Trump Hands Americans Yet Another Tax Hike

Oh, he pretends it isn't a tax increase on us, mind you. It's on those pesky furriners, in this case, them there Chinese:

The Trump administration on Tuesday announced a package of tariffs targeting Chinese exports valued roughly at $200 billion.

A senior administration official called the package about equal to China's total export value with the United States, CNBC reported.

...

The list of goods targeted by the tariffs has not been made public or approved yet, but the official cited by CNBC said that parts of it target the country's 'Made in China 2025' initiative to boost key industries such as technology.

Who pays tariffs? The buyers of the goods the tariffs are levied on. Also known as "you and me." Chinese manufacturers will presumably be able to sell less stuff to us because it will cost more, but it's American consumers who will pay those higher prices.

I don't like anything governments do, but if I ran China, I'd do two things:

First, announce an end to all tariffs on American imports.

Second, announce a complete embargo on Chinese exports to the US, effective immediately. Those container ships waiting to leave Shanghai packed full of iPhones, Lenovo computers, 99 cent flip-flops, and weird shit ("Free! Just Pay Shipping!") from Wish.com? Drop anchor, boys, you're going nowhere for now.

The latter would hurt, but it would probably only hurt for a couple of weeks before Americans grabbed their last remaining (Chinese-made) tiki torches and cheap (Chinese-made) pitchforks and descended on Washington to put the fear of God into Donald J. "The Tax Man" Trump.