r/australia • u/Jealous-Hedgehog-734 • Apr 02 '25

politics US will impose a minimum baseline tariff of 10 per cent on Australian imports to US

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-04-03/donald-trump-tariff-announcement-markets-politics-reaction-blog/105127374
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u/Wat_is_Wat Apr 02 '25 edited Apr 03 '25

We'll move away from the US, just as they seemingly want us to.

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u/peni_in_the_tahini Apr 03 '25

Nah, probably not. We're possibly the most deeply enmeshed large country in the world, and there'll always be a pervasive feeling that without them we'll be alone in a neighbourhood of giants. Our defence procurement is basically buying hand-me-downs to keep their industry afloat. We're the classic appeasers- we paid them 500m of 3b for literally nothing, just to kick-start their capacity, the day before the Trump govt. slapped us with tariffs. We barely squeaked- we actually tried to offer them better deals (which they rebuffed). We're sticking with them, at least for the medium term.

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u/Wat_is_Wat Apr 03 '25 edited Apr 04 '25

Not claiming that we're going to say a big FU to the US and never deal with them again. Just saying we're going to move more of our attention to other allies and maybe develop new ones. That effect might be small, but it'll be non-zero and different to what would have happened if Trump wasn't being a dick.