Rathje Advocates For Tariffs

One of the most thankless jobs in our nation is that of an elected official. While being an elected official means that a majority of the citizen’s in the official’s district approve of the official there is usually a large amount that disapprove of the official at the same time. It is the thankless nature of serving in an elected capacity that result in the closer examination of the said officials motivations. For many that motivation is simply a desire to serve the citizens of the district to the best of the individual’s ability. For others the desire to profit from that service is all too often the primary reason for seeking out elected office. In essence does the official place a higher premium upon being able to profit from his or her time in office.

Unfortunately in the last few weeks I have been receiving communications from some individuals in Iowa’s 2^nd Congressional District that one of their declared candidates may have the profit motive as the dominant motivation for seeking office. The candidate in questions is Steve Rathje. Before I continue I must state that I was not going to run with this because it was unconfirmed, that is I had only received this through secondary sources and had not received confirmation of the event that I am about to show you. Apparently at one of his campaign events Steve Rathje asserted that he would push to institute tariffs on all products imported into the United States. Please watch the following short clip to confirm that he did indeed articulate this view.

This position alone would not be enough alone to cause me to be concerned with his motivation. However the business that Mr. Rathje founded and continues to operate specializes in finding ways for corporations that manufacture products abroad to produce the same products within the United States at a savings. If tariffs were to be instituted as Mr. Rathje advocates, the potential profit that his company would realize would be tremendous. It is this potential profit that throws Rathje’s motivation for running into question.

I truly believe that with his advocation of the imposition of tariffs Mr. Rathje is being extremely shortsighted. While the tariffs would have the short term benefit of increasing the number of jobs in the United States, it would have the unintended consequence of sparking a global trade war. Other nations would have to, out of necessity, impose tariffs on products being shipped to their nation. The only winner in this situation would be governments with the ultimate losers being the consumers of the various nations.