Trump wants Congress to enact border taxes (tariffs) on imports and tax breaks on exports. In other words, he wants to create a recession and be a one-term president. Those of us who import our electronics from overseas and our fruits and vegetables from Mexico and our clothing from overseas are going to rebel against import taxes.
I’m an importer of many products. My remote control on an older Pioneer dvd player completely failed. There is no American seller of this replacement part at anything approaching a reasonable price. A used one is $25 including shipping. However, on e-bay I found a Chinese shipper with a high rating and favorable comments with a new device for less than $10, including shipping. It took 12 days to arrive, and it’s perfect. If Trump Tariffs raise import prices like these, consumers of imported products like this are going to lose.
By the way, the package weighed 5.3 ounces. If I ship this weight overseas to China via a U.S. shipper like UPS, the quoted cost is about $100. I’m serious. The USPS quote is around $60. Try sending a single dvd to Canada and you’ll find the USPS charge is around $10, even if the distance is less than 50 miles. Small shippers in the U.S. cannot generate foreign sales with rates like these. Large shippers who use air and sea freight alternatives face far, far lower costs. But small shippers in other countries, as in this China example, face much lower rates from their postal services than Americans face from theirs.
Addendum: The package used China Post and an ePacket. The latter is a USPS device. It reflects an agreement: “ePacket delivery is an agreement between the US Postal Service and the Hongkong Post to boost growth in eCommerce.”
2:13 pm on March 27, 2017
