Back in the Before Times, we published an article titled Ethical Consumption: How to Pollute the Planet and Exploit Labor Slightly Less. Since then, times have, uh… changed! Because tariffs!
And while much of our advice on ethical consumption still holds true, today I’m going to be revisiting that advice. My goal is to shine a light on how we should all approach shopping during The Stupidest Trade War while still maintaining our morals and savings rates.
We really know how to have fun here, don’t we?
Let’s kick things off with a question from a follower called Blossom:
Hi Auntie Bitches! I have a question regarding an impasse of ethics and finances, so of course I figured you’d be the experts!
I live in the USA, and absolutely hate the direction things are headed in. I’m inspired by hearing that Canada and a ton of countries in Europe are boycotting absolutely everything American made. This is genius because the only way to hurt the greedy pricks at the top is to hurt their bottom lines.
I really want to join in and buy as few goods that are made in the states as possible. However, I also live here and my household budget is already pretty tight. With this ridiculous trade war going on, imported goods will become even more costly.
I’m stuck between a possibly unlivable budget if fully switching to goods that aren’t made here; or being a tad more financially sound but forced to feed the fascism machine by using American goods.
Please, I’d love some advice on how to navigate this?
– Blossom, alert citizen of Bitch Nation
Blossom is clearly paying attention. We couldn’t be more proud of them for considering activism in the face of personal hardship. We should all be more like Blossom.
But I think there’s a fundamental flaw in how they’re approaching the problem. Nevertheless, I think we can come to a solution that does the least amount of harm to Blossom’s bottom line… while still supporting the changes they want to see. Let’s unpack that!
What are tariffs and why do they matter?
A tariff is an import tax. It’s paid by the importing country, to the importing country. The importing country can only impose tariffs on good coming across its own borders. It cannot force another country to pay tariffs.
Blossom’s whole question is based on the Trump administration’s sweeping new tariffs on goods from nearly every country and penguin-inhabited island on earth. So it’s worth going over what tariffs are, how they work, and how this self-imposed economic hardship is affecting us. I will now explain this in a very serious fashion using very real and important economic policies.
A case study in self-defeating tariffs
Narnia regularly imports vibranium from Wakanda. It’s a crucial ingredient in the manufacture of magical wardrobes. But Narnia, a notably lion-worshipping society, gets offended at Wakanda’s panther-centric culture. So Narnia decides to encourage Narnian wardrobe manufacturers to divest from Wakandan vibranium suppliers. They do this by imposing a 10% tariff on imported vibranium.
This means that if Narnians want to import vibranium from Wakanda, they have to pay a tax to the Narnian government. The Wakandans go about their business as usual. They don’t have to raise the price of vibranium or do anything different with their business practices. But now the Narnian wardrobe manufacturer not only has to pay Wakanda for the vibranium, but pay 10% of the cost of the vibranium to the Narnian government to get it into the country. They don’t want to lose profits. So they pass that tax on to their customers within Narnia by raising the price of wardrobes by 10%.
Now every faun, talking beaver, and precocious Son of Adam or Daughter of Eve in the country is paying more for wardrobes because of something their own government did. They’re pissed enough to pressure the wardrobe manufacturer to find a source of vibranium within Narnia so they don’t have to pay the tariff anymore.
But there is no vibranium in Narnia. There never has been. The only place in the multiverse one can find vibranium is in Wakanda. The Five Tribes of Wakanda have a geographical monopoly on the powerful substance. So the kings and queens of Narnia literally raised prices on their own citizens… for no reason.
We are the Narnians. The Trump administration is the kings and queens of Narnia. Wakanda is the rest of the world. The vibranium is fucking everything.
And the tariffs are 10-145%.
Stay alive!
So what are we average Sons of Adam, Daughters of Eve, and NBs of Lilith, to do?
Your first priority in this scenario, no matter what, should be your own survival and well-being. You can’t help anyone else nor effect positive systemic change if you are starving and evicted.
Yes, this means gritting your teeth and buying what you need to keep food in your belly, a roof over your head, shoes on your feet, and medicine in your system. If you have people depending on your for all of the above, it means making purchasing decisions that keep them healthy and sheltered no matter what.
Do not go without proper nutrition, medication, nor anything else you need just because a fascistic administration is fucking with the economy. Not if you can help it.
In our Burnout Workshop, we talk about how important it is to your loved ones and community to take care of your mental and physical well-being. If you aren’t operating at full strength, it becomes that much harder to take care of others, stay informed, and join the fight to change things for the better.
Take only what you need
For as long as we’re living under these egregious, counterproductive tariffs, the most important principle of ethical consumption is to buy only what you absolutely need. This means food, housing, medications… and very little else. Be judicious about what constitutes a need and a want.
Every time you consider a purchase, your first question should be, “Do I really need this right now? Or can I make do with what I already have?”
Not only is this an unintentionally wallet-friendly way to shop, it’s also very much in the spirit of boycotting! The rest of the world considers much of what we buy in the United States to be luxuries: closets full of redundant clothing; toys, games, and sporting equipment; game consoles, bluetooth speakers, and tablets; dog sweaters and word art and throw pillows oh my!
If you cut out luxuries and stick to necessities, then it follows you’ll be boycotting most companies, American-owned or otherwise.
Shop secondhand
Shopping secondhand is one of the most ethical ways to consume in any economy. It keeps items out of landfills and lowers the demand for production of items that might end up in a landfill. Plus, it’s extremely cheap! And much like the word “bitch,” around here we’re taking “cheap” back with a vengeance.
I’m a bit of a thrift-shopping queen [hair toss] so I’ve covered this topic extensively in the past:
Thrift shopping is having a moment right now because you can’t tariff secondhand goods. They don’t need to be imported. And most are donated so they don’t even contribute to a retailer or manufacturer’s bottom line.
If you’re trying to shield yourself from these batshit tariffs, your first stop for literally anything on your shopping list should be Goodwill.
Local is still better… with exceptions
Next, you should strongly consider patronizing smaller local businesses and artisans for your needs.
I know. Blossom’s whole question is based on the idea of joining foreign countries in boycotting American products and companies. What I’m suggesting is the literal opposite of that. But hear me out.
Many of your local businesses and craftspeople are just as angry about the government’s policies as you are. A lot of them did not fucking vote for the authoritarian regime currently running the joint! In fact, many of them very intentionally voted for the other candidate. 75,019,230 voters chose Kamala Harris—not a trade war, not tariffs… and not kidnapping people and disappearing them to a foreign gulag without due process.
The kind of local businesses and craftspeople I’m talking about don’t really have the bandwidth to export their products at scale anyway. Their market is entirely in-country.
These are our allies in this fight. Boycotting them out of business would be a NET LOSS for us all. It’s worth it to keep them alive.
But what if they chose this?
I spend as much time on r/LeopardsAteMyFace as the next red-blooded, embittered progressive. So I know there are plenty of American businesspeople and manufacturers who welcomed our inhumane, repressive, and economically nonsensical overlords with open arms.
Which is why I am just thrilled to announce that the trash is taking itself out for once!
PublicSquare is a website where businesses “who respect traditional American values” (DOG WHISTLE ALERT) can get themselves listed. It’s basically a directory of every self-identified MAGA business in your neighborhood. And they’re doing us the courtesy of announcing exactly where their values, ethics, and priorities lie! (Read: Firmly wedged up the rectum of an oligarch.)
While PublicSquare’s intent was to encourage Trump voters to support likeminded businesses, for our purposes… it’s a great way to know which of your local businesses to avoid! The free market at work!
Take a gander at their interactive map before you go shopping to make sure you aren’t unwittingly supporting businesses who chose this tariff shitfuckery.
… not to mention the rampant human rights violations.
Why bother boycotting?
At last we get to the crux of Blossom’s question: Other countries are boycotting American products and companies, so shouldn’t progressive, anti-Trump Americans do the same?
Those countries are boycotting American stuff to protest the plan behind the tariffs. That plan? To prioritize the sale of American-made goods over imported goods within American borders. The administration’s end goal is to encourage manufacturing to take place on American soil. (This is a very generous interpretation of what is clearly an ill-conceived and haphazard “plan.”)
So by boycotting, foreign nations are saying “Ok, if you don’t want to import our products, then we won’t import yours either.” Boycotting all American-made products from within the United States doesn’t have the same impact or purpose. See my discussion of local businesses and makers above.
Target your boycotting (pun intended)
But selective boycotting is not without merit! Even if you’re sticking to the rule to buy only what you need to survive, you can still be picky. Remember what I said about PublicSquare?
Some retailers, grocers, and manufacturers are caving to the Trump administration’s destructive and authoritarian policies like a dog rolling over to avoid being kicked. Others enthusiastically supported the regime’s plans and threw money behind that support.
Now it’s time to make them eat it.
They should be punished for choosing The Stupidest Trade War—punished for tariffs and alienating our global economic allies. As Blossom says, “the only way to hurt the greedy pricks at the top is to hurt their bottom lines.” Which is poetically symmetrical and also totally true!
Here’s what we’ve written before about how to do retail activism:
A special note on the service economy
Blossom worries about buying American products. But the United States is not primarily a product economy… it’s a service economy.
This means we don’t so much make things as offer intangibles for sale. Whether it’s software, media, financial services, ride-share and vacation rental apps, or convenient chain retailers and restaurants, services are a huge part of what we “make” and “export.”
In 2021, the service sector represented 77.6% of U.S. GDP.
So if you want to boycott American-made stuff in a way that will really hurt the oligarchs enabling the Trump administration… start with the service sector.
Financial services
Wherever possible, pay cash.
Credit card companies and BNPL (buy now pay later) apps profit every time we swipe our cards or pay with an installment plan. And many of these financial services firms are based in the United States, headed by American businesspeople who have traditionally supported the kind of destructive conservative economic policies that brought Trump to power in the first place. Like Jamie Dimon! Who sucks!
I’m not suggesting we should all shut down our retirement funds and withdraw money from the stock market (PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS). But targeted boycotts of the American financial industry is a lot more effective than a blanket boycott that will hurt allies as much as enemies.
Tech services
Here is a partial list of tech CEOs who showed up for Trump:
- Elon Musk (Tesla)
- Mark Zuckerberg (Meta)
- Jeff Bezos (Amazon)
- Tim Cook (Apple)
- Sundar Pichai (Google)
So boycott away.
Firefox and DuckDuckGo are solid alternatives to Google. It’s pretty easy to avoid buying Teslas. We could all do with less time on social media. And I’ve been railing against Apple’s practice of planned obsolescence for ages!
Also… you guys aren’t still using Amazon, are you? After all: if you want to eat the rich, you need to stop feeding Amazon.
Media services
We are contractually obligated to encourage library patronage at least once per article. So consider this your friendly reminder that if you want to cancel Spotify, Netflix, and all other media streaming services, you can easily replace them with a library card.
This has the added bonus of saving you money and supporting one of our most precious social institutions while it is under attack by the Trump administration.
We’re stronger together
Boycotts are hard. But when done right, they can be wildly effective.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott lasted for thirteen months. That’s over a year of a community banning together and willingly enduring hardship for a righteous cause. Over a year of Alabamans boycotting public transit and walking, cycling, and carpooling—in 1955! Before cars had air conditioning! Imagine the righteous stank of all those freedom fighters packed in like sardines on their way home from a ten-hour shift at the widget factory. Truly they were The Greatest Generation.
We’re already seeing results from the Target boycott after they rolled back their DEI initiatives to appease the Trump administration. The company is panicking so hard their CEO had to take a 45% pay cut to make up for their plummeting sales. I don’t know if I can find a violin small enough for this moment!
My point is that we need to properly identify our allies and our opponents before leaping head-first into a boycott. Just as we should be punishing businesses who support not only Trump’s tariffs but the wholesale kidnapping and torture of human beings… we should reward those that oppose it.
If you liked this topic, you have our Patreon donors (and Blossom!) to thank. Every month our dedicated patrons vote on what topics they want us to cover. And last month they chose “current events but not in a way that is going to depress us and/or make us want to claw our eyes out please we’ve had enough of Signalgate and Qatari Airplanegate and motherfucking DOGEgate.” And I hope they’re happy with the results!