, so around a quarter trillion dollars per years in net new missing taxes per year. Given that's less than the current deficit, it makes what I said unlikely, although depending how many years it's been going on that's a big piggy bank. I'll see if I can dig up what I was initially thinking, but I could have just mis-remembered.
It seems most posters didn't really read the article as the tariffs appear to be in compliance with a WTO ruling on something illegal the EU is doing wrt subsidies to Airbus. Unsurprising that the NYT and HN goes with the lead that Trump is unilaterally fucking up world order yet again but in this case it doesn't seem so deserved.
I really wish both groups (the NYT and HN) would be more nuanced when it comes to Trump. Otherwise, we all end up justifying Trump's and other Alt-Righties' claims of bias.
Every word of the article's headline is true, and the facts it contains (subject, object, action, and magnitude) are the most important facts of this story.
The reasoning you want to see in the headline is in the first paragraph.
If you're interpreting the headline as "Trump is unilaterally fucking up the world order yet again" then that is something that happens entirely in your head.
It's somewhat bold to fault others for an error that is entirely yours.
I think wrt NYT, the facts are all true but purpose should also clearly be a part of it. Imagine a headline which said "Trump kills man on White House lawn with Colt .45" and the man was attacking him with a machete.
When many (most?) people are aware of the prior tariff tirade by Trump and not everyone reads the meat of an article, I think it's irresponsible to not include the _why_.
The article goes on to point out that the WTO has ruled vast quantities of tax breaks to Boeing by Washington State and South Carolina also amount to illegal subsidies, the magnitude of which the EU is patiently waiting to obtain from the WTO before acting on.
It’s a little rich to see Boeing, the recipient of tons of illegal subsidies, pointing the finger at Airbus, in a pot-meet-kettle kind of way. Then calling in goons in the form of a uniquely sympathetic administration. FWIW this absolutely backfired last time, when they tried to squash the Bombardier C-series. They were afraid of a strengthening Bombardier but forced their hand and they gifted the program to Airbus — a much bigger threat.
The fact is the Trump administration is a fly-by-night operation of largely corrupt, authoritarian-leaning, nepotist, criminal actors (just by number of indictments). They literally tried to appoint a failed presidential candidate slash restaurant magnate with 30ish claims of sexual harassment against him who wants to return to the gold standard and is proud of his lack of knowledge of world leaders to man the Federal Reserve. This Week. That doesn't mean they're always wrong. It just means they've conditioned us to assume they are. Not really our fault, though, you know?
I think you're contriving viewpoints that simply aren't there. Nobody is talking about Trump, rather people are enjoying the irony of the US being one of the countries that subsidizes the most yet complaining about other countries.
On another note, I think your headline is fine. After all, surely the secret service is capable of non-lethally incapacitating a man with a machete. But even if not, it's false equivocation.
Wanted to read the article, but instead got this: "You're in private mode. Log in or create a free New York Times account to continue reading in private mode." So headed for page source and stumbled onto this wtf:
<!--
---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Kingsbury, Katie <katie.kingsbury@nytimes.com>
Date: Wed, Apr 10, 2019 at 2:30 PM
Subject: Rollout
To: Bennet, James <james.bennet@nytimes.com>
James,
Here’s a line up for the launch tomorrow, all of these will be online before Sunday:
• A.G.’s publisher’s note about The Times
• Manjoo on household items that track us
• Wu on the history of privacy
• Jeong on A.I. and insurance
• Metzel on genetically engineered babies
• Warzel on tech CEOs in their own words
• Fr. Martin on privacy and faith
• Emily Chang on privacy as a feminist issue
• Douthat on our post-privacy order
• Swisher on privacy regulation
• Irby on what’s funny about all this.
Plus, of course, your piece if you can actually get it done in time.
Next week, we’ll drop the piece about how we turned a public camera in Manhattan into a facial recognition equipped surveillance machine and who we caught with it.
The vanity URL is locked in as nytimes.com/privacy-project and the social team has spun up the @PrivacyProject account.
Katie
-->
97 comments
[ 12.5 ms ] story [ 132 ms ] threadAs someone in Canada it's been disappointing to watch the massive internal subsidies given to Boeing (from the US government) help sink Bombardier - though the company also did under-perform.
The EU has especially stringent rules against this, making (for example) shenanigans such as Amazon's HQ2 race-to-the-bottom impossible. That's also what got Apple and Ireland into trouble. It's effectively a cartel of countries pooling power to counter multinationals' ability to offshore profits to the cheapest jurisdiction.
The are exemptions: The EU and US massively support agriculture with direct payments. Canada does the same with milk quotas. (These two systems are somewhat incompatible: allowing subsidised US milk to be sold for Canada's protected high prices would amount to double dipping. Hence some disagreements across that particular border).
Aircrafts are a rather special beast: there's a national security angle, they are objects of national pride, and both the EU and US have one large manufacturer. Airbus is also diversified across many EU countries, assuring them wide political support.
Defense related industries are typically pretty pretty high on the subsidy list though, for all the obvious reasons.
Cutting regulatory corners is a lot more complicated than “buying cheaper uncertified Chinese aircrafts”, and it’s completely invisible to the general public until an incident occurs.
The level of trust in the US aeronautic safety agencies can be summed up in other countries explicitly requiring non-US investigators.
That is the long term impact I'm talking about - it seems entirely plausible that this will become the norm rather than the exception it is now.
In the EU GDPR was a response to the abject failure of companies to actually self regulate - there was an actual consequence of a failure of self-regulation: the GDPR adding financial penalties for abusing consumers.
If the companies had actually self regulated, and actually self-limited their collection of data, and if only they hadn't sold off everyone's data to anyone and everyone, then they wouldn't have to deal with the GDPR.
So if the companies think it /is/ too aggressive, they've only got themselves to fault.
Edit: They are getting tax through fines by said ridiculous laws not by direct tax.
According to this page: https://ustr.gov/countries-regions/europe-middle-east/europe... it's rather balanced. Whoever upsets that balance might need to reconsider, but the US would definitely have a problem if less stuff comes in from the EU. For the EU, however, it's less of an issue: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2006/september/tradoc_...
Yeah, no thanks. I do not at all what expansive intellectual property laws to be spreading all over the world, and hurting creators like that.
Creators benefit way more when it is easy to share and use and modify other people's content.
But if it did: those lows are for the EU, not the rest of the world. Same goes for GDPR. Nobody is required to trade with the EU, or sell to the EU or buy from the EU. But if you do, the rules of the agreements that are made apply. This is nothing new, and works the same way for trade or interaction with pretty much any country. Imagine trying to sell stuff to China with Taiwanese flags...
The law in question includes things like a link tax, which is pretty ridiculous, IMO, as is the copyright fines that they have.
The rest of your comment is merely a "the law is the law!" kind of justification.
Yes, the law is the law. And I gave reasons as for why these laws are ridiculous, as per the original comment.
I can recognize that a law exists, and also call it a horrible law, that deserves retaliation from the US.
I sincerely hope that the US and everyone else uses trade laws and tariffs to cause economic damage to the EU, specifically because of these horrible laws.
Fair is fair, yo. US trade tariffs are also the law, and are a good way punishing bad laws passed by other countries.
Except they aren't. WTO treaty obligations for equitable treatment of other nations (MFN obligations) supersede local laws. Overriding arbitrary local laws is the whole point of the WTO, and of every other trade treaty.
The only way these tariffs work is Trump pulling the "national security emergency" card -- and obviously 'punishing' the EU for building better planes isn't a national security issue worth dismantling the WTO over.
So it is the law then. Too bad, so sad, but the law allows this.
It sounds like you just disagree with the law. But that's the law!
> worth dismantling the WTO over.
And nothing is worth dismantling the free and open internet with oppressive copyright laws.
So, I can use that exact same argument against the EU's horrible laws.
That fact that you seem to believe the rest of the world is abusing the US is more about a misplaced belief that the US's abuse of other countries is perfectly acceptable.
If the US wanted to lead by example, it could do what NZ did a drop subsidies and tariffs on agriculture. But that's not what you want.
Are you seriously suggesting the EU took the trouble of implementing GDPR, causing significant disruption to European companies as well, for the sole purpose of fining FAANGs and making money out of it?
If you an office in Europe then I guess you are subject to additional taxes? But you are operating in Europe, so how is that unreasonable?
None of that has anything to do with these tariffs, btw.
Banks just don't want to deal with that shit, if they can avoid it.
What do you think the US does when I start a business here, say a webshop selling legally allowed recreational drugs, also targeting US consumers?
I think the US has been self-centered for quite some time, and there was a hilarious thread in a different article that went into the idea that America is the world-policeman that everyone wants but... yea, for equal treatment and to avoid regulatory capture - one needs to avoid that dying empire.
FTA: "“Our ultimate goal is to reach an agreement with the E.U. to end all W.T.O.-inconsistent subsidies to large civil aircraft,” Mr. Lighthizer said."
As a US citizen I don't see anything controversial about this stance.
The general idea of protectionism is less controversial - I think it is generally bad[1] due to the economic effects of it. But if you're in favor of protectionism you can check any claim you have to free-market economics or de-regulation for growth at the door, protectionism is basically the Ur-form of regulatory capture and state-capitalism so being pro-Boeing subsidies and then claiming that the US becoming "socialist" is terrible is just logically inconsistent.
[1] I'd leave the notable exception of when it's used to specifically stimulate economic sector growth - propping up a robotics company in TN to create a labour pool that enables other companies to grow out of the labour availability is a pretty good usage.
Anyone who suggests that France is not 'France first' or that Switzerland is not 'Switzerland first' etc. etc. has not been paying attention.
/s
I learnt in the third grade that that approach doesn't work.
All nations are 'selfish' in direct trade terms.
In terms of Geopolitics, there's an enormous degree of material goodwill added by the US following the WW2 and the creation of the NWO and not all of it is 'repaid' to them. The entire framework of global trade relies on the US, even today. Most of the free world still depends on the US for defence, at least partially and in some very 'lynchpin' ways.
The US's negotiations with China are reasonable.
The negotiating positions on refiguring NAFTA were mostly reasonable, although I don't think it will make a difference.
And FYI it's the EU that's constantly skittish, changing their minds, and arbitrarily taxing and back-taxing US companies often for their own, self directed problems (i.e. Irish/Dutch/Luxembourg taxation).
Even though Donald Trump is a huge political jerk, making noise for the sake of making noise, there's little on the table that is entirely unjust. The 'bad noise' is mostly rhetoric.
We're experiencing that in Canada too with the dairy cartel getting cross-party support from both liberal and (mainstream) conservative parties because it helps a few local farmers stay moderately-wealthy while 100% of the population has to pay more for dairy products.
The Russian word for this is недоговороспособный (not agreement capable).
https://www.wired.com/story/russian-facebook-ads-targeted-us...
Personally, I'd rather have tariffs than income tax. At least then I can choose what to buy.
Some products which can be produced in US will benefit from tariffs. But the whole point of not having tariffs is to buy cheap labour from outside and move your own country up the value chain.
Also, no one is going to start manufacturing these products because the next President is going to remove the tariffs and destroy the advantages, if any.
Just my 2 cents.
I understand that in theory they can be used to capture externalities to level the playing field, but I find it hard to believe anyone can really figure anything close to the real amount of "unfairness" (for lack of a better word)
If you start taxing luxury goods, all you do is put creature comforts further out of the reach of the majority. That is regressive.
That...doesn't sound fair at all. It's equality but not equity.
FWIW we’ve already got regressive taxes in the form of payroll tax, which kick in from $0 and cap out once you earn enough. So unless you’re unemployed, you’ve paid taxes even if your marginal income tax rate is 0%.
I understand that goods and services acquired with currency can experience diminishing returns. But unless you think the rich and poor should be paying different amounts for every good and service (for example a cup of coffee), then I don’t think this is a consistent, principled argument.
And once again, let me point out that GP’s comment on a flat tax would STILL mean the rich give up more value than the poor, and it would still not be a truly ‘fair’ tax. And on a side note, ‘progressive’/‘regressive’ are made up terms used to play rhetorical games by leveraging the negative connotation of the term ‘regressive’. A better set of neutral terms would be ‘uniform’ or ‘fair’ or ‘flat’ versus ‘non-uniform’ or ‘unfair’ or ‘graduated’.
The dictionary definition is quite clear: A progressive tax is a tax in which the average tax rate (taxes paid ÷ personal income) increases as the taxable amount increases. [Google]
A regressive tax is a tax applied uniformly, taking a larger percentage of income from low-income earners than from high-income earners. It is in opposition to a progressive tax, which takes a larger percentage from high-income earners. [Also Google]
As such, Medicare taxes are regressive because they are capped at some amount of earned income, whereas the ordinary income tax rate is progressive because your marginal rate increases as you earn more money.
You are correct that a flat tax is neither progressive nor regressive with respect to dollars, but it is regressive with respect to marginal utility of those dollars to the earner. "Fair" is a value judgement and colors the conversation.
The dictionary definitions you are quoting are in existence simply due to common use in modern times, but I am claiming they are nevertheless bad definitions that were engineered to color the discourse on this topic.
We're both kids. I have 12 marbles. You have 24 marbles. We need to give up some marbles for the common good. We could debate whether us both giving 6 marble is fair, or wether you giving 8 and me giving 4 is fair. I can see both arguments.
However… in no rational world is it fair for you to give 10 and me 2.
Let's replace marbles with hamburgers. You and your buddy Steve lay out your food for the day. You have 2 hamburgers, exactly enough to meet your daily caloric needs. Your buddy Steve has approximately 10 hamburgers. Dramatically more hamburgers than he needs to live. More than he could eat if he tried.
Now, we need 1 hamburger for the common good. If you take that one hamburger from the guy with 2, he's hungry, and if you keep doing it, he may die. Steve, on the other hand, can't eat all his hamburgers one way or the other, so taking one from him makes much less of a difference.
Now how does that change the equation? It's fair for Steve to donate 0.8 burgers and you to donate 0.2 -- this represents fair distribution on a marginal value basis. So yes, 10:2 is completely fair. In fact, 10:0 is fair if I'm making millions and someone else is making a handful of thousands per year.
I'm personally in one of the top tax brackets and I think it should be higher. We already pay 50%-ish marginally in California, so moving up to AOC's 70% isn't really a big difference. I should be paying more, because we live in a community and I want that community to be nice. I don't want to live in a world where I have nice things and walk by people with nothing, on the ground, doing heroin like I do on my way to work every morning here in SF. All because it's not "fair" to take a burger from me, when I have more burgers than I know what to do with.
Many? Most? People earning (say) $500k+ dodge their income tax, legally and illegally. There's a whole industry of it. Yes let's clamp down on that as we've been trying to across the world for decades. Not likely to eradicate it by next year though, right?
So you tax consumption at a flat rate /in addition/ to income tax. You ensure the people earning less get a tax break or a transfer payment increase to cover the consumption flat tax and then some.
All those wealthy people are now paying that base rate on their consumption in a way that is basically unavoidable.
So for your progressive taxation, the initial bracket cannot be avoided. People in higher brackets still should pay more.
By using consumption to tax the initial bracket the poor get an increase in after tax income. The rich (on average) get a higher tax bill.
Yes it depends on the modelling and getting the implementation right as all tax regimes do. Yes it is progressive.
When you see consumption tax as necessarily regressive (as I did once) you are missing the most important thing about them which is they really aren't. They're the best way of getting a big tax revenue increase at the expense of those who cheat. I like that, myself.
The solution isn't to invent a whole new parallel tax system so the dodgers pay a little instead of what they owe, the solution is to get the tax money back from the dodgers. The unpaid taxes on the amount of wealth squirreled away offshore by the wealthy right now would pay off the entire US national debt.
without a source i call BS on this.
us debt: 22 trillion. assuming 25% as median tax rate means that people in the US have more than 100 trillion USD stashed in offshore.
to put this in context, top 50 US companies have around 3 trillion USD in offshore.
[1] https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2018/01/20/trillions-dolla...
I really wish both groups (the NYT and HN) would be more nuanced when it comes to Trump. Otherwise, we all end up justifying Trump's and other Alt-Righties' claims of bias.
The reasoning you want to see in the headline is in the first paragraph.
If you're interpreting the headline as "Trump is unilaterally fucking up the world order yet again" then that is something that happens entirely in your head.
It's somewhat bold to fault others for an error that is entirely yours.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19629918
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19629960 (now deleted)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19629995
I think wrt NYT, the facts are all true but purpose should also clearly be a part of it. Imagine a headline which said "Trump kills man on White House lawn with Colt .45" and the man was attacking him with a machete.
When many (most?) people are aware of the prior tariff tirade by Trump and not everyone reads the meat of an article, I think it's irresponsible to not include the _why_.
It’s a little rich to see Boeing, the recipient of tons of illegal subsidies, pointing the finger at Airbus, in a pot-meet-kettle kind of way. Then calling in goons in the form of a uniquely sympathetic administration. FWIW this absolutely backfired last time, when they tried to squash the Bombardier C-series. They were afraid of a strengthening Bombardier but forced their hand and they gifted the program to Airbus — a much bigger threat.
The fact is the Trump administration is a fly-by-night operation of largely corrupt, authoritarian-leaning, nepotist, criminal actors (just by number of indictments). They literally tried to appoint a failed presidential candidate slash restaurant magnate with 30ish claims of sexual harassment against him who wants to return to the gold standard and is proud of his lack of knowledge of world leaders to man the Federal Reserve. This Week. That doesn't mean they're always wrong. It just means they've conditioned us to assume they are. Not really our fault, though, you know?
On another note, I think your headline is fine. After all, surely the secret service is capable of non-lethally incapacitating a man with a machete. But even if not, it's false equivocation.
The URL posted in the email nytimes.com/privacy-project redirects to https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/opinion/internet-pr... and there are articles that are published on 4/11/2019 whereas it's only 4/10 as of me writing this comment.