That’s been the point all along… they are significantly raising taxes on the bottom 90% of Americans and most are too stupid to even understand it. Gotta pay for those tax cuts for the wealthy somehow.
This isn't some natural state that's unrecoverable. The people you describe have been given a highly addictive media environment tailor made to engender outrage and drive behavior. It shouldn't be a shock when most people cannot resist it. The first step to changing it is not writing them off or insulting them for being had.
No. Someone refusing to spend 30 seconds understanding how a tariff works is the result of an idiot. My 10 year old figured out how they work in under 5 minutes. There’s literally no excuse for a grown ass adult to refuse to educate themselves on the subject.
“This media environment” doesn’t prevent them from typing “how do tariffs work?” in their search engine of choice and reading the first result.
>Tariffs are taxes imposed by a government on imported goods, making them more expensive to encourage consumers to buy domestic products instead. The costs of these tariffs are typically passed on to consumers, resulting in higher prices for imported items.
I don't see any "college level vocabulary words" and it directly says that it makes goods more expensive and the costs are passed on to consumers. Maybe Google's complicated answer is part of the "media environment" being criticized.
Edit for the sarcastically challenged among us.
In simple terms, think of a tariff like a special tax a country puts on goods it buys from another country. Here's how it works: When a country wants to import something, like cars from Japan or clothes from China, it has to pay an extra fee (the tariff) to its own government before those goods can come into the country. This extra fee makes the imported goods more expensive than products made in the country itself. Why do governments do this? To protect local businesses: By making foreign products pricier, the government hopes people will choose to buy things made in their own country, helping local businesses grow and create jobs. To make money: Tariffs can also be a way for the government to collect some extra cash. To get other countries to change their ways: Sometimes, countries use tariffs as a way to pressure other nations to follow certain rules or to stop unfair trade practices. Example Imagine a bicycle store in the US wants to import a bicycle from another country that costs $1,000. If the US has an 11% tariff on bicycles, the store would have to pay an extra $110 (11% of $1,000) to the US government, making the total cost to bring the bike in $1,110. This makes bicycles made in the US seem more affordable by comparison.
For crying out loud, information is so accessible. The inability to find and discern at least some level of truth (or at least gather multiple contrasting perspectives) is laziness, AND stupidity.
I'm all for better schools, a better information ecosystem, and more tolerance, but why are we bending over backwards to tell malignantly underinformed people it's not their fault? It is! It is their fault.
People have much better things to do than look up words, look for dissenting opinions one something the face on their TV tells them. There's taking the kids to _______ practice. There's TV shows to keep up with. There's an infinite feed of content to scroll through. There's plenty of other things that they would prefer to do themselves than whatever it is you would prefer them to do. That does not qualify as stupid. To me, what is stupid, is everyone here calling others that have differing view points than their own stupid. You are willingly using that term in the same way you say they are willfully not looking things up.
I sure as hell can tell people not to have an opinion. That is my constitutional right. If someone has strong beliefs about something and votes accordingly, and they don’t put in the effort needed to find out the basic facts about the matter, then they are stupid and that’s bad.
I asked Google to "explain tariffs in simple terms" and it sure did. A sixth grader would easily get it. Here's the response (and now I'm wondering whether a GenAI system could create a short animated video or slide deck that could become a TikTok):
Tariffs in simple terms
A tariff is like a special tax that a country places on goods it buys from other countries.
Imagine this You're buying a toy made in another country.
The government of your country might add a tariff to that toy's price when it enters the country.
This makes the imported toy more expensive than a similar toy made in your own country.
The company importing the toy pays this tax to the government.
However, they might then pass some or all of that cost onto you, the customer, by raising the price of the toy.
Just want to point out that giving more money to an underperforming school only makes it worse.
Is there no circumstance where more funding would help an underperforming school? It certainly “can” make it worse in instances, but there are many reasons that a school might be underperforming. To imply that more resources would fail to help any of those problems is quite a leap.
What if the student-teacher ration is 40-1 and more funds allows for another teacher, might that make the school better?
What if the school is only open for 4 days due to low funding, might an additional day of school make it perform better?
What if a school has multiple disabled students slowing down the curriculum, but no funds to give them personal support, might more funds help it perform better?
I'm often reminded of a conversation my arrogant younger self had with an Englishman I was having a bit of back and forth banter about Yanks vs the sun setting on the English empire. I asked if the Empire was so great, why did all of the colonies end up revolting? His answer was simply, "we taught them how to read." Once the masses can read and think for themselves in an educated manner, they tend to no longer put up with being trodden over for much longer. So the answer is clearly simple to stop educating the masses.
There are a lot of high quality media sources out there that don't promote outrage.
In addition to being rude, its not a particularly clear word.
So I coined "idiodidact", to specifically describe people who have personal selectivity with regard to being teachable. (Greek/English usage: "idios"/personal choice + "didact"/taught)
Any resemblance, to any other word, would be a coincidence.
Two things can be true at once. Being force-fed bullshit doesn’t necessarily make somebody an idiot but it also doesn’t necessarily make them not an idiot.
Almost all of which correlate in some way to 'stupidity'.
I posit that your first line is wildly wrong, but your message is broadly valid.
I think you're being overly optimistic here.
True, but I'm not sure what that proves. Some people who have different points of view than I do have come to those points of view via reasonable means, and some of their PoVs might even be more consistent with reality than some of mine.
But some people are actually just stupid. Sometimes it's for understandable reasons, but sometimes it's for reasons that the GP laid out, and that's sad and unfortunate, and makes life difficult for the rest of us. I think there are a lot of people like this, and I'm afraid that public policy is in no small part driven by these people's susceptibility to propaganda, and their inability to think critically.
Basically when all or most of the facts are on your side, how do you balance the need to indulge stupid talking points and perspectives so that you can "reach" people, while also not inadvertently conceding ground in an attempt to meet a person where they are?
Ideally being informed would be both easier than it is today (less misleading crap, more trustworthy structure to think about what issues are relevant) while also being more rewarded somehow.
Imagine a demand and a supply curve. From the perspective of a producer outside the country the tariff effectively shifts the demand curve, but doesn't affect supply. That's going to lead to a lower price at equilibrium.
Of course, from the perspective of the consumer it's the opposite situation, the supply curve shifts which leads to a higher price at equilibrium.
Both happen simultaneously, who pays most of the tariff depends on the elasticity of the supply and the demand
For example, if there's a 35% tariff on a $100 item, the importer technically owes $135. But the exporter might lower their price, maybe selling it for $70 instead to help offset the tariff and keep the business deal going. In that case, the exporter is basically covering part of the cost. On the flip side, the importer might just raise the final price and make the customer pay more...or better yet, assume the cost due to intense local competition.
So even though the importer pays the duty upfront, who actually feels the cost depends on how the parties involved respond. That's why it makes more sense to say someone in the supply chain pays. It's not always the same person every time.
Please explain how members of a low-income household would rationally and knowingly advocate to eliminate the only access to healthcare they can afford.
Then, if you are able to present a coherent argument, try to explain that in a stupidity vs diverse point of view, this stance is indeed not founded on stupidity.
> loathe Obamacare and like the ACA
they were not arguing for or against obamacare, they were pointing out the laziness of people that don't realize that Obamacare _is_ the ACA, but somehow hate the former and love the latter.
How can we heal, change, and recover from this without reaching out and understanding their POV.
There is la video circulating of a business owner making fun of the Amazon concept of showing thd amount tariffs add to the final price to the consumer. This guy in this video says that number is going to be 0 on his website because his product and the stuff used to make it is "Made in America". The next video is literally him bitching about how some of the Made in America stuff he needs to make his product increased by a grand in just one month. And he like, "why in the fuck are these Made in America affected? Something's messed up here."
At the end of the day, this is a business owner who was aware that the biggest online retailer in America said tariffs are going to affect the price of products the American consumer buys. If this guy can't be bothered to dig a little deeper to save his business, it's hard to expect other people that are a couple degrees removed from the action to do so as well.
He never suggested that. You defended these voters by saying they gladly accept the propaganda information diet, not that they have well-reasoned differences of opinion.
All I'm saying is stop painting with a broad brush in that anyone voting for a party is stupid. I'll defend people voting for who they want or even voting against someone they don't want. To call them stupid is just stupid.
Still, arbitrary_name seems consistent about not judging people for ideological differences but rather for choosing not to be accurately informed. I.e. he is not saying "they're dumb because I don't agree with tariffs" he's saying "they're dumb because after Trump promised to make us rich with tariffs, they didn't bother to check how duties are collected." You seem to agree with this to an extent.
> All I'm saying is stop painting with a broad brush in that anyone voting for a party is stupid.
I mean, it's four broad brushes right? The dupes, the single-issue voters, the identity voters, and the ones who believe in whatever his policy happens to be. I don't think it's fair to say they fall into a single bin but they're not all snowflakes who cannot be characterized en masse.
> I'll defend people voting for who they want or even voting against someone they don't want.
Okay but what about the ones who vote for what they don't want. The ones who voted Trump to release the Epstein files. Or to balance the budget. Or to end the Ukraine war day one? They took a look at his first term, listened to his campaign promises, and decided, "surely he will deliver!"
Is it though? East Germany comes to mind as well as the rest of the Cold War countries behind the Iron Curtain. China seems to be pretty hostile as well. In the US, it is still much easier to find real information that counters the propaganda than it is in any of those other countries. There's no Great Firewall to bypass. You don't even need to do anything anonymously. Yes, the current administration is doing its damnedest to pull the wool over the eyes of their followers, but it's only effective for them. Nobody else is fooled nor stopping their publishing of the opposition to the propaganda.
Yet at the moment where there is still diversity, people can make the mistake of thinking that the propaganda is just a difference of opinion so perhaps trust it more.
There is also so much that's womderful and amazing and positive. No light w/out darkness, "no mud, no lotus", etc. -- which IMHO it's increasingly important to focus on, deliberately.
Psychology around ads and how to manipulate peoples thoughts were not nearly as well understood at the time. Large scale studies based on data collected of peoples behavior on computers has lead to dramatically better ability to manipulate and nudge people to do what you want.
The information environment was more oppressive there, but it was easier for people to have their own thoughts since the marketing was forced and blatant but way less manipulative and devious.
RFE/RL could broadcast whatever it wanted. If you received it and heard the contrary views from what official stance was, you can pretty much just accept it. You couldn't just go and search for more information in a browser/app. Seeing video of things just wasn't happening over the air on your wireless. You couldn't jump onto social platform of choice and see images in real time. Information is so freely flowing today it is a joke to compare the two.
>Typical American response confidently knowing literally nothing of what they speak of
Sadly, this reads from someone with a person grudge that has nothing to do with the conversation. If you honestly think there was more information freely available then as compared to know, you've just disillusioned yourself for whatever reason. Yes, there was resistance back during the Cold War. Fax machines FTW. That still just does not compare to how freely flowing information is today. To call today the "most information hostile environments in human history" is just nonsense. How can you even compare it?
> The idea that people in authoritarian countries are clueless about what’s really going on is arrogant and frankly ignorant.
You can't comment like this on Hacker News, no matter what you're replying to. The guidelines clearly ask us to avoid swipes and name-calling like this. If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
ONE of the most. That you can highlight a few others where things might have been worse doesn't negate that claim.
Also, acting self righteous while demanding decorum is rich considering how this admin promised to and followed through on completely dehumanizing huge swathes of people as its base cheers on. Please, display one ounce of good faith.
There are certain life skills that can be considered “smart” like revisiting your established opinions when presented with new information, or knowing that encountering a new piece of information from a single source doesn’t carry the weight of encountering it in dozens of places, or that making a mistake doesn’t guarantee that your existence is doomed but been presented with a learning experience.
The “stupid” folks refuse to take the simplest steps to better themselves. They refuse to self-evaluate honestly. That’s the root cause. This stupidness results in them being duped and misinformed.
Therefore, when one encounters an uninformed and duped person, it’s not out of line to consider that person “stupid”.
So when people like OP say that people are stupid, it’s not a dig via victim blaming. It’s a judgement that they’re clearly being stupid, that their poor life skills need work because they ended up misinformed.
I can think something is a good idea for any number of reasons, it can also still be stupid.
With tariffs, it's entirely possible that the loss of blue collar jobs due to offshoring more than offsets the cheap toys those folks get to import in exchange. Especially when the cost of housing, education, and medical care is rising regardless. It's not uncommon to hear labor leaders rail against NAFTA and be pro-tariff[1] for this reason.
[1] https://uaw.org/tariffs-mark-beginning-of-victory-for-autowo...
A concept of a plan, a verbal agreement, even just a phone call is better than a binding trade agreement that lasts 20y. Because the former provides what matters most: distraction from the things that will put Trump in jail and a feeling of power and importance.
People are incentivized to be intellectually lazy since there isn’t really any personal reward for making the effort (your vote is on the margins practically meaningless, even if you’re “right,” whatever that means).
But there is great reward for staying ignorant (dopamine hits from outrage media and camaraderie with the large plurality of similarly intellectually lazy people).
How do we make it so that having well reasoned opinions is actually rewarded commensurately?
Although I also take issue with labeling people "stupid," I also take issue with the blanket assumption that people are victims of the media environment. Both take away people's agency in their own way.
Instead, I'll ask this uncomfortable question. What if a good chunk of these people would prefer to believe a convenient lie over an inconvenient truth? If so, what does that say about them and their morals? Is that better or worse than being labeled stupid or a victim?
The truth? They do not care about basic right and wrong. They voted for a rapist, a felon, a vile insurrectionist. There’s no morality and we know this based on how they’ve voted.
But also the unwillingness by their friends and family to call them out promotes non-accountability. For everyone.
1/3 of the voting population elected a known criminal, known sex predator, suspected child rapist, and known economically illiterate imbecile. The information may be hostile but it was widely and easily available.
At least 1/3 of the US voting population are idiots. Obviously there is a subset of that voting base that made an intelligent decision knowingly and complicitly elected Trump despite the extremely serious red flags, but I would still consider them to be idiots.
Normalising this way of behaving means that yes, if you're in the group that benefits from today's decision you're ok, but nothing stops you from being in the out-group tomorrow. And if your goal is inflicting harm, well tomorrow that harm will be inflicted upon you.
How can so many be so gullible?
But also, they’re being misled. Most non-Trumpers coddle, forgive in advance, and invite Trumper friends and family to the usual social functions. This is permission. It’s helping everyone normalize the depravity.
In a very real way there’s no conversation happening because one party has removed themselves from rationality and the other party has broadcast they don’t care.
There will need to be enormous amounts of pain to get either party to snap out of it.
yeah, it sucks that I can’t buy a JetKVM right now. otoh being dependent on (often) adversarial nations for everything we buy is also not ideal.
Like, assemble domestically? Or actually source 100% of the parts, supplies, building materials, machinery, etc domestically?
So basically the US government was able to take a slice of the profit from everyone but the consumer.
Seems pretty smart to me?
Whoever has the greater elasticity doesn't pay much of the tax.
In most markets, long run elasticity of supply is very, very, very high. So that means demand side (consumers) end up paying the tax.
But short term elasticity of supply can be low-- dominated by capital costs and inventory.
The other effect is to reduce international trade and the kind of national interdependency that creates, and so makes, large scale war highly unlikely.
The US is also trying to use it's economic power to force people to choose sides ( cf secondary sanctions on India ).
So while Trump might be anti-forever wars he is busy creating a world where WWIII is much more likely.