No Extra Dolls For You, Little Girl
Trump's New Economy
"They made a trillion dollars with Biden selling us stuff. Much of it we don't need. Somebody said, 'oh, the shelves are gonna be open.' Well, maybe the children will have two dolls instead of 30 dolls, and maybe the two dolls will cost a couple of bucks more." — Donald Trump, April 30, 2025
I hesitate to speak for Trump voters, but I’m skeptical that this is what they thought the Golden Age would actually mean.
And yet there was our billionaire president — surrounded by the golden gaud of his Trumpified Oval Office — telling the masses to go without, do with less, and pay more for it.
“Let them have cake,” suggested Marie Antoinette. “Let them have two dolls,” suggested Donald Trump, as his tariffs slouch toward what looks to be an especially stingy Christmas.
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But, as we know so well, the buck never stops with this president. You might detect the pattern here. Trump in January 2024:
Here he is now.
Happy May Day, and greetings from Boston.
The knee-bending by billionaire media moguls and the enshittification of social media by the broligarchs has transformed the media landscape... and made independent outlets like Substack more vital than ever.
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Trumponomics
In the grips of their own peculiar strain of Trump Delusion Syndrome, the nation’s titans of commerce imagined that he would be the most pro-business president ever, ushering in a new Gilded Age of lower taxes, deregulation, economic growth, and mouth-watering profits. They suspected that Trump would put the Crony back in Capitalism, but since many of them were the cronies who stood to profit, they ignored all the (waves hands) other stuff and prepared for…
Jeebus, not this.
Economic output is shrinking. The stock market has dropped sharply. And consumer confidence has tumbled to its lowest level since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
That hardly looks like the new "golden age" the president promised on Inauguration Day just over three months ago.
Figures released by the Commerce Department Wednesday show that the United States' gross domestic product contracted at an annual rate of 0.3% in the first quarter of the year, after growing at a solid pace of 2.4% in the final months of 2024.
Think of it as the Trump Effect. There was no exogenous incident that tanked the economy. No disaster. No mass hysteria. No financial crisis. Just Trump and his tariffs-by-whim. Writes David Frum: “Trump pushed the US economy into decline by his ignorance and malice, enabled and abetted by advisers who were variously obnoxious, stupid, cowardly, and/or crazy.”
So much winning.
Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers notes the disastrous fallout from the Trump Economy: “Trump vowed to do new things and we have something new: the American capital flight trade.”
It's a major pattern in markets when the president does something consequential and new, we see four things: stocks go down, bonds go down, the dollar goes down and gold goes up.
The signature's very clear.
It's revulsion against American assets. Foreigners less willing to put money here and Americans eager to diversify out of the country.
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A Golden Age of Prosperity it is not. And, while a full-blown recession is not yet a certainty, the worst is certainly to come as the tsunami of non-trade heads to our shores.
U.S. retailers had rushed to import goods into the country ahead of President Trump's sweeping tariffs going into effect, leading to a spike in imports since last summer. Now, with the 145% tariffs making goods from China roughly two-and-a-half times more expensive than they were last year, "essentially all shipments out of China for major retailers and manufacturers have ceased," Seroka said.
By another estimate, container bookings from China to the U.S. are down by as much as 60%, according to Flexport, a supply chain management company. Bookings from other Asia ports, such as Vietnam and Thailand, are up 5% to 10% as some exporters look to expand production outside of China to avoid steep tariffs.
The decline in bookings from China comes during what is usually a busy period for imports to the U.S.
"We would normally see an increase in bookings across the board, because this is the beginning of the shipping year," said Nathan Strang, director of ocean freight at Flexport. "It's when back-to-school items and Halloween items start to come in."
“It’s a precipitous drop in volume with a number of major American retailers stopping all shipments from China based on the tariffs,” said Gene Seroka, executive director of the Port of Los Angeles.
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Meanwhile, China seems to be weathering the trade war. Via Foreign Policy: “Trump’s Volatility Is Pushing Asia Toward Beijing.”
And, even as the US economy shrank by 0.3 percent in the first quarter, China's economy grew faster than expected, expanding by 5.4 percent.
BONUS: The tariffs are becoming a tax on babies.
President Donald Trump’s administration wants to encourage more births. His tariffs could be an obstacle.
Car seats, strollers and other essential items for new families are among the items impacted by Trump’s trade war with China. The disquiet in the industry has led expecting families to stock up on items and the owners of baby stores to worry about their future, while companies and trade associations feverishly lobby the Republican administration for an exemption.
“It is a tax on families that are having a baby,” said Natalie Gordon, the founder and CEO of Babylist, an e-commerce marketplace for baby items. “Tariffing these products is completely at odds with that stated goal of increasing birth rate and supporting families.”
The voters blame Trump
You could almost feel the flop-sweat as Trump tried to blame his predecessor for the lousy GDP numbers and the latest market crash. But recent polls suggest that voters aren’t buying that spin.
A new CBS News/YouGov poll showed that Americans are increasingly critical of Trump's handling of the economy, and that more people are blaming him than a month earlier. It surveyed 2,410 U.S. adults from April 8 to 11.
When asked whose policies are more responsible for the state of the economy, 54 percent said they believe Trump's policies are more to blame. Only 21 percent said they believe Biden's policies are to blame. Twenty percent said both of their policies are equally to blame, while 5 percent said neither are to blame for the state of the economy.
This compares to a March CBS News poll, when 38 percent of respondents said they blamed Biden for inflation, while only 34 percent blamed Trump.
And the business community that had indulged such fulsome hopes for the new Administration?
At the 100-day mark of the second Trump administration, a new poll from Leadership Now Project and The Harris Poll has found that a majority (84%) of senior business leaders express concern over the current political and legal environment and its impact on their business, including shifts on tariffs and global competitiveness.
A majority (84%) of business leaders are very or somewhat concerned about the impact of the current political and legal climate on their business.
Business leaders across the political spectrum are concerned: Regardless of political party (92% Democrats, 81% Republicans, 82% Independents) or political philosophy (91% Liberal, 79% Conservative, 84% Moderate), majorities of business leaders are very or somewhat concerned about the political and legal climate’s impact on business.
Nearly half (45%) of business leaders say recent Executive Orders and policies have negatively affected their business’s competitiveness.
BONUS: It’s now also the Congressional GOP Economy: “A bipartisan measure to undo Trump's global tariffs fails in the Senate.”
Nicholas Grossman: Tariffs, Tyranny, and Tipping Points
On today’s “To the Contrary” Podcast, I’m joined by Nicholas Grossman, editor of ArcDigital and political science professor to dissect the first 100 days of Trump's second term—from the international backlash to his Canada rhetoric to the domestic fallout of authoritarian policies. We explore the growing cracks in public opinion, the danger of a politicized military, and the economic time bomb of Trump’s tariff regime. Plus, we discuss whether civil society—not Congress—holds the real key to stopping the administration’s most extreme ambitions. You can watch or listen right here or on YouTube / Listen (and subscribe) on Apple/ Spotify / iHeart / RSS Feed.
Thursday dogs
Eli amid the bird feeders.
The doll comment nearly ripped my heart out.
Every Christmas, my church has a gift tree for children whose parents are served by the local homeless shelter and food pantry. Last December, guess what presents were most requested by those parents?
Socks, shoes, and underwear for their children.
Dolls? Nope. Shoes.
That's how millions of Americans celebrate Christmas, unable to even pay for shoes for their children. A single doll would be a dream.
The casual cruelty of this administration when it comes to the poor, when it comes to struggling families, when it comes to children makes the unredeemed Ebenezer Scrooge look like Santa.
Jamelle Bouie talked recently about how the Time interview suggests that “nobody” is currently president. Meaning that you have a hodge podge of free-wheeling grifters and evildoers that are using Trump as a vessel. I have to say, I think he’s onto something.