Robert Reich writes:

Not exactly a war, but a trade war — which will impose huge costs on both American consumers and on Canada.

As I said, Trump is now completely and utterly out of his mind.

The very idea of a trade war with Canada — our neighbor, our ally, our closest friend, a nation that’s peaceful and whose people have a reputation for kindness — is absurd.

But Trump is doing it anyway. He’s imposing a 50 percent tariff on goods coming from Canada — which, remember, is an import tax paid by you and me. The tariffs account for $20 billion of the $382 billion worth of products Americans bought from Canada last year and cover a wide array of goods (the full list of more than 500 products can be found here, here and here).

Trump has singled out several Canadian industries — especially forestry, including building products like plywood.

The obvious effect will be to make it more expensive to build houses in the United States. Couple this with the rise in long-term interest rates — i.e. mortgage interest rates — courtesy of Trump’s war spending, his tax cuts mainly for the rich and big corporations, and the giant corporate AI debt (encouraged by Trump) — and the result will be to make housing even less affordable than it already is. [Continue reading…]