Are the tariffs designed to help out russia?

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
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Consider the following questions:

1. What has happened with Trump’s 1st term tariffs?
Trump enacted some tariffs 8 years ago, mostly against China. In the end they didn’t work, because China shipped their goods through other countries like Vietnam. They paid Vietnam a little fee to re-label the goods and then they could be shipped to US bypassing Trump’s tariffs

2. Why were the current tariffs calculated like that?
This time, there is a formula to Trump’s tariffs: trade deficit divided by trade volume multiplied by 100. A lot of media covered it.
To me, the messaging of this formula is very clear: you can’t bypass these tariffs. If you try to send your goods through penguin islands, we will just recalculate the formula for those and tariff your goods anyway.

3. Why no tariff on Russia?
So that now there is only one way to ship goods to the states tariff-free (or at least with low tariffs): Russia. This setup is designed to make companies want to work with Russia again. Maybe there’s no chance for German companies to do that, but how about the Indian ones? Vietnamese? Brazilian? And when all of these get the upper hand on the US market, maybe the German ones will exert a lot of pressure on their government to do so too!

4. Why does Trump not post any demands to countries?
Because there is nothing to negotiate. These tariffs will only help Putin if they cannot be negotiated.

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Yes, but what does Russia export? Vodka, caviar, and furs like sabil.

When was the last time you say a Russian car on the street?

They have a terrible reputation for quality. Hence traditionally they sell commodities like oil, natural gas, and gold. We have them embargoed. How do you collect tariffs?

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No.

20 times ‘No.’

The Captain

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Russia was not included in Trump’s new tariffs list, with the White House citing that sanctions already preclude meaningful trade.

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The lack of any trade at all didn’t stop him from putting a tariff on some uninhabited islands.

–Peter

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We sell to Russia about $500 million in whatever each year. We buy from Russia about $3 billion in stuff each year. That is much more than happens with those uninhabited islands full of Penguins that are somehow on the list.

In fact, here are the countries with smaller trade deficits which did manage to climb onto the list:

  • Algeria,
  • Nigeria,
  • Nicaragua,
  • Venezuela,
  • Norway,
  • Sri Lanka, and close by a whisker:
  • Pakistan.
According to the Office of the US Trade Representative, trade between the US and Russia was worth $3.5bn (£2.7bn) in 2024. It mainly consisted of fertilisers, nuclear fuel and some metals, according to Trading Economics and Russian media.

You continue to defend the indefensible.

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