If the target, set by the government, is to be protectionist, then EVERYTHING in terms of investment needs to be canceled, because it does't make sense to invest when the internal market is going to be controlled by means of tariffs.
Given the chaos, how does any industry make long term investments any more? All financial plans could be flipped upside down for any reason at any time.
I've heard the most prosperous times for the US are when the president's party is different from the congressional majority. Few laws get passed, so things stay stable for businesses.
No, the issue is half of Americans and American states are still into Red-state zero-sum policies which don't work very well in a modern world and modern economy. Today you want the black/female/trans/foreigner working at their absolute full potential, not slaving in your farm.
In the past it didn't matter so much economically because slaving in your farm was still one of the most important jobs. In 1900, ~40% of the American workforce was employed in agriculture. Yet even then the (ex) slave states were poor compared to northern states because they didn’t know how to invest in their population (still don’t).
You can make investments if you have a long term outlook. Odds are the president will be different in 4 years. Odds are the democrats take the house in 2 years (there is a small chance they take the senate too, though that seems unlikely). There is a 25% change Trump isn't even alive in 4 years just because of age, and the farther beyond that you look the less likely it is he lives.
Which is to say you have to invest for something knowing things will change and not knowing how. As always. This might even be a good time to invest if you have cash - prices are down and interest rates are up.
Democrats can't unring this bell. Decades of trust are irrevocably lost.
Ordinarily, I'd say you're right about investment. Long term, the market goes up. Trying to time the market isn't very effective; you might as well invest cash now.
These circumstances aren't ordinary. This is potentially a decade-long depression. I really hate saying that; "this time it's different" always sound stupid. But every nation on earth has just looked at the US and said, "Maybe not", and that's really unprecedented.
I'm not pulling out of the market myself, so you have to take everything with a grain of salt. Without more information, I don't know what to do, so I'm sticking with inertia, and hoping I'm wrong about the magnitude of the potential cataclysm.
Yet he's already changed the amounts and/or start dates how many times in just a couple of months? It will continue like that because chaos is the nature of his whim-driven presidency.
Further, he won't be in power long enough to ensure nothing changes for 40 years – US trade policy isn't read-only form here on out. Painful tariffs might not even survive until the midterms next year, if Congresspeople start fretting about keeping their jobs.
> But even before President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs on imports, many of those projects were being canceled — leaving thousands of jobs and the shift to clean energy in doubt.
Sure, his energy policy was predictable too, but you'd have needed to predict the election results too to act on them. Who knows that'll happen in 4 years, will it be more of this or will we see EV subsidies returned? That's the part that's hardest to predict.
What isn't predictable is how long things will last. Many in congress are for free trade and have the ability to stop tariffs in various ways. (tariffs fall under some emergency ruling not a low passed by congress as the constitution requires). There is likely to be more elections in the future with different people in charge with different intents. The question is will the next people in charge also keep tariffs high.
What's worse is lets say it takes you 3-4 years to get your factory online. A new admin comes in and rescinds all the tariffs. Now your new factory and all it's debt need to compete with the pre-tariff prices.
Many people online are saying (or trying to convince themselves) that the tariffs are part of some smart negotiating strategy, and that they will be rescinded once other countries feel the pain (or when citizens revolt). So large companies will hold out on doing any major investment, lest they be holding the bag.
The administration's general instability and flip-floppiness makes it impossible to make any long-term business decisions. Having a leader who can't be trusted to change their mind on a moment's notice does damage regardless of the policies.
Maybe crashing the stock market really is part of the plan, i mean if you arent investing maybe you should use that money to open a factory? I hear AI will do all the labor for you and that will "only get better (TM)"
Although all those nvidia racks apparently use more power than any datacenter in the world has ever deployed in the past... so i hope you know how to run your own power plant onsite too
Oops you also need to install prison level security around all your buildings and homes because the entire population wants your blood, thats ok its an excuse to diversify into weaponized drone manufacturing and local deployment which is another big business opportunity. Wow so many opportunities for rich people!
An awful lot of business decisions depend on the expected price of the materials and equipment your business needs, and/or what market price you can expect to be able to charge for whatever it is you plan to sell. Tariffs this sweeping will make both of those things much harder to predict for almost every business in the country soon.
The federal government does a lot more than dictate tariffs. There's immigration, monetary policy, war spending, etc. And Trump is not afraid to bully governors, so state policies will also be affected.
That's quite likely to happen given how American politics tend to go left to right then back almost every election. I suppose some companies (but not all) will prefer to lose some money now rather than to take the risk of investing in large factories in the USA and lose whole factories, along with all money they invested into it, later.
The tariffs are going to be used as leverage in negotiations in the following months. If countries sign on to trump's new trade agreements, it likely won't make sense to rescind them.
Stephan Miran, Trumps top economic advisor, laid out exactly what they are doing in an essay he wrote back in November[1]. For better or worse, this is what they seem to be moving forward with, and the document spells out things like unilateral tariffs and expecting a lot of potential market volatility, before offering trade terms that seek to devalue the USD in return for protection and favorable trade agreements.
In short, they are trying to force a global trade restructuring that will increase US manufacturing strength and weaken US financial strength - all while trying to keep reserve currency status.
This isn't 4d chess. The first trading partners he threatened were Canada and Mexico, who we set up a trading agreement with in his last presidency and declared it the best trade agreements ever.
Sorry, but let's be clear about something. Capital has an overwhelming say in the direction of the American government. If they want to push us in a direction, they can simply buy that direction.
They bought this one, and now they are crying about it.
So the answer to your question is: go invest in a congress person. Buy stability. Or else remain flexible, don't invest, go out of business, whatever.
I think what they mean is: these plans were made in another time so they might harm the company financially (or be extremely lopsided) given the "new mandate" (may change again too) from the Trump admin.
Just a measure to take a step back and assess the whole picture I'm assuming.
