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Comment Re: Welcome to The Future! (Score 1) 150

First of all, nobody is going to balance the budget. Dems and Republicans both spend like there's no tomorrow.

Secondly, printing more money is one source of inflation but it is certainly not the only one. Inflation also happens when demand for products goes up and/or supply goes down. The increased demand for goods and services after Covid generated price increases that corporations have latched onto and refused to let go of after the surge has subsided. The war in Iran is causing a shortage of fuel and fertilizer that has been driving prices up as well. And don't forget about the tariffs. Sure, the breakneck pace of printing money isn't helping, but right now there are other factors that are having a much larger and more immediate effect on pricing than "money machine go brrrr".

Comment Re: Welcome to The Future! (Score 2) 150

It's not that BNPL will cause the bubble to pop. A large increase in the use of BNPL is a bellwether that indicates that people are struggling to afford basic necessities. When this happens, it means that we could likely see an uptick in delinquencies of mortgages, auto loans, student loans, and medical debt. All four of those things are currently in bubbles that are ready to pop, not to mention cryptocurrency and AI stocks. All of the sectors of our economy are so highly interconnected now that it's very hard for a huge setback in one industry not to have a widespread effect on the others.

Comment Re:It's just a tax on you (Score 1) 60

Winner! This is about Chinese drone companies being forced to pay bribes to Trump to remove the tariffs, and if that fails then the fallback is that the tariff is enacted and acts as a national sales tax. Republicans have wanted a national sales tax for years because the lower and middle classes spend a larger percentage of their income on goods than rich people do. And for importers and retailers, tariffs are much worse than a sales tax: sales tax is only paid on items that were sold and the retailer has already collected the money that needs to be paid to the government while tariffs apply to all items imported, including items that may never be sold, and they need to be paid upfront which requires lots of extra liquidity.

Comment Re:Why not a ban? (Score 2) 60

That's true now but it's highly probable that China's economy will eventually outpace the U.S. to a point where they could tell us to piss off. Sure, it would hurt China's economy but it would hurt the U.S. a lot more. While that may seem unlikely today, it's something they may be willing to do if relations between the countries deteriorate significantly.

Comment Re:Why not a ban? (Score 1) 60

However, in the case of an emergency the executive can give itself more power. Emergencies like national security risks.

It's interesting that none of the Constitutional crises Trump has perpetrated have resulted in the use of emergency powers but any and all competition to his business interests seem to be rife with the use of emergency powers.

Comment Re:Why not a ban? (Score 1) 60

Paying a tariff on imported drones is a security measure in the same manner as charging an extra $45 for airline passengers who don't have a Real ID is a security measure. Evildoers don't have modest amounts of extra cash to throw at the U.S. government for the purpose of inflicting harm or death on proles, and if they do have that cash then they'd better be ready to pay for the privilege.

Comment Re:So there are contingencies for that (Score 1) 162

If a company in the United States collected and sold

But what if Flock buys the data and generates a proprietary score that gives people an idea of your financial means without divulging any of your actual financial details? I'm not saying that Flock does that, but it doesn't seem outside the realm of possibility.

Comment Ironic Donnie (Score 2) 139

One of the few things in which I agree with Trump is that I'd like more chips to be fabbed in the U.S., especially for national security reasons. However, imposing tariffs is only going to make that process more expensive and therefore even less likely. This is yet another case of this guy saying he wants a particular outcome and then doing everything in his power to make that outcome less likely.

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