There's no misinterpretation here, mhaze, and you know that.

//tariffs on China are at around 53%//

Your 53% line was explicitly tied to “China’s being nudged more.” That only makes sense if readers think it applies broadly. If it’s just a “rough average,” then it doesn’t back your point at all.

You can’t have it both ways: either it was misleading in context, or irrelevant.

//“China either plays nice or doesn’t play at all (after citing a 60% deficit drop)//

That only makes sense if you were holding up that deficit drop as proof tariffs were “nudging” Beijing. If that’s the case, it’s cherry-picking a single month. If it wasn’t, then the stat was irrelevant filler.

Either way, it collapses.

//part of the US tariffs are the so-called fentanyl penalty//

That’s just a new rabbit hole.

The issue isn’t whether tariffs exist, it’s whether they’re working the way you claim. On that, your examples still fail. Padding with penalties doesn’t rescue a bad argument.

Your "malice or ignorance" false dichotomy is pure performance.

On the cost question, mhaze, this isn’t opinion. The evidence is overwhelming...

Amiti, Redding & Weinstein (American Economic Review, 2019):
Tariffs were “almost entirely borne by U.S. importers.”
http://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.33.4.187

Amiti, Redding & Weinstein (AEA Papers & Proceedings, 2020):
Even as trade tensions escalated, “tariffs continued to be passed through fully into domestic prices.”
http://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/pandp.20201018

NBER Working Paper “The Impact of the 2018 Trade War on U.S. Prices and Welfare” (2019):
Complete passthrough of tariffs into U.S. import prices, costing households ~$1.4 billion per month.
http://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w25672/w25672.pdf

Peterson Institute (2019 overview):
“Tariffs are taxes paid by Americans, not foreigners.”
http://www.piie.com/blogs/trade-and-investment-policy-watch/trump-has-it-backward-china-not-paying-us-tariffs

Morningstar / MarketWatch (July 2025):
Analysts at Citi and Deutsche Bank show U.S. companies are largely shouldering tariff costs.
http://www.morningstar.com/news/marketwatch/2025072294/heres-who-is-bearing-the-cost-of-trumps-tariffs-so-far-this-year

MarketWatch (Goldman Sachs, Aug 2025):
Businesses absorbed 64% of tariff costs through June, with consumers covering 22% - a share expected to rise.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/goldman-sachs-says-tariff-burden-to-shift-from-businesses-to-consumers-bdcc4854

Penn Wharton Budget Model (updated June 2025):
“Among major trading partners, China faces the highest effective rate of 39.8 percent in June 2025.”
http://budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2025/8/14/effective-tariff-rates-and-revenues

Yale Budget Lab (July 2025):
“Overall US average effective tariff rate … brought up to 20.2% … highest since 1911.”
http://budgetlab.yale.edu/research/state-us-tariffs-july-23-2025

Across academic studies and financial analysis, the verdict is the same: these tariffs function as a hidden tax on Americans. They didn’t “nudge Beijing into fair play,” they raised costs at home.

...

"Of coarse [sic], I can't help but notice you haven't the slightest evidence for your claim." - mhaze

"That only makes sense if readers think it applies broadly. "

Why?

Why can't there be targeted tariffs that nudge nations in the desired direction? You make the assertion and think that that makes the case. oops ...it doesn't.

oh all your 'proof' that Trump's 2025 tariffs are borne by consumers are about the pre-2020 tariffs. Very convincing!!

Why, mhaze?

//“That only makes sense if readers think it applies broadly.”//

You know why: because your own line was “China’s being nudged more.” That only makes sense as a whole-country claim. If tariffs are just targeted at a few sectors, then they don’t back your point. You don’t get to shift from “broad nudging” to “targeted nudging” after the fact.

//“All your proof … is pre-2020.”//

Um, no…

Goldman Sachs (Aug 2025) found U.S. businesses absorbed 64% of tariff costs through June, with consumers already picking up 22% and rising:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/goldman-sachs-says-tariff-burden-to-shift-from-businesses-to-consumers-bdcc4854

Morningstar/MarketWatch (July 2025) reported the same: U.S. companies, not Beijing, are largely shouldering costs:
http://www.morningstar.com/news/marketwatch/2025072294/heres-who-is-bearing-the-cost-of-trumps-tariffs-so-far-this-year

And the earlier Fed/NBER/AER studies remain relevant because they show the mechanism hasn’t changed: tariffs are taxes paid by your own side. That was true in 2018-2020, and the 2025 evidence shows it’s still true today.

So the question remains: where’s your evidence that these tariffs have “nudged” Beijing into fair play?

Because so far, oops… they haven't.

"That only makes sense as a whole-country claim."

Why?

Why can't China be nudged to do the right thing in certain areas. Why? Just because you say so? You make the assertion and think that that makes the case. oops ...it doesn't.

Nobody’s denying that, mhaze.

//Why can’t China be nudged to do the right thing in certain areas?//

Of course sectoral tariffs can push on specific industries. The problem is your own framing: “China’s being nudged more.” That’s not a sectoral claim, that’s a whole-country claim.

If what you really meant was “a few Chinese industries are targeted,” then fine - but that’s not the same as “China being nudged more.” You don’t get to dress a narrow point up as a sweeping one and then retreat when called on it.

So again: where’s your evidence that these tariffs - broad or narrow - have actually made Beijing “play fair”? Because right now, all you’ve got is the wording games.

And until you can produce that evidence, your “nudged more” line is just hot air.