Albanese is stating However, the exports of those two metals to the US make up a miniscule fraction of Australia's total trade output – "less than 0.2 per cent of the total value of our exports," Albanese noted – so it's unlikely to have a significant impact on the overall economy. Who believes we should play dead ? I for one will avoid ANYTHING that is brought in from America. Trumps tariff is a spit in the face given we buy more from America. Anyone know what's Dutton's view on the subs ? I would cancel the order.
When you buy a car from the USA you pay "luxury car tax". What is it's purpose? Yet, when Australian Holdens were sold in the USA, no such tax was charged. LCT is a tariff, with a tricky name, so that we can pretend we're adhering to the free trade agreement we signed with the US. There are thousands of examples like this, used by hundreds of countries in order to make their imports from the US more expensive for local consumers whilst avoiding tariffs in the other direction. Trump is on a mission to clean it up.
LCT is only applicable when over the threshold. LCT is not a tariff , If a FN BS tax. Luxury being the key word. No luxury tax on a 10 million dollar ring , house , boat or what ever only cars. So its here for ever until some politician commits to remove it as a election promise. American make cars so cars imported to them SHOULD have a tariff to protect their manufacturing , i.e the real reason for a Tariff. Free trade is trading with no tariffs. Trump is FU . clean up what ? We buy more from the States than what they buy of us. Do we sell them cars ? Do we buy cars of them , yes . Treating us like **** WTF should be continue especially with a spiraling price ? Tell me if all the Ferrari orders here or in the states would still go ahead with a 25% tariff increase ? We are buying their cars. See how that pans out if we get 25% tariff on that then add the LCT and stamp duty. You would be a moron to pay what the figure would be. Our car prices are about parr based on anything under the LCT and with AUD conversion.
You're missing my point and swearing doesn't make your arguments stronger. Free trade agreements are signed in a fanfare of media, then Treasury bureaucrats immediately go to work to circumvent them. Our weasel politicians won't admit the truth, they're happy to play the victim and have punters blame Trump. Let me give you another example. Australia (and the UK, France, Germany, etc) pay their technology companies an "R&D incentive" to make software locally. There is no such incentive in the US. This is a reverse tariff. We get 40% of salary costs returned by the govt, then sell our software in the USA, comfortably undercutting US competitors (salaries are very similar when currency adjusted). Australian taxpayers pay $14.4Billion per year for this subsidy, which is widely abused and, in my direct experience, has done nothing to increase tech exports - our productivity is nowhere compared to the US tech industry. The international trading system is a gordian knot of conflicting rules and nightmare bureaucracy. The only winners are the public servants who administer the morass. Meanwhile the west is slowly sinking in a pit of declining living standards. Trump is the only politician prepared to tell the truth about bogus free trade.
You forget 'tariffs' are directed are directed at a country; LCT is not - it is payable on value, not origin. LCT applies whether there is a tariff applied to Australia or not (and the LCT would apply to the higher price due to the tariff - blame Trump!). Trump is not 'on a mission to clean it up'; he is simply lining the US government coffers with money PAID BY HIS OWN CITIZENS! Anyway, who wants an F150, current Corvette, Mustang or Jeep anyway! (and most of the Mustang and Jeep fall below current LCT levels anyway)
Steve - dismissing anyone who disagrees with you as a 'Lefty' is not helpful., At that rate you'll start screaming 'Fake News' shortly... I don't consider myself a 'lefty' - I've never voted for a left wing party in my life. I just dislike greed, corruption, nepotism and incompetence and that is not an exclusively left wing or ring wing issue. We all have different knowledge, perspectives and opinions and that's part of life. If you instinctively dismiss anyone else's opinions or views, then you are no better than Trump and his cohorts. I agree with some of your points and disagree with others, but hey ho - that's life and we are all (hopefully) grown up enough to talk about it rationally. Trump and his cohorts are basically running a 'pump and dump' scheme on the US economy and he and a select group of billionaires will by up stocks cheap as the market tumbles and come out of it smiling when things recover - on the backs of lots of poor and sooner to be poorer Americans and to the lesser extent the rest of us. Just look at history and how the Republican party has presided over 10 of the last 11 US recessions and who benefited. See 2020 for recent times (under Trump) and how the net worth of a select few increased dramatically. Now with Ukraine, if he can get Russia to the table, good on him. I seriously doubt if he can make anything happen that Putin will stick to - that's not Putin's nature unfortunately, but if there is a positive move, then that is good for most of us. You never know, he could go for the ultimate land deal and take over Russia and really have a lot of money and resources to play with then - much more than he could ever get out of Ukraine...
I think Putin knows that if there is a ceasefire then NATO plus some other countries will send in ground forces to sure up the perimeters and expose Russia to the full might of NATO if they start killing those ground forces, so Putin will not agree to that So it will be time for Trump to put his big boy pants on and sabre rattle Putin
Agree to disagree. I buy from Taiwan 5% duty. I buy from China ZERO % LCT is an Australian tax to get revenue. Tariffs are to protect local manufacture. Its being used by Trump to bully. No the only winner to Trumps tariffs is Trump himself. Americans will pay.
Imagine in Trump would put a Tariff of 25% on American cars ! Wow. Frankly don't care if he put any Tariff on Australia as I wouldn't buy it. I wouldn't respond with Tariffs either as no one wins in a tariff war. We should just look for new buyers of our goods.
I'm waiting for the inevitable murder of Musk or Trump 400+ million guns plus mentally ill people, one of them will get pissed off
Mate the food he eats will get him before anything else: "Synopsis Donald Trump continues to enjoy a diet heavy on fast food, including burgers, fried chicken, and Diet Coke. His love for these foods is part of his public persona. While he claims good health and high energy levels, medical professionals are concerned about his diet and lack of exercise affecting his stamina."
The only people pissed off are far left loonies. You know, the same people who preach peace, love, tolerance, respect, and understanding. Just like the peaceful BLM riots...
You're as mad as a meat axe Who started the Ukraine war ? Who has sided with Russia and North Korea? Who ate all those pets ? Trump is a fwit in Putin's back pocket Canada is the US's enemy ? Europe is the US's enemy ? I must be living in an alternate universe
Well, you are in Queensland. Stop leaping to conclusions. There is a very long way to go in all of this. I don’t know if what Trump is doing will work or not. No one does. What I do know is that what was being done up until now wasn’t working. No real progress was being made in Ukraine or the Middle East. Something needed to change. By any measure of actual results (instead of emotions) things are no worse now than they were six months ago - in fact they are better. Let’s wait and see how it all pans out.
And stop this stupid leftie crap This left and right **** is divisive and I got sucked into it but no more, neither the the left or right have a monopoly on good or bad ideas People with a brain (even some Republicans) can see Trump is a loose cannon causing grief across the world America wants to be isolated ? ,fine **** off and we can cancel the $700m+ for aircraft and $360B for the subs that will never turn up and the $3B for another 25 F35s It's not a one way street dealing with this MAGA child
It’s funny how on the one hand some people (note how I didn’t say “lefties”. No need. We all know who they are) endlessly bang on about how the US imposes itself on everyone as the world police and they should butt out and leave everyone alone, but as soon a democratically elected President comes along and says “Fine. Up to you now. Off you go” it’s all wailing and gnashing of teeth about how could they do that? Isolationism blah blah. Make up your mind. Funny how all of a sudden Europe and others have decided to step up to the plate. Why is that, I wonder? Our defence spending? Pfffft. Means nothing to the US. Our location on the map, however? Very important. That’s why we have their support. And thank God we do. Because we couldn’t defend ourselves from a nutter with a pop-gun without their help. Successive governments on both sides have let us down badly in that regard.
The "world police" were quite happy to throw the big stick around but now they want the protected to pay. This happened in Australia back when that prick Howard was in power. He held East Timor to ransom for protection until they signed over the oil fields between Australia and Timor so they did and then the military were sent The Ukraine situation is the same, sign over your minerals and we'll protect you You have to remember that Clinton encouraged Ukraine to get rid of the nearly 2000 nukes they had which has now left them exposed Trump can't even sabre rattle towards Putin The smart thing to do is keep rearming Ukraine and weaken Russia without putting any US military in harm's way and when Putin moves back NATO can strengthen the borders This war is about right and wrong not left/right ideology Our defence force is currently ranked at 18 so we're not defenceless but we should definitely aim higher And yes, I agree, Trump has woken up Europe to being able to pull their weight so score one for him but it is morally wrong to withdraw support for a country because you want their resources
I don’t disagree with some of what you said, except the anti Howard BS. I won’t have that. If only we had another Howard, we’d be a lot better off. Frankly he could come back tomorrow and we’d be better off. The only thing he did I don’t agree with was to turbocharge the middle class welfare which is now out of control. That’s a controversial topic. Probably even more so than Trump. Again: why panic now? It’s early days. Instead of going off like a 13 year old in a massage parlour why don’t we wait and see what actually happens? Nothing of any significance has happened yet. The only difference is that some countries have been made to wake up.
