So what are the extended details that will address the impact on the greater economy?
Is it even welfare? I saw an earlier reference to “credits” - which to me implies loans. Which eventually have to be paid back. Good luck to the small/medium farmers on that if the tariff fight goes on very long.
If old customers decide the US is too erratic to be relied on as a supplier and forge new relationships with other countries, it could be a while before customers come back even after tariffs go away. China started cancelling orders for US soybeans back in April, before tRump slapped tariffs on some of their exports to us. Some of that was a seasonal phenom - there are North/South shifts that go with who has the lowest price at any given point of their growing cycle. However, Bloomberg reported that the cancellations were unusually large and that Russia got a lot of new orders (which is counter-cyclical) while Brazil also got larger orders than normal. Those may not come back for a while.
Those may not come back for a while.
Personally, I think we could be looking at the better part of a decade. The reason I say that is if the relationships that China is cultivating with Russia, Brazil turn out to be viable and worth pursuing, as you said, why go back to an erratic supplier that’s dependent on a crazy leader?
The smart ones have already figured that they are going to get screwed in this - it is going to cost them far more than that quarter to properly attend to the mess that this will create -
The stupid ones will get ambushed by all of the hidden costs associated with this fiasco
Hummm … one of those subtle little favors for Putin - not quite as obvious as ass-kissing in a news conference - but in many ways more valuable.
Mark Jackson, who farms with his son and his brother on 2,000 acres in southeast Iowa near Oskaloosa was supportive of Trump’s efforts to realign global trade to an improved balance for the United States. He said he agrees with the broader goal of balancing trade especially with China.
“There is a tendency for a little bit of Trump piling on,” he said. “We’re trying to sort through a lot of the chaff to get down to the real heart of the issue to make this thing a little more equitable. How come nobody’s talking about Hillary e-mails?"
Those guys that reporters keep interrupting while they are plowing aren’t getting a single thing. My guess is that they have figured it out. There’s a sweetness, somehow, to the the fact that this incredibly transparent bid to bribe the farm vote is not getting the universal praise that they anticipated.
The interesting question is this whether this will be one of those times that people tell pollsters one thing and vote a different way when they get in the voting booth. I don’t expect them to turn on T right now, but they might when they get to vote.
You’re going about this calculation wrong by assuming that the money will be distributed equitably. My prediction: farmers in deep red counties will get just enough money not to be too embarrassing. Farmers in blue counties will get just enough not to trigger immediate criminal investigation. Farmer in counties that could swing an election or counties with farms owned by particular friends of trump and his cabinet will get the lion’s share.
Look, in good conscience I can’t tell them not to because their families and farms are at stake but my hope is that you recognize the bribe that this is as you’re accepting it. That doesn’t mean you have to STAY bought. Like when you’re going into the ballot box, for example.
FDR knew, over 80 years ago, how the GOP Cocksuckers would handle relief if they were ever in charge:
Tariffs specifically, and combative trade in general, really play into Trump’s winner-loser us-versus-them make-a-better-deal worldview. I actually think this is his most inner-core policy position, insofar as he has policy positions. It’s more innate and ingrained than even his racism. It’s the most literal reading of “MAGA”. It’s not going away.
Don’t give’em shit. They’re all voting HOP anyway.
In the meantime, Iowa’s governor race has moved from “Likely Republican” to “Toss Up”. And Steve Fucking King’s race has moved from “Safe Republican” to “Likely Republican”. Keep it up Trump.
Yep. I’ve read analyses about how this fits with his worldview and his let us say simplistic way of seeing things. But I think there’s also an above-zero possibility the GOP shuts this down. We’re now three months and change from the midterms. This thing flares up into a full-on trade war and they’ve got trouble. Plus which Trump has virtually no authority to be doing this.
No one has the instinct and gut reactions that can drive a functioning entity into bankruptcy than tRump. Maybe he will work this magic for America?
On another note I’m unamused by the daily pivot from driving the car over one cliff to driving it off another. There seems to be an ever expanding number of cliffs on tRump hill.
Well, you take however many cliffs are fallen off in a Road Runner cartoon, divide two years by seven minutes and multiply, and that’s how many cliffs approximately we’ve gone over so far. But W.E. Coyote is nothing if not resilient, so we’ll just carry on and muddle through somehow. 
I suspect this is not a popular view, but:
Farmers said they would rather have Trump settle the trade disputes with China, Mexico, Canada and the European Union and get free trade flowing again.
“A Band-Aid doesn’t cure an illness, but it might make it temporarily better,” said Dave Struthers
“Experience has shown that trade wars and all this tit-for-tat is devastating to the (agriculture) economy and drives prices down,” said Richard Schlosser
“I can’t argue they are trying to help us but how long will this last?” said Watne. “Are they truly going to get us a solution that will make things better?”
“This is an election ploy. And we as farmers are playing the dupes again in this whole process,” said Wisconsin farmer Michael Slattery
“I don’t want free money. I don’t want bailouts. I want trade. Trade is what works,” said Wanda Patsche
I am of course opposed to these absurd tariffs, and I am horrified to watch Trump act like a bull in the china shop of international trade agreements. But I am actually really heartened to see these farmers largely on the same page with me – farmers being a group that mainstream political opinion would erroneously have me believe are uneducated rubes who are too stupid to assemble a worldview that extends past the border of their own land and their neighbors’ bedrooms.
I like cheap, locally grown food. I’m glad there are other people willing to do the often gross and very hard work of providing it, and I hope there is always a market that welcomes their goods.
Exactly. By the time they get their last payoff, er Trump welfare, their “international markets” and any hope of competing again will be gone. MAGA.
I’ve been waiting for Whiny to just not pay China what we owe them, which is the cornerstone of his economic policy.
The cognitive dissonance is deafening.
They are critical of Trump’s tariffs but are appreciative of his offer to provide some cash to help offset the losses he caused. They don’t want free money, just better crop subsidies and other revenue loss protections in the massive federal farm bill. They think Trump’s tariffs are “government interference at its worst” but are supportive of Trump’s efforts in government interference to realign global trade. Apparently, the only way "to make this thing a little more equitable” is for the government to heavily subsidize US farmers in the name of fair trade and free market competition.
I think it is eminently more reasonable for the administration to not harm the people in the first place.