Discussion

U.S. set to launch tariff refund system on April 20

hoppyhoppy2: Am I reading between the lines correctly, that consumers who paid higher prices to help cover the cost of these tarriffs can expect no refunds?

aucisson_masque: That's what I wonder too.Ultimately it's the customer who paid more for his his'goods, not the importer.Is the us government seriously going to give American citizens money to some Chinese importers ?

tacodestroyer: Absolutely and I highly doubt those businesses will lower the prices on anything they raised prices on. Double dip FTW.

ivraatiems: It's nice to see them actually complying with the Supreme Court's decision instead of just ignoring it and telling them to enforce it.

csouers: Oh, don't worry. They'll find a way to screw over the consumer.

JohnMakin: Yes, it's effectively a transfer of wealth from the consumer to the companies above them, much like everything else these days

comrade1234: From what I understand a tariff refund system has been in place for decades, as companies dispute tariffs they were charged and get refunded.

BoiledCabbage: Yup, another failure of a policy. And again not a surprise, it was widely explained ahead of time they were illegal, but instead they were forced through under an "Emergency" situation and now enormous amount of money wasted and what's returned is being refunded to corporations even though the consumer ultimately paid the bill.Another case of acting impulsively.Kinda like the reason the price of oil is so high right now.

bmitc: This does screw over the consumer, or at least doesn't reverse the screwing of any consumers.

Freedom2: This forum told me that other countries would pay the tariffs for the end customer. Was that incorrect, and if so, how could this forum get it wrong? What other confidently stated truths could also be wrong?

skybrian: If the company got overcharged for materials, you don’t get a refund either.Unless the company wants to. Apparently, Costco has said they will be providing refunds:https://finance.yahoo.com/news/costco-pass-along-tariff-refu...

parineum: > What other confidently stated truths could also be wrong?Well, for starters.> This forum told me that other countries would pay the tariffs for the end customer.

parineum: Plenty of companies didn't change their prices and ate the tariffs.

ticulatedspline: I keep seeing basically this comment over and over, which on reddit would be expected but I'm surprised how much it pops up here. I would expect the HN crowd to be a bit more cognizant of the fact that the consumer is at the end of a potentially long chain and that direct-to-consumer refunds through that chain are at best impractical and at worst literally impossible.This study actually follows that chain:https://www.nber.org/202603/digest/pass-through-tariffs-evid...In this case the importer was losing money post tariff so was the exporter. the consumer was actually paying more than the tariff (due to margin).making each actor "whole" in even this short, cut-and-dry chain would be extremely difficult not even counting the overhead of each entity issuing refunds. A product with multiple importer inputs and more hands in the pot would be nearly impossible to even trace and you'd have to be able to definitively construe that each change in price at each step was directly related to tariffs, maybe someone in the chain was already going to raise prices some and then didn't raise any more on top of the tariff thus the tariff increase was absorbed by a pre-planned price hike.Did people get charged more? yes. Are you getting your money back, no. does it suck? yes. Is it some conspiracy to make importers more wealthy? no. Were more than just end consumers harmed? yes! Is this fair? fuck no, but truly fair is impossible so might as well do something rather than let the corrupt government keep their ill gotten gains.

rasz: only because Lutnick's sons will be main benefactors.

true_religion: It’s not really impossible to do refunds to consumers. Businesses wouldn’t have to be compelled to cooperate either. If they are suitably enticed, they will go through their own records, find rationale for higher prices because of tarries and submit individual records to the government.Businesses are already basically forced to do KYC on direct to consumer imports so they have the information on file.It’s only for the wider market, where items aren’t imported to be sold direct, that it’s harder to tell because as you said there is a chain of actors.

platevoltage: I wonder how much Lutnick's net worth will increase when this goes online.

firejake308: Right, this is what I remember seeing. Overall, inflation didn't increase much last year even after the tariffs because a lot of companies had stockpiled inventory and were able to postpone the price increase. Seems like that bet paid off, and now they should ideally be able to get their money back without increasing prices.Obviously there were some companies who did raise prices because of tariffs, but I'm saying that on average, they must not have since inflation didn't go up by 15%

bayff: Didn't some guy buy up a bunch of the rights to tariff refunds at discount hoping for this?

extraduder_ire: It's more than one guy, there's a whole industry around it.I think the most famous one is a person working in government or closely related to someone who is. (drawing a blank on the name right now)

drawfloat: …your Commerce Secretary.

dh2022: Is his son to be precise.

dh2022: Our country’s gargantuan fiscal deficit is about to get even larger. At what point will lenders get sick of subsidizing the US government?

Larrikin: Can you name any? Everything I purchased went up in a price, even if some of the better ones tried to hold out for a couple months.

notamario: You mean the SC ruling that moves money from the US treasury to the aristocracy class?

mindslight: [delayed]

rstuart4133: [delayed]