Day 862: Dow in midst of longest losing streak since 2011

Tariffs and trade wars loom large, as 2017 tax cut did nothing to help either.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished down again Friday, cementing its sixth-straight losing week. The Dow lost another 3.01% for the week. The run is the longest losing streak since June 2011 during Barack Obama’s first term.

Global markets have been volatile particularly as a result of Donald Trump’s frequent trade war rhetoric and tariff implementation (to say nothing for his lack of actual deal-making). The market downturn and general distaste for tariffs wasn’t stopping Trump from threatening more Thursday evening and Friday morning. This time, instead of looking east to China, he looked south, to another one of the U.S.’s biggest trade partners: Mexico.

Trump is trying to use tariffs to get a foreign country to affect domestic immigration policies. If that doesn’t happen, with no evidence whatsoever, he believes companies will just suddenly decide to leave Mexico. If the tariffs go into effect, the people that are going to end up bearing the additional costs of everything from electronics to produce to automobiles are American consumers. That’s how tariffs work and the White House knows it.

So while Trump likes to brag about a booming economy — while conveniently omitting the fact that he inherited the vast majority of it — the facts are quite a bit muddier looking forward. The market is stagnating as a result of past and continued questionable decision-making on tariffs. Additionally, a substantial tax cut to corporate entities and wealthy Americans jammed through by Republicans in 2017 failed to do much of anything for the economy at large. However, it did provide tremendous returns for the richest Americans.

862 days in, 600 to go

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