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We could do with fewer items --though items of higher quality and usefulness. Conspicuous consumerism is on a downward path, I hope.
First we argue that tariffs will bear no harm for the American people and when people plainly see prices going we change tack and argue that Americans not only should bear the pain of the tariffs in order to achieve the largely entirely imaginary gains but that they can do so merely by sacrificing unnecessary luxury.
The problem is that each economic segment of society lives a live entirely different from the ones above it and the bottom half shall not be sacrificing luxuries and the US shall not be stronger for it.
Importing cheap clothing allows people to have 30 shirts in their closet; however, on the flipside, people working as seamsters and seamstresses lose their jobs. That can mean taking lesser jobs at lesser pay and fewer benefits or leaving the labor market altogether. Underemployed or unemployed people get subsidized and that requires taxes. So the money we saved that allow us to buy cheap clothing also comes with paying more taxes. We'd have a better society with gainfully employed people while wearing more durable clothing with less impact on the environment.
If it costs $5 for cheap insert country here and $10 for cheap American crap worse than the 5 then 8 for cheap stuff in some other poor country with a better trade deal and $20 for good American stuff almost none of your market moves to the 20 stuff and almost all of it shifts to the $8
The government already has its hand on thousands of levers that control our lives. I agree with many and disagree with some. That's life in a republic.
Who needs 4 tires, 3 are enough.
That attitude is even worse coming from a billionaire