A quarter of respondents to the University of Michigan’s monthly national economic survey this week said they’re stocking up on appliances, computer parts, electronics, and other durable goods in anticipation of prices getting jacked up due to convicted felon President-Elect Trump’s planned tariffs on foreign manufactured items, a development the Wall Street Journal reports is itself part of the reason why the Consumer Price Index posted a slight increase to 2.7 percent in November.
“If the run is big enough and the shortage is big enough,” a retailer will have to raise prices, said Columbia University economics Professor Harrison Hong of the current wave of spending now to not spend even more if and when the fat fuck unilaterally raises prices. “People can make a judgment that, ‘Well I thought I was going to buy a TV in the next 12 months. Maybe I should buy it in the next 12 weeks,’” said Johns Hopkins University economist Robert Barbera on (some) consumers’ thinking.
“The notion that you think prices are on a particular trajectory plays elementally in your decision about how to raise your prices, or what your wage demands are,” Barbera added, referring to retailers, who may as well pad in a few extra bucks for themselves if this is happening anyway.
It’s not clear yet if Trump plans to arrest retail industry CEOs for unfairly raising prices to pass their cost along to consumers and being honest about it during calls with investors. While he will almost certainly not be able to have them prosecuted in retaliation, it’s a safe bet he will instead use more conventional means to punish them for “pledging allegiance to China” or something.
Using a revolutionary technology called the “browser inspector,” we’ve created an exclusive “sneak peak” at a future headline from the midst of such a public “backlash” against retail businesses who will by that point already be trapped in a nightmarish feedback loop of consumers holding back on buying the clothes, phones, computers, furniture, and so on that they want and looking on used or refurbished secondary markets for their needs, forcing them to cut jobs and close locations.
The next day Trump himself will probably share the clip of Hannity amplifying Charlie Kirk, Jack Posobiec, DC Draino, and their ilk’s crusade against Best Buy or whatever other large retailer they’re accusing of treason, leading the fat bastard himself to post something like “Worst Buy CEO Corrie Barry, an overrated ‘executive’ who’s Number 1 job is to make China rich, wealthy, and keep their manufacturing jobs, made some very Hateful comments to her failing company’s investors about our very powerful tariffs, that have already forced Canada to stop Illegally selling artificial ‘bath salts’ that have ravaged our nations communities, are bad for their business! Well CORRIE, maybe you should of stopped buying all your JUNK from CHINA before our wonderful tariff’s were levyed to stop other countries from ripping us off! Best Buy is an America Last dump of a store that everyone who loves this country should boycott for having such a Marxist loser CEO who raised prices!”
After that some hedge fund hustler like Bill Ackman will lead a push to get Barry fired and she’ll resign a few days later, replaced by a senior vice president whose strategy for running the company is “to stay out of politics” and change exactly nothing else while Barry takes her $35 million severance and practices yoga for two years before Target hires her as CEO. Meanwhile the MAGA shitposting machine turns its ire on Taco Bell for promoting tolerance in the workplace during Pride Month, even though they already fired their director of diversity, equity, and inclusion in February.
And an “LG – 350 Sq Ft 8,000 BTU Window Air Conditioner” that costs $262.99 now but will run you $319.99 in the middle of this whole shitshow in May 2025 will cost you $319.99 in July 2025.