The Thinking ‘Kat: ‘Liberation Day’
Traditionally the 1st of April is April Fool’s Day, but you might be forgiven for believing the 2nd of April has claimed that mantle. The 2nd of April 2025 has been styled by Donald Trump as the USA’s ‘Liberation Day’, though precisely what Trump is liberating America from is unclear. If the goal is to liberate Americans from their money, and siphon it into the pockets of CEOs, executives and the rest of the 1%, then congratulations Donald, your liberation plan has succeeded. If the goal is to liberate the world from a reasonably stable global economy, then once again congratulations are in order. If the aim is to somehow create a prosperous America, then it appears Liberation Day is a spectacular failure.
The core of this is the tariff plan. In placing steep tariffs on countries around the world (including islands inhabited entirely by penguins, but curiously overlooking Russia), Trump is forcing up prices around the world, including for Americans. The importing nation pays the tariff, so if there’s a 35% tariff on TV parts, American businesses will pay this, and they will inevitably pass on their costs to the consumer. You can guarantee companies won’t increase wages, so everyone aside from some business owners, shareholders etc, will lose.
The stock markets have also crashed, wiping billions of dollars of value from global trade. Again, who/what is being liberated by this? But hey, eggs are a bit cheaper, right? And we know how egg prices are the defining article of economic performance…
In the long-term, it is possible that Trump’s tariffs will lead to more regional manufacturing, with all the benefits this permits. The problem is, this will require considerable investment from local companies, as building new factories is hardly a cheap process, and nor will it be a quick one. These companies will still face rising costs of materials to build their factories, and they will pass on all the costs of new manufacturing to the consumer.
The average American will not benefit from this supposed ‘liberation day’. Everyone’s costs will rise, and those costs will trickle down. It’s all well-and-good to hope for money to be raised by these tariffs, but does Trump seriously think the rest of the world will roll over as he destroys economic convention? He’s started a trade war, where the only winners are the people at the very top. But egg prices, right?
