Tracking toy tariffs

[cmoney]

Was ANYone building 50% tariffs into their pricing? It's nuts. I just got the third wave of JoyToy TMNT figures in today, thankfully, but I've got two more on pre-order (they're Chinese, for those who don't know) and am I gonna suddenly have to throw another $50 or whatever at them just to get them here? Because they killed the $800 de minimus rule for incoming parcels too.

 

[Ashtalon]

One word mentioned on this board but hasn't been stated enough in public political discourse is...integrity. I feel you could have destroyed Trump by just hammering the concept home. There's no sense of honor with the man. But I feel his diehard followers don't believe in the concepts of integrity and honor anyway. There's a real vindictiveness to many of his followers. No real agenda and ideology except to lord power over others. Empathy is a weakness which should be exploited. If you cause pain in the process, all the better. There's a real moral decay in our country (and others as well).

These tariffs are all just part of that vindictiveness. They showcase a real surface left thought process to how to improve the economy via an ego-centric idea (Trump and cohorts had a basic thought) and any suffering their ideas cause is irrelevant. Even looking at history is meaningless, despite similar previous attempts having resulted in economic depressions and suffering. No study is needed. They have an idea and haven't thought through the consequences. And they literally don't care who is harmed in the process. Egos must be fed.

Oh and to keep this post a bit more toy-centric, I can't wait till people have to start smuggling toys into the country like drugs.

 

[JakeEkiss]

Posted over in the Longbox Heroes thead, but Fresh Monkey Fiction canceled the Kickstarter for wave 2 of the retro figures over the price increases the tariffs will cause. This industry is in trouble, I think.

Not just this industry. If you're a tabletop person, you might go see what Steve Jackson Games is saying. A majority of book printing and game making happens overseas in China, and the days of that being remotely affordable, if these tariffs stick, are basically over. If those low and mid-tear gaming companies go under, guess who that hits next? Your friendly local gaming/comic store, who are also going to be eating all the new toy and printing costs on comic stuff.

This will be a wave that crashes through the economy and annihilates whole markets. If it's a business that operates on thin margins and needs overseas imports of any kind in it's chain? Dark days ahead.

Like, for real, this could be like an economic asteroid impact.

 

[Justice]

An economic asteroid impact is exactly what I think it is going to be. Just on the toy side of things I don't see how small companies like Fresh Monkey Fiction, Boss Fight, Nacelle, and others will make it.

I can't pay $60 plus for a standard Monster Force figure. $40 was pushing it because I like to army build. You have to think they will lose at LEAST half of their sales if figures end up costing that much.

 

[JakeEkiss]

An economic asteroid impact is exactly what I think it is going to be. Just on the toy side of things I don't see how small companies like Fresh Monkey Fiction, Boss Fight, Nacelle, and others will make it.

I can't pay $60 plus for a standard Monster Force figure. $40 was pushing it because I like to army build. You have to think they will lose at LEAST half of their sales if figures end up costing that much.

Absolutely. I don't know how these smaller outfits will make it. Heck, I don't know how HASBRO will make it without some wild changes. I'm suddenly thinking about my sentinel preorder and thinking what if shipping on that thing suddenly jumps up to be as much or more than the preorder cost? Who knows, we're in chaos world now.

 

[Ru1977]

Oh and to keep this post a bit more toy-centric, I can't wait till people have to start smuggling toys into the country like drugs.

Great. Roving gangs of action figure thugs.

I can't pay $60 plus for a standard Monster Force figure. $40 was pushing it because I like to army build. You have to think they will lose at LEAST half of their sales if figures end up costing that much.

I keep inching closer to preordering the blue suited hooded Cobra Commander standin, but on the way home just now I was thinking... oh man, no way I can preorder any of those wonderful looking figures now. Maaaaaaaan that sucks because I imagine they're gonna get so many cancellations.

And I know it's a little silly, but I don't feel that bad, to center my perspective on the toy industry. But I realize it's just the example I'm very familiar with, while countless others are getting hit the same way.

Absolutely. I don't know how these smaller outfits will make it. Heck, I don't know how HASBRO will make it without some wild changes. I'm suddenly thinking about my sentinel preorder and thinking what if shipping on that thing suddenly jumps up to be as much or more than the preorder cost? Who knows, we're in chaos world now.

Right. Everything is really at risk.

 

[vicious]

I don't know about that. The Trump-owned golf courses that he charges the tax payers millions of dollars every weekend to use are going to do great business over the next three years.

 

[Justice]

I don't know about that. The Trump-owned golf courses that he charges the tax payers millions of dollars every weekend to use are going to do great business over the next three years.

I hear that business is already booming.

 

[Damien]

I just saw on Insta that the latest Kickstarter for Longbox Heroes has been cancelled due to all the tariffs and related nonsense, as was already mentioned above. I think what was most depressing but also most predictable, was the amount of people posting 'we're making America great again!' and similar rhetoric, while continuing to ignorantly parrot the lines about how 'other countries have been doing it to us all this time.'

It's endlessly frustrating and depressing how unstoppably credulous and stupid people can be. And there's just so many of them. And they're just so impervious to sense, reason, or facts. Because the Republicans have spent decades creating a post-truth society where they can say and do anything, and everyone else literally just let them do it.

It's sad. It's infuriating. It's every negative emotion slamming into me in waves.

I live in Canada, as most people here know by now. The fact is... toy collecting has been barely affordable for at least the last several years here and no one has really cared very much. Marvel Legends figures are in the $35-$40 range for a standard figure. My silly little Medieval Spawn Kickstarter figure, after import duties, exchange rate, and shipping, was about 100 dollars.

While I can still largely afford to keep collecting, within reason, I've already started making my peace with the idea that not only do I need to slow way down, but maybe it's time to start wrapping up. Because even if I -can- afford it, that doesn't mean the figures are actually WORTH it. Those are two separate questions. I can afford all kinds of things I don't buy because I don't think the cost is worth the product. A 35-54% tariff for Hasbro, especially in addition to Canada and the US having intertwined economies (OUR dollar is basically in free-fall because of fucking Trump being a dumb cunt), means that Hasbro's action figures will be WELL outside what I am willing to pay for an action figure, even if I can -theoretically- afford it.

I'm sure I'm not alone here. In fact, I fully expect this latest round of idiocy could completely end the collecting market in all of Canada, which has already been on life support for the last several years. And it's just sad to watch a hobby you love just .. die.. because of greed, narcissism, and abject stupidity that was preventable for the last two decades if anyone, at any point, had actually done something.

 

[Justice]

I just saw on Insta that the latest Kickstarter for Longbox Heroes has been cancelled due to all the tariffs and related nonsense, as was already mentioned above. I think what was most depressing but also most predictable, was the amount of people posting 'we're making America great again!' and similar rhetoric, while continuing to ignorantly parrot the lines about how 'other countries have been doing it to us all this time.'

It's endlessly frustrating and depressing how unstoppably credulous and stupid people can be. And there's just so many of them. And they're just so impervious to sense, reason, or facts. Because the Republicans have spent decades creating a post-truth society where they can say and do anything, and everyone else literally just let them do it.

I wonder, when I see comments like that, how many of them are part of the massive bot network whose sole purpose is to spread pro-conservative propaganda. It would explain why we end up without any real pro-Trump comments here on these forums but on huge social media platforms where it is really easy for anyone to get in and spout nonsense it quickly fills up with comments like you are describing. I know the bots amplify some of what is already out there but I'd like to believe there's not nearly as much of it as we think.

 

[Ru1977]

I don't know about that. The Trump-owned golf courses that he charges the tax payers millions of dollars every weekend to use are going to do great business over the next three years.

Well, the one closest to where I live is likely to fall into the ocean any day, so it's not all bad.

 

[EnigmaticClarity]

This is the part (THE part? one of many) driving me crazy about this. He doesn't even have the power to be doing this! Why is Congress so damned blase about just letting him swipe their powers? Why is no one challenging all these BS "emergencies" he's using to justify this biggest of all self-owns?

Because everyone who spoke out or voted against him during his first term was primaried out of office aside from those two senators from states that use ranked-choice voting, i.e. Susan Collins in Maine and Lisa Murkowski in Alaska.

Ranked-choice voting is the fix for all of this, but so few people realize it that it's unlikely to happen in most states for a century or more.

 

[hmmberto]

I bought Mafex Tobey Spidey about a week ago from Hobby-Genki and left him in the "Private Warehouse" to hopefully be shipped when Rogue releases. But now, that figure is going to be tariffed at an additional - what? 24% (if the Japan tariff applies) or 54% (existing 20% + new 34% + removing the de minimis exemption) if the China tariff applies since that is the country of manufacture? If these stay in place there's just no way the hobby survives.

 

[EnigmaticClarity]

What I'm still trying to figure out is what his game is with tariffs. He has one, I just haven't figured it out nor heard anyone else figure it out. Whatever it is he's had it in mind since before he became president the first time, this is just the first time he's been bold enough to do it. People assume he's just dumb, but that has almost never been true. It's easy to be misled into thinking so by listening to him talk, but to believe that HE believes anything he says is a grave mistake. He doesn't. He says whatever he thinks will manipulate people into doing what he wants, and he's been that way for at LEAST two decades now, i.e. long before he finally gave up on becoming a Democratic candidate and switched to a party he realized was easier to ascend in.

It's completely unlike him. Bringing back jobs to a country is the typical reason for tariffs, but our unemployment is so low and has been for so long I don't know why you'd want to bring back the worst jobs around particularly given that they will barely be around in 10-20 years due to automation making them obsolete. They won't even come back for the most part until he's out of office, and long games like that aren't his thing.

He's got some short-term benefit in mind, and I don't know what it is. I want to say it's his way of funding the biggest tax break on the wealthy we've ever seen, but that assumes he cares about blowing up the deficit. There's no evidence he does, so I just can't figure it out.

 

[TheSameIdiot]

Putting on my behavioral scientist hat for a moment:
That level of intense, parasocial worship, even to the point of eroticizing the subject (see those weird “his head on a swole body” memes and such), is inherently unhealthy, no matter who the subject of said parasocial worship is and what their intentions are.
Now, when the subject intentionally courts that behavior, and then punishes any deviance from that behavior, and sets themself up as an unquestionable object of adoration and obedience and *power* over others, there is a very specific, very clinical word for that. It’s been overused (and misused) in popular discourse, and lost much of its intrinsic “punch”, but it’s no less true for all that.
The word is CULT.
It’s an uncomfortable and inconvenient truth and it makes for incredibly awkward conversations, but it is what it is.
And when a sizable chunk of the vox populi needs not just to be convinced and educated, but actually *deprogrammed*, well, that’s a very tall order. Especially because it only works if the person to be deprogrammed *consents* to the deprogramming.
It’s also incredibly difficult to have rational discourse when a basic, shared reality of facts and truths can’t be agreed upon.

Can I enter the weird child-abuse-adjacent "daddy's home" language into the record?

I always think back to a conversation I had years ago at work about shared facts/reality. It must've been 2017 or 2018. I was talking to coworkers about how right-wing media (specifically Rush Limbaugh) taught his audience to distrust the government, academia, science, and media. I told my coworkers I didn't see how we could peacefully get through it as a country. If half the country is skeptical of the very foundations that keep it alive... well, I don't know. I guess what happens is what's happening now.

My best guess at the time was a national divorce. I don't know. How long will blue states let the administration pillage them for tax dollars and send nothing in return? If the Constitution is vapor (it basically is at this point, the Executive Branch disregards both Congress and the Judiciary), then we have no union.

I just saw on Insta that the latest Kickstarter for Longbox Heroes has been cancelled due to all the tariffs and related nonsense, as was already mentioned above. I think what was most depressing but also most predictable, was the amount of people posting 'we're making America great again!' and similar rhetoric, while continuing to ignorantly parrot the lines about how 'other countries have been doing it to us all this time.'

It's endlessly frustrating and depressing how unstoppably credulous and stupid people can be. And there's just so many of them. And they're just so impervious to sense, reason, or facts. Because the Republicans have spent decades creating a post-truth society where they can say and do anything, and everyone else literally just let them do it.

It's sad. It's infuriating. It's every negative emotion slamming into me in waves.

I live in Canada, as most people here know by now. The fact is... toy collecting has been barely affordable for at least the last several years here and no one has really cared very much. Marvel Legends figures are in the $35-$40 range for a standard figure. My silly little Medieval Spawn Kickstarter figure, after import duties, exchange rate, and shipping, was about 100 dollars.

While I can still largely afford to keep collecting, within reason, I've already started making my peace with the idea that not only do I need to slow way down, but maybe it's time to start wrapping up. Because even if I -can- afford it, that doesn't mean the figures are actually WORTH it. Those are two separate questions. I can afford all kinds of things I don't buy because I don't think the cost is worth the product. A 35-54% tariff for Hasbro, especially in addition to Canada and the US having intertwined economies (OUR dollar is basically in free-fall because of fucking Trump being a dumb cunt), means that Hasbro's action figures will be WELL outside what I am willing to pay for an action figure, even if I can -theoretically- afford it.

I'm sure I'm not alone here. In fact, I fully expect this latest round of idiocy could completely end the collecting market in all of Canada, which has already been on life support for the last several years. And it's just sad to watch a hobby you love just .. die.. because of greed, narcissism, and abject stupidity that was preventable for the last two decades if anyone, at any point, had actually done something.

Whenever I think of Biden sitting on his hands for four years, it sends my blood boiling.

I think Biden was a great president. Definitely the best of my lifetime. His economic and climate policies were phenomenal. But his legacy rises and falls with trusting the American people to vote against Trump instead of throwing his ass in prison. If I were president, he would've been perp walked down Pennsylvania Ave on January 21, 2021. You don't let an insurrection walk free. You make an example of them. I'm mad with envy at the way South Korea and Brazil handled similar situations.

What I'm still trying to figure out is what his game is with tariffs. He has one, I just haven't figured it out nor heard anyone else figure it out. Whatever it is he's had it in mind since before he became president the first time, this is just the first time he's been bold enough to do it. People assume he's just dumb, but that has almost never been true. It's easy to be misled into thinking so by listening to him talk, but to believe that HE believes anything he says is a grave mistake. He doesn't. He says whatever he thinks will manipulate people into doing what he wants, and he's been that way for at LEAST two decades now, i.e. long before he finally gave up on becoming a Democratic candidate and switched to a party he realized was easier to ascend in.

It's completely unlike him. Bringing back jobs to a country is the typical reason for tariffs, but our unemployment is so low and has been for so long I don't know why you'd want to bring back the worst jobs around particularly given that they will barely be around in 10-20 years due to automation making them obsolete. They won't even come back for the most part until he's out of office, and long games like that aren't his thing.

He's got some short-term benefit in mind, and I don't know what it is. I want to say it's his way of funding the biggest tax break on the wealthy we've ever seen, but that assumes he cares about blowing up the deficit. There's no evidence he does, so I just can't figure it out.

I remember hearing similar from you at Fwoosh. I think you have easily the most generous interpretation of the president's actions of anyone here.

I don't think he does anything intentionally. He's a dumb man obsessed with looking "strong." He has no impulse control. There is no master plan. He hears the term "trade deficit" and thinks it means we're getting ripped off. Truth is, he's the kid in class who didn't do the reading. Unlike most of those kids, though, he thinks he knows more about the book than anyone in the room.