(06-09-2024, 09:04 AM)The Real Marty Wrote:

(06-08-2024, 04:53 PM)mikesez Wrote: It doesn't surprise me that you don't understand opportunity cost.  Our workers can work on other things if China wants to sell lithium cheap.  Plus we will have a bunch of batteries we didn't have before, they will probably make our economy more efficient overall.

I'm not opposed to fracking and I'm not opposed to extracting lithium from frack-water.  But I don't want to subsidize it either.

 People don't want to subsidize businesses, which is understandable, but they want to put tariffs on Chinese imports.  It's the same thing.  A tariff on foreign products is a subsidy for domestic businesses.

"Same thing" is a stretch.  Tariffs allow consumers to still make their own decision but obviously price encourages them in a particular direction.  Subsidies often prop up bad ideas or bad business models for political or ideological reasons.

Tariffs are not a bad idea when the playing field isn't level.  The playing field isn't level when the cost of labor in China is kept artificially low.  The US has the most attractive economy in the world to do business in.  We shouldn't be giving unfriendly regimes unfettered access to it which by extension allows them to enrich themselves with which to metaphorically throw their weight around in opposition to us later.

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