A repeat of the great depression is imminent
Political and Economic opinion of mine
Foreword
President Donald Trump is repeating the exact footsteps of the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 that worsened the great depression to a new low, except the fact that Senator Smoot and Senator Hawley had good intentions, Trump doesn’t seem to have a good reason for attempting his tariffs, he inherited a good economy from President Biden, a significantly better economy than the one he left for Biden in 2021.12
The Smoot-Hawley act was an attempt to get America out of a terrible economic crisis, which America is currently not in. Although the attempt worsened The Great Depression, it was a valid attempt, although in retrospect not a great one. But we must remember that everything is “obvious” in retrospect. In the moment the decision is not so easy without knowing all future facts.
The issue at hand
Quote, directly from the whitehouse.gov website:
Obtained from whitehouse.gov 02.02.2025 05:25AM CET
These tariffs are additional tariffs, meaning they are additive on top of already existing tariffs.
Canada has already responded with equal force, as announced by Trudeau mere hours ago:
Obtained from nbcnews.com 02.02.2025 05:40AM CET
This is eerily similar, if not a literal repetition of what happened after the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 was implemented and Canada retaliated, here is a section from the retaliation subsection on Wikipedia:
Obtained from en.wikipedia.org 02.02.2025 05:43AM CET
Do these promises and the unfulfillment of them remind of you of what Trump has been saying? It is quite literally a repetition of history and I truly hope that the world and the United States recover post the Trump presidency. But I fear that the damage may be too severe, at least for America. Direct quotes from president Trump:
- “We had no wars, for four years we had no wars. Except we defeated ISIS,” said Trump.3
- “We defeated ISIS in record time, but we had no wars. They said ‘he will start a war’. I’m not going to start a war, I’m going to stop the wars.”3
Well, not even a month into his presidency Trump has broken the promise of no wars, he has started an economic tariff war with Canada4, Mexico4 & China4 and he has also promised that he will put tariffs on the European Union.56 What an absolute speedrun of ruining centuries of good will and trust between these partners. As one of my favorite yet brutal sayings goes: “It takes a lifetime to build a reputation, but only a few seconds to destroy it, burn it all to the ground”.
The insane spread of misinformation on social media is yet again another one of the partial reasons for me leaving all social media platforms (deleting all my accounts, I still use the platforms to keep up with the world - but they no longer have data on me nicely encapsulated in the form of an account), but this topic deserves a post of its own once I find the time. I believe that the insane spread of misinformation about the political parties, false promises & naivity of young generations on social media were the main factors that won Trump the 2024 presidential election. He hit the economically weakest people right where they were most vulnerable; food prices. He promised that food prices would go down on day one7, which of course was not a fulfilled promise.7
I don’t see a light at the end of the tunnel for America, a land once divided between liberals (the American left) and conservatives (the American right) is now divided between a party of personal attacks, false rumours and between a party of stupidity and naivity. Obviously democrats are the better party, everyone with a single ounce of a braincell sees this outside of America, but they are far from perfect, I’d go as far as to say they are far from good. Civilian members of the democratic party have been spreading pure hatred, vile misinformation and heavy criminal allegations on all social media platforms towards Republicans, which I believe strongly helped the Republican party. Now, Republicans or as I mark them currently; the party of stupidity and naivity - have done their fair share of fake news and false allegations, but not with such insane hatred and yelling as the Democratic party. The sheer volume of these posts that I saw on social media from democratic supporters was astonishing. Instead of focusing on the good they elected to not only point out the bad in the opponent; they made up complete false allegations, which I believe at the end of the day was their demise.
I am of the belief that content moderation is one of the hardest engineering issues of this century and that there is currently a severe lack in quantity of removals (when it comes to removing false claims and allegations on all social media platforms). Numerous careers, livelihoods and lives have been ruined by false allegations & accusations on social media platforms and it is becoming a serious epidemic of hate powered by sheer numbers & by the fact that everyone on the internet forgets the most important rule of the internet - Don’t automatically believe everything you see! I am noticing that after 2020 everyone on the internet automatically assumes that everything they read is true - which translates into “Guilty. You are a fucking criminal and a piece of shit! It must be true, this guy on the internet said so.” Scary times we are living in.
Not only do people believe everything they read and see is true, only now with the rise of AI are some people starting to realize that photos, screenshots and videos can be faked! But this has long been a thing, elite dark web video editors have been able to fake just about anything as long as you pay them a sufficient amount of money (pictures as well, but that is so easy nowadays that it is not mention worthy). There are also numerous tools for creating fake screenshots on all social media platforms and all devices within seconds! Yet every single time I see a screenshot from a social media platform every single person in the comments of that post believes that it is real.
This malicious spread of misinformation online once again deserves a post of its own that I have planned. The real culprit are social media platforms, news also sometimes post wrong or misleading information - but not nearly to the degree that civilians post en masse.
In conclusion, I hope the US and World economies do not collapse, but it is looking imminent.
Sources
Economic Policy Institute: President-elect Trump is inheriting a historically strong economy ↩︎
U.S. News: Trump Will Inherit a Better Economy Than He Left Behind ↩︎
Trump pledges no wars during his second presidential term on 6.11.2024 at a Rally ↩︎ ↩︎2
Trump puts tariffs on Canada, Mexico and China, spurring trade war as North American allies respond ↩︎ ↩︎2 ↩︎3
Trump threatens trade war with EU. President hits China, Canada and Mexico with tariffs – and says Europe will be next ↩︎
Trump pledged to bring down food prices on Day One. Instead, eggs are getting more expensive ↩︎ ↩︎2