DH and I are in the middle of flipping a house. Last Friday, we dropped almost $16k on flooring and appliances, including a washer and dryer, in advance of the tariffs kicking in. Today, I was poking around and found this article, which contains the full list of items effected. OH, SHIT!
This is going to hit all of us in ways big and small. Have any of you wise mustachians examined this issue? What are you stocking up on? I expected the durable goods, but the list of food items is huge!
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-china-trade-war-list-of-goods-tariffs-2018-9
There are quite a few foods on the list, but how much food do we actually import from China? I know we get lots of seafood and a quick search suggest mushrooms and apple juice imports are significant.
I was wondering this too. While it's a long list of foods in many cases I don't think Chinese imports are making up the bulk of US consumption? If it does significantly impact grocery prices for items we regularly buy now, I'm sure we'll be refiguring our diet if an alternative option becomes cheaper, so the price increase to us might be less than the amount of the tariffs.
For the durable goods...I'm not going to start stockpiling, as these are items we use either infrequently or not at all. I'm sure this will wind up costing me money in some way, BUT...finding space to store a stockpile will cost me too! And it's possible that in the longer term either the tariffs will be reversed or manufacturing will move out of China. If I knew I was likely to need a bigger ticket item in the next 6 months or so, I might consider buying that, but further out, it just starts to seem like hoarding.
I think for mustachians with a high savings rate, these tariffs will likely eat at that, but aren't going to actually put any of us in the poorhouse. I know my household could sustain a 25% increase in the cost of EVERYTHING we buy and still come out ahead. For folks with a lower savings rate, the tariffs are obviously going to be more of a problem and require more lifestyle changes.
While I think these tariffs are poorly thought out, I do think we have an excess of cheap shit in this country. I'm not so alarmed by the thought of things becoming more expensive, I am alarmed at the way the administration is implementing these but doesn't really seem to have a good plan in place to manage the impacts.