That's my feeling too. The tariffs are just another variation for the plan to replace income tax with sales tax. You could argue tariffs are a little better because in theory they result in more jobs at home.
> You could argue tariffs are a little better because in theory they result in more jobs at home.
No serious person would argue this because it's ridiculous. Tariffs on components of finished items don't do anything to help manufacture those items. The only way to increase manufacturing with tariffs is to target them to very specific industries or segments of industries and use the proceeds to subsidize the industries you want to create.
Manufacturing just about anything at scale to make it affordable/desirable requires leveraging a deep efficient supply chain. Everything from raw material harvesting to manufacturing to warehousing to transport. It takes decades and a lot of investment and real estate.
Asinine tariffs won't do any of that. They're effectively just a regressive national sales tax.