Everyone seems to have an opinion about tariffs. Some believe we should just accept the current practice of the United States being taken advantage of by other countries and not disrupt the status quo. Some believe we need to balance the tariffs through eliminating all tariffs between countries and literally having free trade. Others believe the tariffs that the United States is negotiating to place on other countries is necessary to eventually create free trade while creating a fair playing field across the international markets.

I do not accept the belief that we should continue to get walked on by other countries. We continue to get played by these countries who charge unreasonable tariffs on our goods and somehow that is supposed to be good for us. We can’t blame them for making billions of dollars off the Unites States if we are willing and stupid enough to keep allowing them to tax our goods at such extremes. It certainly has not stopped people from buying our better-quality items in these other countries.

Here is where it gets interesting. Those billions of dollars that countries will lose if we get to a “free trade” status is not something they will give up easily. They would be crazy not to fight for all that money so having our political elite side with these countries, some of whom are our allies, is just another measure of attempting to keep the status quo. It continues to encourage Americans to purchase cheap, lower quality goods rather than buying from American manufacturers. If we stopped buying steel and aluminum from China and started buying more from US steel and aluminum manufacturers, we would continue to see our economy strengthen and grow. The argument that somehow we are hurting American manufacturers by not purchasing cheaper goods from other countries – those who also have little human rights in place – is just stupid.

We need tariffs on these countries. It is the only way we will get them to the negotiating table. Free trade is good for all countries but until they realize the pain of balancing the spreadsheet, they have zero interest in talking.

For the United States, the imposed tariffs on these other countries makes us healthier. It forces us to purchase more US-made goods at a slightly higher-than-current price. For example, purchasing steel and aluminum from US manufacturers is good for the country rather than buying cheap, lower quality materials from China. People who argue that imposing tariffs will somehow destroy American businesses are the ones who do not understand that we should be buying more American materials, supporting American industries, and keeping American made goods for Americans.

For a little while, we may see prices go up on foreign-made goods. So, what? There is nothing that we get from these countries that we cannot do ourselves. Why would we purchase inferior products if they were the same price as our better quality, US made products? Right, we wouldn’t.