Article

2019-09-04 Economy

[Dallas News] Businesses say Trump's China tariffs on apparel, other Christmas presents ignore realities
"And now, a word from your Chamber of Commerce 'Sky is Falling' Media Division"
Ed V. has been trying for three months to hire someone in Dallas who can sew, just one person. He’s not trying to find skilled seamstresses for a whole factory.

"I have one lady who is retiring and another one who would, but I can’t find anyone to fill their jobs," the CEO of a Dallas-based women’s apparel company said.

"We now have had two generations in the U.S. who don’t know how to sew," he said.
Hmmmmm.... Interesting. I wonder if that has anything to do with the fact that China has loads of people who know how to sew?

President Donald Trump's trade war with China, including the latest round of taxes imposed on U.S. companies Sunday, has created uncertainty for suppliers of apparel, shoes, accessories, sporting goods and smartwatches ‐ all things people buy as gifts during the Christmas season.
Unless ... maybe they bought American goods? Swiss watches? Belgian chocolate? Japanese radios? German tools?
With Sunday’s new tariffs, 69% of the consumer goods Americans buy from China will face Trump’s import taxes, up from 29% last week.
I wonder if the ChiComs are feeling the heat yet. [rhetorical question]
Tariffs on another batch of Chinese products go into effect Dec. 15. By then, 99% of the products Americans buy from China will be taxed, according to the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Farmers are receiving subsidies from the federal government for their lost business, but there’s no assistance to U.S. retailers, apparel makers and shoe and luggage companies that are paying more for goods.
Interesting news. The Feds are easing the pain? I thought the farmers were all destitute and desperate. Or maybe the retailers are fishing for a subsidy?
In less than two years, Bown said, Trump will have increased the average tariff on Chinese imports from 3% in 2017 to more than 24%. The Chinese have devalued their currency, which has the impact of lowering prices some, but not enough to erase the tariffs.
Devaluing their currency also raises the value of the dollar, amirite, making American imports more expensive. Very clever, these Chinese!
Some estimates put the cost of tariffs to an average U.S. household as much as $1,000 a year. That’s on the high end of most Americans’ holiday spending budgets. Consumers have led the U.S. economic expansion in recent months as corporate spending has waned. Americans are worried about tariffs, according to a new report released Tuesday by Coresight Research:

• Almost 60% of holiday shoppers are concerned about tariffs causing prices to rise on holiday gifts.

• The majority of shoppers will not increase spending to absorb any price hikes. Only 16% said they would spend more than they planned.
That's what they say. In four months, we'll know for sure.
• Others said they will buy fewer items (25.5%), switch to cheaper retailers (22%)
or buy cheaper products (22%).
I wonder if "Buy American" was one of the options on the survey?
The timing is bad for many retailers that were already struggling with issues such as leveraged buyout debt and the higher costs of running tandem store and online businesses.
Next administration would be better. Not Trump II, but the one after that.

Macy's said it tried to pass along increases in housewares, luggage and furniture this year but its customers balked. Target told suppliers it will not accept any cost increases related to the tariffs.
Fewer products on the shelves, I suppose.
Plano-based J.C. Penney said in a letter to the Office of U.S. Trade Representative in June that driving up costs will hurt Penney's core customer, middle-class working women.

"The disproportionate impact of the proposed List 4 tariffs on women is striking," Penney said in the letter.
The journalist or JCP did not provide any examples of this dire impact on middle-class working women, some of whom were unemployed three Christmases ago.
Tuesday will be the first day U.S. companies pay the new tariffs. As soon as buyers take delivery, the shippers will pay the extra tariff when goods are released and the accounts of U.S. brands and retailers will be automatically charged for it. The money goes straight to the U.S. Treasury.
Excellent! Reducing the deficit, or eliminating the need for new taxes! Every cloud has a silver lining!
"The apparel industry has always been tough. It’s difficult enough in normal times because nobody really needs clothes, they go out and buy some when they feel good and cut back when they’re nervous," Ed V. said. "But it’s really difficult when someone takes control of your business."
You want to talk taking control of your business? Talk to Bernie or AOC. They can help you out. Otherwise, you're worrying about an unplanned expense all of your competition will endure as well.

Posted by Bobby 2019-09-04 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11135 views ] Top

#1 Verging on Bee-style satire.

Are these morons seriously arguing that Americans can't cobble and stitch and weld and bolt and, you know, make stuff?

Or that we have a shortage of people willing to work for a living? Really?

Stop importing illiterate peasants from Central America and the fourth-world parts of Mexico.

Start training Americans to do skilled jobs, and pay them a living wage.

And cease with your f---ing lies and fairytales about how "we need" illegals' shit labor for shit wages.

Posted by Lex 2019-09-04 02:10|| 2019-09-04 02:10|| Front Page Top

#2 If a skilled labour deficit is really the case, it's even better news. More trade-school applications than college loans. More American workers top to bottom. More jobs and less activism. The wins should just keep adding from there.

Until the left strikes with unionism ! But blow that bridge when you get to it.

Posted by Dron66046 2019-09-04 04:08|| 2019-09-04 04:08|| Front Page Top

#3 ^LOL

Posted by g(r)omgoru PB 2019-09-04 05:11|| 2019-09-04 05:11|| Front Page Top

#4 More trade-school applications than college loans.

Times 10, please.

My now 32 year old son, the baby, got a small scholarship to Emerson College from our local auto dealer because it was the closest thing to a trade school that they could find.

Posted by AlanC 2019-09-04 08:01|| 2019-09-04 08:01|| Front Page Top

#5 "We now have had two generations in the U.S. who don’t know how to sew," he said. BS. Nearly every woman of age who has arrived in the United States from Central America knows how to sew.

Posted by Chereting Pelosi1889 2019-09-04 08:12|| 2019-09-04 08:12|| Front Page Top

#6 Toys r Us hit hardest. Oh, wait, never mind.

Posted by Procopius2k 2019-09-04 09:00|| 2019-09-04 09:00|| Front Page Top

#7 The cosmic-level chutzpah is amazing when you see a seamless pivot from sneering at "underbred 'Deplorables' shopping cheap Chineses knock-offs at WalMart" to "Gracious! Tommy won't get his ~~Christmas~~ 'Holiday Season' plastic truck!!!11!!!"

Posted by magpie 2019-09-04 10:15|| 2019-09-04 10:15|| Front Page Top

#8 Maybe we should take the hint as a country to quit buying great quantities of $h!t every December and calling it Christmas.

Posted by Alaska Paul 2019-09-04 12:59|| 2019-09-04 12:59|| Front Page Top

#9 It is disgusting the way the department stores and other retailers have hijacked and perverted Christmas. And, for the past several years, the Chicoms have hitched a ride on Santa's sleigh. It's time to kick 'em off.

Posted by Abu Uluque 2019-09-04 15:04|| 2019-09-04 15:04|| Front Page Top

#10 First of all, Christmas sales should be much smaller. It is a ridiculous, disgusting trend that encourages people to spend six months of their annual income in a single month (hopefully with credit cards from various stores).

Second of all, I'm sure it would be much worse for Christmas sales if the American workforce had lower wages and lower employment levels.

Third and finally, addressing the issue of sewing, there are plenty of people who can sew. A number of my middle class friends can sew (perhaps not well enough to be a seamstress, but they can still sew). But they aren't going to do it for a living because they have much better jobs already. I have a sneaking suspicion that businesses who say "I can't find anybody to hire" almost always mean "I can't find anybody to hire at the poor wages/inadequate benefits I plan on offering them".

Posted by Vernal Hatrick 2019-09-04 15:45|| 2019-09-04 15:45|| Front Page Top

#11 If a job has been open for three months in an area the size of greater Dallas, it is the employer's fault, not the labor pool's.

Posted by Vernal Hatrick 2019-09-04 15:46|| 2019-09-04 15:46|| Front Page Top

#12 What Au said.

The irony that a country which demolishes churches and jails christians sells the most christmas merchandise is lost upon the 'christian' world.

Not that Christ is bothered in the least.

Posted by Dron66046 2019-09-04 16:10|| 2019-09-04 16:10|| Front Page Top

#13 Nohz not da cheep dizzy knee noise makers!

Who will irradiate muh girlz jewelry?

Posted by swksvolFF 2019-09-04 16:35|| 2019-09-04 16:35|| Front Page Top

#14 I have to throw the bullshit flag on that one. Lots of sewing machines still being sold.
I know a little store in Indiana that has several seamstresses to make their custom historical clothes and they have to keep expanding and hiring more to fill demand.
There are lots of 3rd world people already here that can sew just fine.
Sewing isn't that fucking hard. Just takes practice.

Posted by DarthVader 2019-09-04 17:32|| 2019-09-04 17:32|| Front Page Top

#15 ..used to be part of Home Economics in junior high school (and the boys got shop). Not aligned with the college track installed by, guess who?, the College of Education at most universities. So guess what's been cut. /rhet question

Posted by Procopius2k 2019-09-04 20:35|| 2019-09-04 20:35|| Front Page Top

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