Public sentiment is polarized regarding US-China trade relations; many express strong support for China's retaliation to US tariffs, viewing it as justified and necessary while criticizing US trade policies as aggressive. Concurrently, significant frustration exists among American farmers, who are suffering economically due to these policies, with some commenters suggesting they deserve their plight for previously supporting the administration. Overall, there is a pervasive negativity surrounding the implications of tariffs, which many believe will harm American consumers and the economy.

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American Farmers

Won't this be a fairly minor thing considering that the US basically doesn't build ships, everyone is flying the flag of like the Philippines of the Canary Islands or wherever they get the best deal these days, and the US basically doesn't have any large shipping companies anyway?

SufficientlyRabid

&gt;U.S.-owned vessels docking in the country

That might literally be zero ships.

Robo1p

Double taked pretty hard at “China hits US Ships…”

PQ1206

&gt;China’s Ministry of Transport said on Friday in a statement that its special fees on American vessels are “countermeasures” in response to “wrongful” U.S. practices, referring to the planned U.S. port fees on Chinese vessels.

always playing the victim.

tooltalk01

We all understand this is for show right? trump would sell Ivanka into slavery if it helped him in the midterms.

trump will give China anything and everything privately if they give him public victories in the summer and fall of 2026. 

And they absolutely will. trump is the best thing to happen to China.

BigDaddyCoolDeisel

lol just like a mad man blew his head with a shotgun in order to spill his blood on your new cloth.

Sxeh1077

Global demand for Chinese-built ships will be hard to break. China State Shipbuilding (CSSC) built more commercial vessels in 2024 than the entire US shipbuilding industry has built since the end of WWII. With CSSC also leading China's build up of military vessels, Washington has a few reasons to be concerned.

Meanwhile senior executives at CSSC are routinely disappearing due to anti-graft investigations.

I guess this is what happens when central authorities set conditions for cut-throat competition to stoke demand and high output in a strategic industry, you create incentives for graft.

NecroPulse23

I don't see how it'll benefit the US other than short-term monetary gains.  
Companies will just rearrange their fleet to service the US with non-Chinese ships while using them for the rest of the world.   
That's like treating the US as an exception/troublemaker/asterisk.

Steamdecker

So, like, 99% of the ships in the world?  
But dude, it’s just not viable to build anything in the most expensive country on Earth.  
Even building a ship in Singapore or Switzerland is cheaper than in the U.S.

ThierryHD

All it'll do is boost traffic for Canadian and mexican ports, delay US imports, which (again) hurts American consumers.


Stupidity comes in abundance for the Trump administration lol

Friendly-Sky-5963

Of course like all these things, the eventual cost will be paid by US customers, whether retail or business. Or where this is uneconomic, as US customers no longer can afford, or want to pay, higher prices, they'll stop shipping due to the additional cost.

I doubt they will tranship them via Mexico. The US has already said they will clamp down on transhipping, and they can impose new tariffs easily. In theory they could use non-Chinese ships but China so dominates container shipping that I doubt there's the spare capacity. And the US could just impose the same fees on any foreign ship working the China - US trade.

What about US ships? Lol, nope.

Skandling

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Trump is so shortsighted… and horny just want to fuck up everyone

tshungwee

This will be bad for both China and US. China of course is on the bad end of the deal, but the US won't benefit from it. The cargo ship building business already doesn't have much margin in it, and nobody is going to start up that industry in the US because it's not profitable enough to be worth the risk. Those orders for new cargo ships will just go to Japan and South Korea. Also US is going to have to deal with whatever retaliatory measures China enacts.

FrancisHC

Sgt_Pepper_88

RETARDED1414

DON'T WORRY TRUMP WILL JUST MAKE ANOTHER GREAT DEAL

  
President Trump stunned many in the tech world after announcing a controversial deal with chipmakers Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices, allowing them to sell advanced artificial intelligence chips to China in exchange for giving the U.S. government a 15 percent cut of their revenue.

Now there are questions about the legality of this deal and its implications for national security and beyond.

PatBenatari

Do any ships actually fly the US flag these days? I’m wondering how much this will matter.

not_too_old

Redrump1221

Are we getting hidden dragon instead of crouching tiger in this round of tariff escalation?

superawesomefiles

Are the US ships dropping off goods or picking them up?  If they are picking up goods, isn't this just China increasing the cost of their own goods going to the US?

psyon

I heard a rumor that China are in control of most of the shipment terminals in the US, say it ain\`t so.

FoundationGreat7072

When are Americans going to realize they’re the dotards in this situation… it’s literally going all in on a 7-2 off suit hand and thinking you’ve got all the odds in your favor…

Xiaopeng8877788

Don’t worry china is going to pay those tariffs like Mexico the wall 🙌🏻🙌🏻 MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN !!

Prestigious_lfc

That is China trying to grab headlines. Companies will just start using non US owned ships to ship goods to the US and send US ships elsewhere. Basically, just shuffling them around to avoid it. 

But heres the catch, while the cost of logistics won't go up for big companies, he'll it might even go down. Prices will still go up. Let no crisis go to waste, as they say.

willkode

US ship? Let me know when you find a US registered ship.

GoldenMegaStaff

That’s the whole reason china doesn’t care about tariffs anymore, this cargo fee by itself will effectively embargo china goods into the US

CollectionCreepy

fun thing is the buyer isn’t going to pay them, the seller won’t pay them, the logistics broker won’t pay them. they will just work the cost into the overall price and in the end it’s you the consumer that will pay the higher price. 

and when a lot of people in the global sales industry work on percentages the higher the overall cost the greater their cut is, provided there are still people wanting to buy whatever is moving.

imnotasdumbasyoulook

THe thing is none of these owners spoke up pre-election because commercial interests saw it the same way as many immigrants, taking the "they won't fuck with us" attitude.
Now everyone is affected, and the business interests are up in arms because they thought their support would get them a hall pass. If it weren't for the fallout of good people losing their jobs, it'd be enjoyable to see these people get the same shit sandwich we're getting.

We are in uncharted territory now though, where the man at the top who makes these policies sees the world with a grievance mentality. If you don't kiss the ring, you're fucked. If you kiss it, donate, etc., he's still going to rug-pull you.

There are seventy years of history of this family's fuckery to see if you read a few pertinent books and open your mind - But how can reason triumph when there is no cohesion between Americans?

I'll tell you why - Because this was the plan all along, and all these people with lots of money and huge business were screwed over as if they were just you or me.

Now though without actually hurting this leader's bottom line, you guys are as fucked as everyone else. If that's what you voted for, bully for you - If not, my sympathies. 

Nobody deserves this on either side of the fence - But babycakes, this *IS* the new normal unless we get our shit together and put some of our differences aside to find common ground.

Something has to give at some point, and we will fall if we remain divided - It's not even an if, but a when.

Sorry for the mini-tangent, your post was well-written enough though that it hit me that way. Cheers.

M3g4d37h

Great write up and you hit all the key points. I wish the public understood how bad an idea this is as currently written.

deanspeakeazy

2/3 of newbuilding vessels are now built in China. No country can compete with their costs and delivery times. When the orange clown, in all his stupidity, understands how stupid this decision was, he will find an excuse and revoke it. Until then, only Japanese/Korean built vessels will visit US ports, which will exponentially increase freights due to shortage of supply, or Chinese built vessels will discharge in Canada/Mexico and goods will be transferred via trucks. Under both scenarios, the price of the goods will soar, and the end consumer will be the victim. MAGA jackasses do not have enough IQ to understand this.

ModeAble9185

This writeup is fantastic. Alarming and depressing, but fantastic. Thank you!!

timecapsulebuttbutt_

Damn, trump even hitting the cocaine smugglers

Legal_Illustrator44

If you're not watching/listening to [What's Going On With Shipping](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNs2g_sfok8)*,* you should be! 

The latest discussion got into just this topic. 29 minutes in they touch on the port fees specifically.

Kiltmanenator

The lack of commercial shipbuilding capacity in he United States is a national security issue.  There are better shipyards in South Korea , Japan, and Poland that use higher quality steel that won’t flake like sheets of paper, and are not subject to the port fee. And now there is a business incentive to shop for ships outside of China.

rocket42236

Yeah this is absolutely going to sink Seaboard and Tropical, that was the first thing I thought when I heard about this. This is seriously going to hurt at least Palm Beach, and probably Miami and Port Ev in the slow season.

[deleted]

&gt;A man representing one of the yards in America was there in support of the proposal yet he even admitted that we dry dock our own Naval vessels in China due to lack of capacity here.

I've never heard of a US Naval vessel ever drydocking in China. Got a source for that one?

Ciryaquen

This is a gift to the rest of the ship building nations of the world. The fee only applies to Chinese built ships. 

 Singapore, Korea, Poland, Japan etc will benefit greatly. The fees don't seem high enough to me to make American built ships for foreign trade a significantly better economical option. But it does help stop our main geo political ally from monopolizing the world's ship building industry which is vital to our national security. 

At least this helps friendlier nations grow their industries which we will definitely need when and if a conflict arrises

OkCauliflower4273

Mathjdsoc

I'm guessing this doesn't apply to the superyachts built by ferretti yachts or Italian Sea Group (makers of virtually every Italian superyachts, owned and controlled by Chinese Weichai)

Tell me your Betty K or Antillean without saying it 😂

keylime89

As someone who is here because the post was randomly shown in my feed:

In what ballpark are port fees normally?

KippieDaoud

This is nothing but another tax on the American people. We cannot get a single ship owner to agree terms on a US port penalty clause that doesn't put the cost on the charterer. Charterers pass that on to traders who pass that on to recievers who pass that on to consumers.


Ridiculous.

R33MZ

You’re making excuses for not supporting America mariners, American ship builders and American operators.


You’re using Chinese ships to engage in U.S. trade with other countries.

Screw that!

The United States and China have escalated trade tensions by implementing reciprocal port fees on ships from each country. Analysts warn that this tit-for-tat approach could distort global shipping flows.

US-China Trade Relations and Maritime Fees

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