I buy in bulk to save money and my storage plan is still a bit chaotic since Mom moved out. (Yes, I’ll blame Mom….)
Anyhoo, I bought another 40 pound bag of cat food that was on sale and then I find 2 buckets full of cat food stored that needs to be rotated and fed to cats. Great news Mom has a few semi-feral cats and a new kitten to feed so I can give her a bucket of cat food. This way I can rotate the cat food and still have extra food on hand for any “Alley” Cats that need a meal or two this winter.
Added 10 cans of coffee to rebuild the stash at $4.99 a can. Even with Mom buying a can or two from me I should have plenty of coffee for the winter. Now that I’m not buying more wood, rock or meat to prepared for winter I can focus on getting the odds & ends that will go up in price because of the Trump Tariffs.
I’m not complaining as I think we need to have Free Trade in the world. But it must also be equal trade. Apple and Nike should not be allowed to destroy Asia’s environment and pay slave wages to sell $1,000.00 Iphones or Nike sell $300.00 sneakers paying 2nd /3rd world people at best the equivalent of $ 8.00 -12.00 a day working in a sweat shop. We will pay higher costs because of tariffs and that is a price that must be paid to bring manufacturing back to the USA.
Higher wages in the west via free trade will also help the average 3rd world worker by driving up wages and protecting the environment long term. There will also be a lot of short-term pain as the world markets reset or try and hold out against the tariffs.
Get your parts on hand now for your mechanical stuff. Buy up what you need for food, heat and geegaws before winter hits because the cost of living will go up. Having all your basic needs covered means you can “take the hit” on the rising cost of imported goods you buy. Be able to sharpen that ax, have nails/screws on hand. Oh you want to build something with wood. Canada is getting hit with tariffs on lumber so wood prices are going up.
The point of Tariffs is to protect businesses from unfair trading practices, but it also protect workers from falling wages and unemployment. I’m no socialist I think the min. wage should be $0.00 and everyone should negotiate the wage/benefits they want. Either you are worth the wage to the employer. You go sell yourself to another employer or you start your own business. I know that may sound a bit like Prostitution but it all depends on the skill set you have to sell to the buyer.
For example:
I learned a lot about installing a toilet as a DYI’er. Gosh I must have spent 3 weeks trying to fix a cracked tank, a bad hose and replacing a bad water cut off valve and installing new guts into the toilet. A good plumber could have done the job in a couple of hours and cost about $300.00- $500.00 depending on cost of the toilet. In that 3 weeks I learned a lot about plumbing I bought a used toilet with a 3 gallon flush tank that is compatible with the city sewer system. Learned to replace guts of an toilet tank and seal the toilet properly over the sewer pipe. I’m not sure about the cost benefit ratio but I sure learned a lot. As many people have said ” You can have it properly installed, have it installed fast or have it installed cheap. ” The generous folks say pick two options cause you ain’t getting all three!
Sorry, a bit off-topic paragraph. Buy what you want of imported items now as the import window and storage facilities are filling up now. I think the cost increase will hit start hitting hard about mid October. Think of the little items like screws and sand paper. Razor blades and thread. Fabric and House paint depending where it comes from. I hope the tariffs will motivate companies to bring back jobs to the USA. It is quite possible the oligarchs will just wait out Trump or make him ineffective.
It is what it is folks and we can only do what we can as individuals.
