Riots are breaking out at factories all across Communist China this week as President Donald Trump’s tariffs do their expected work. Workers are being laid off and denied their final paychecks.
The fact that the tariffs have barely gone into effect shows just how much of a paper tiger China’s economy really was, and how brilliant President Trump’s plan was. China was never going to win a trade war with the US. Short-term pain—long-term gain.
It’s unclear just how many jobs have been lost in China at this point. Thousands of workers showed up to scream, throw things, and protest outside an LED light manufacturing plant in Shanghai. They haven’t been paid their wages since late January, when President Trump was inaugurated and declared that tariffs were coming.
President Trump says the tariffs are having their intended effect.
“They were taking from us a trillion dollars a year,” Trump stated. “They were ripping us off like nobody’s ever ripped us off. They’re not doing that anymore.”
Another similar protest broke out at a sporting goods store in Dao County. The store closed without notice last week and the employees didn’t get their final paychecks.
In Tongliao, located in northeast China, construction workers climbed on top of a building and threatened to jump off and kill themselves en masse if they didn’t get paid.
There are reports of factory protests from Inner Mongolia in the northeast part of China all the way down to Sichuan in the southwest.
The CCP has never dealt with protesters in a kind way. The most recent protests there happened in 2020, when the people revolted against the COVID lockdowns. Xi Jinping responded by sending the military to weld their apartment doors shut and left the protesters inside their homes to starve to death.
Speaking of the COVID lockdowns, China’s export orders are now at the lowest level they’ve been since then. As we reported earlier this week, the number of container ships from China docking at the Port of Seattle has plummeted. It’s near zero on some days.
Goldman Sachs estimates that the Chinese economy could quickly shed as many as 16 million jobs as Trump’s 145% tariffs rip them apart.
The Wall Street Journal reports that a major garment exporter in southern China named Huang Deming has already fired 30% of his workforce. Three of his biggest US clients dumped him. A textile manager in China told the journal that the internal market there is so bad right now that the remaining factories are locked in suicidal price wars just to keep their doors open.
Meanwhile, the US economy added another 177,000 jobs in April. America is adding jobs and just getting started, as China is estimated to lose 16 million jobs. Xi Jinping won’t be able to sustain this much longer before he will have to come to the table and negotiate a new deal with President Trump.
Trump’s tariffs will also have a broader benefit of containing China’s military ambitions. Xi Jinping will be dealing with internal strife on a mass scale, and a lot less revenue to maintain his military (because he’s not ripping off the US taxpayers any longer). Three of China’s top generals and military advisors have now been “disappeared” this year. It’s doubtful that the trade war will lead to democratic reforms in China, but we could be dealing with a new chairman of the CCP before this is all over.
In another sign of China’s leadership getting nervous, Xi Jinping released 1 million ounces of gold. That will generate a quick $3 billion for the Chinese government, but it’s also good news for American investors. The spot price of gold dropped by about $50 within the first 24 hours of Xi’s move. (Hint, hint: Good time to buy gold!)
A country with a trade deficit never loses a trade war. The lopsided trade agreements that Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama made with Communist China were to the detriment of the American economy. But those deals also made China’s fragile economy entirely dependent on the USA.
China is already having riots in the streets because of Trump’s tariffs. Has anything in your life changed because of the tariffs? Has the price of anything actually gone up? The media says we must all be miserable right now because of the tariffs. But has anyone even noticed them in America yet?
