Understanding President Trump’s new tariffs

“The operation is over! The patient lived, and is healing. The prognosis is that the patient will be far stronger, bigger, better, and more resilient than ever before.” That is how President Trump described the state of the economy and the nation in the wake of the unprecedented tariffs levied on more than 180 countries around the world late Wednesday afternoon. This is despite the stock market experiencing tremendous drops and losing roughly $2 trillion in value on Thursday. 

But while no one was really quite sure how much of a hit the market would take when the day began, Trump had been warning that there would be a painful adjustment period. He just also claimed—and continues to claim—that it will be worth it in the end. 

So what do the new tariffs mean and how is all of this likely to turn out? Let’s look at some of the essentials:

• Every country on the list will experience at least 10 percent tariffs, with some—such as China—climbing to five or six times that amount after the new levies are added to the old.
• While the tariffs are theoretically supposed to be reciprocal, many countries with whom we have a trade surplus are also being taxed by the tariffs.  
• The hope is that tariffs will bring businesses back to the United States so that they can produce their products without having to pay the tariffs while also forcing other nations to end what the president sees as predatory economics. 
• Trump claims that “The tariffs give us great power to negotiate,” indicating that he is open to possibly reducing the tax if other countries give “something that’s so phenomenal.” He named the potential sale of TikTok to an American company as one such example. 
• The amount each country will be taxed through the tariffs was determined by dividing the trade deficit by the amount of imports from those foreign nations, then dividing that number by two. Paolo Confino gives the example of the US having a trade deficit with the European Union of $245.6 billion. By contrast, we import a total of $605.8 billion worth of goods and services. The math gives you a 19.4 percent tariff rate, which was rounded up to 20 percent. 
• To further complicate matters, it appears that the Trump administration’s policy either originated with or is mirrored by the answer that most of the major AI chatbots will give when asked for “an easy way for the US to calculate tariffs that should be imposed on other countries to balance bilateral trade deficits between the US and each of its trading partners, with the goal of driving bilateral trade deficits to zero.” I tried that prompt with both Gemini and Grok and received the same answer. 

While the vast majority of economists agree that the tariffs will cause far more harm than good, most also agree that something needed to change. The president’s approach to global trade appears to mirror his approach to other aspects of governance as well, with unpredictability and chaos wielded as weapons to accomplish his goals. 

Now, the question is simple: Will it work? Unfortunately, despite what many have claimed, it’s far too soon to know the answer to that particular query.

The best take on tariffs

Isaac Saul from The Tangle gave one of the best descriptions I’ve found for Trump’s tariffs and their impact on the world when he wrote: 

Let me start with a bit of radical honesty: I have no idea what’s going to happen now. I’m not an economic journalist, an economist, a trade expert, nor a tariff expert, and our modern globalized world has never experienced any major power trying anything like this. So I just don’t know what is going to happen, and despite the confident predictions you may hear from some corners, I don’t think anyone does.

He went on to add:

Most of the economists I trust and follow (regardless of their political orientation) are absolutely, 100% sure that President Trump is in the process of making a massive, term-defining mistake. . . . But I’ve heard some pretty compelling arguments in the opposite direction from some serious economists. 

His entire piece on the tariffs is informative and helpful, and I appreciated the degree to which he was honest about the inherent unpredictability of a truly unique situation. The world has never seen a country be so bold—and, some would say, reckless—with its power in the global economy. Where we go from here is truly uncharted territory.

The EU and several others who have received higher-than-expected tariffs from the US have threatened to respond but, as of this writing, nothing has been finalized. Yet, despite the assurances of most economists that all of this will end in disaster, Trump seems unphased. Considering he’s held a consistent position on tariffs since the 1980s, perhaps that should be expected.  

And, as Saul pointed out, “If this ‘works’—which I think means re-shoring of manufacturing, market rally, more/better U.S. paying jobs, and more balanced trade deals—I’m not sure the ‘experts’ will ever be trusted again.” There’s an important lesson in that truth for each of us today that goes far beyond the economy.

Be good stewards of your witness

Of all the resources at our disposal, trust is perhaps the most fragile. Real trust—the kind that can help people believe or rely on what you say even when they’d rather you be wrong—takes a long time to build but can be lost in an instant. Oftentimes, it only takes a single crack in that foundation for everything built upon it to begin crumbling.

That basic reality is a big part of why God places so much emphasis on us being people whom others can trust. 

As Christians, we are asking the lost to bet their eternity on the idea that Jesus is God, that he came and died for their sins, and that he has been raised back to life again. Moreover, we’re also asking them to make a personal relationship with him the bedrock upon which every other part of their lives is built. Every hope and dream is to become secondary to following his will. 

That’s a lot to take on faith, and the dependability of the messenger will go a long way in determining just how tough it is to believe. 

Now, there’s more to faith than just trusting that what someone else said is true. There is solid evidence that Jesus is who the Bible says he is and that the rest of the claims about him are not only believable but more logical than the alternative. While faith is still a necessary step, God has gone to remarkable lengths to make it as simple and reasonable as possible to take that step. 

Still, the degree to which people can trust us when we tell them about Jesus is often tied to how well they trust us in the other parts of our lives. To the lost, we are the “experts,” and how we live each day will go a long way toward determining whether we will have the credibility and trust required to share the gospel well. 

What can you do to be worthy of such trust today?

Quote of the day:

“The weakness of the Church lies not in the lack of Christian arguments but in the lack of Christian lives.” —William Barclay

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