Best Of 2025 Part 4: Today's Economic Failures
Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff
Democracy at Work
4.8 • 2.1K Ratings
🗓️ 19 August 2025
⏱️ 32 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this week's episode of the "Best Of Economic Update Series," we examine a comparison between the economic failures we face today caused by the same political forces and capitalists that we have encountered before, as well as the causes and effects of economic policies proven to fail. We hope you're enjoying this "Best Of" series. We will return to regular weekly updates on Labor Day, September 1st, and as always, we thank you for your attention, support, and solidarity.
The d@w Team Economic Update with Richard D. Wolff is a DemocracyatWork.info Inc. production. We make it a point to provide the show free of ads and rely on viewer support to continue doing so. You can support our work by joining our Patreon community: https://www.patreon.com/democracyatwork Or you can go to our website: https://www.democracyatwork.info/donate Every donation counts and helps us provide a larger audience with the information they need to better understand the events around the world they can't get anywhere else. We want to thank our devoted community of supporters who help make this show and others we produce possible each week. We kindly ask you to also support the work we do by encouraging others to subscribe to our YouTube channel and website: www.democracyatwork.info
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Today's episode is a little different than usual. It is a compilation of segments from previous |
| 0:25.1 | episodes of economic update that remain relevant for all of us today. And I hope it provides |
| 0:32.6 | you with a fresh look at what's changed, how far we've come, and how far we haven't over the last decade. |
| 0:40.3 | The next update I want to talk to you about is what has been in the news so much, the tariffs. |
| 0:46.3 | The decision by President Trump to impose, at least he says he's going to, as we go to press, |
| 0:53.3 | a 25% tariff on steel imports and a 10% |
| 0:58.0 | tariff on aluminum imports. |
| 1:01.7 | What is this about? |
| 1:03.4 | Well, let's first be sure we all understand what a tariff is. |
| 1:07.1 | It's just a special name for a tax. |
| 1:09.7 | Basically what a tariff does is say, if steel comes into the United States, whatever the price being charged, the importer is going to have to pay 25% more than that price, a tax on the steel that will go to the federal government, which is imposing the tax, and |
| 1:29.3 | the likewise 10% for the aluminum. |
| 1:32.3 | It's very good news for the producers of steel and aluminum here in the United States. |
| 1:38.3 | See, it turns out they haven't been doing real well. |
| 1:42.3 | They can't compete with imported steel, which is either |
| 1:46.5 | of better quality or lower price or both. And of course, when companies can't compete, |
| 1:54.0 | one of the strategies they're free to pursue is to get the government to protect them, by making |
| 2:00.6 | it more expensive to buy the better |
| 2:03.2 | quality or lower priced imports, it will force buyers here to turn to the American |
| 2:09.8 | companies. And guess what? They can jack up their prices so long as they stay just a |
| 2:15.4 | little bit below what the imported cost will be with |
| 2:19.4 | this new tax, and that will allow them to raise prices to whom, to all the rest of us, |
... |
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