Donald Trump conflates 'trade surpluss' with theft. If another nation can produce an item AND import it to the US for less than the US can produce it, ask why. There are a range of reasons from lower wages (Mexico, China) and much cheaper access to the raw materials (Canada). He's gone back and forth with tarriffs after US manufacturers have pointed out that they also import parts and materials so tarriffs wouldn't make them any more competitive.
On the other hand, Donald Trump considers VAT to be an 'unfair tarriff' in spite of the fact that wherever a product is made, VAT is applicable (on most items). So it's in no way unfair to a specific nation. Almost all US statees add sales tax to the prices of most goods. I freely admit that 3 states do not charge sales tax (Delaware, Montans and New Hampshire) but I note thay raise taxes on specific products, savving/dividends and state income taxes. At the end of the day, the ONLY difference is that the tax is paid to the state but at the end of the day, does that detail matter to the consumer?
The state with the lowest taxation appears to be Alaska but as I understand it, Alaska actually has to pay people to live there. No insult to Alaska, but I imagine with those vast open spaces and it's geographic location will conspire to make it more costly to live there. If you have well-paid oil-workers, you still need a lot of other people doing those 'unskilled' jobs that need still doing.
I really have to wonder if Donald Trump AC|TUALLY knows what he says isn't true i.e. he's essentially just being aggressive with a view to 'getting the best deal' OR are we witnessing an elderly man disaplying neurological decline? I note Fred Trump (Donald Trump's father) developed dementia and it appears to be a heritable class of disorder. It would tie in with my previous thought that Fox News and Donald Trump are essentially in a reenforcment-loop. Donald Trump will say or do something ridiculous, Fox News will cast it in the best light possible to please their most important viewer and that re-enforces Donald Trump's belief that every pronouncement is an act of genius.
Interesting that Rupert Murdoch who directly and through his family trust holds the majority sharholding of Fox Corporration apparently loathes Donald Trump. Rupert Murdhoch is NOT stupid. He studied the greats at Oxford so likely has a better understandong of how politics really operates than Donald Trump. For Murdoch, Trump is a bafoon, but a bafoon who is likely to vastly enrich Murdoch and at the end of the day, Murdoch is all about the money.
Either way, the US isn't the largest marketplace in the world, it's not even the second largest. By all means use tarriffs - retaliatory tarriffs will simply result in the US ending up as an autarky. Only products made in the US will be sold in the US, but no US-made goods will be sold anywhere else in the world. But it will result in a sharp increase in prices.
I'm reminded of that William S. Burroughs quote 'Beware whorse who say they don't want money. The hell they don't. What they want is more money. MUCH more'. I note that those DOGE payments are likely to only be given to people who earn over $40,000/annum i.e. only those who pay federal income tax. To me, this is OLD. When the UK government sold off energy, public transport, public housing and utility suppliers (all of which were built via taxation), people were offered cut-price shares. But of course, you had to have the money to buy the shares to benefit. 30 years later we end up paying more for each and every one of those things than any other European nation... But hey, the cheap shares distracted enough people for long enough to avoid political backlash...