The goal of Republican policy is to make the wealthy & powerful, more wealthy & powerful. As we see here, small companies can't deal with the tariff complexity, and so they turn away American customers. Large companies can handle the complexity, both by having compliance employees and lawyers who can cover over mistakes. So, Americans must do their business with the only remaining suppliers, which are the large companies who can now charge higher prices due to less competition.

The mega-wealthy individuals will not suffer from any economic downturn, so it doesn't matter if their policies harm the economy.

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jordanpg 2 days ago | parent [-]

Maybe, except that doesn't explain the deliberate kneecapping of R&D, health, and academia.

I'm pretty sure that if the curtains are pulled to the side, the people who are behind these policies are not seeking wealth and power. They are instead religious zealots seeking transformation.

	▲	coldpie 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		> that doesn't explain the deliberate kneecapping of R&D, health, and academia I think it does, those are all efforts to destroy trust in qualified experts. It's impossible for everyone to understand everything, so we have to trust experts. But the experts correctly point out that Republican policies are actually harmful to their own voters. So, Republican media bought into a ton of conspiracy theories, which are centered around exploiting difficult-to-understand systems and promoting "do your own research" type conspiratorial thinking. Once your voters no longer trust the experts, you can sell them anything you want, namely policies that move wealth from the poor to the wealthy.