If Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs on foreign imports weren't already divisive enough, the President of the United States is now being accused of using artificial intelligence to help craft his financial plan that will supposedly usher in America's next 'Gilded Age'. Announcing a baseline 10% and levying harsher tariffs on the likes of China and Vietnam, a defiant POTUS told crowds at the White House Rose Garden how other nations have been "looting, pillaging, raping and plundering" the USA for decades.
Even though many support Donald Trump and have praised him for his strong stance, there are plenty of alarm bells ringing for others. As well as watching some $2.3 trillion get wiped off the stock market in seconds, there are concerns that the price of goods will continue to go up... even as eggs already cost a fortune.
Elsewhere, there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to how he calculated some of these customizable tariffs, with one of the remotest places in the world being targeted despite having no inhabitants (aside from a lot of penguins).
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According to Cointelegraph, there are potential signs that these Trumpenomics were actually concocted by an AI chatbot. Giving us some serious The Wizard of Oz vibes, the site reports how it looks like the tariffs simply divide the trade deficit between the USA and a particular country by the value of the goods imported from it. Then, it’s simply a case of dividing this by two.
Trump's critics were quick to point out how ChatGPT is known for performing this exact calculation, with crypto trader Jordan "Cobie" Fish asking OpenAI's chatbot: "What would be an easy way to calculate the tariffs that should be imposed on other countries so that the US is on even playing fields when it comes to trade deficit. Set a minimum of ten percent?"
Crunching the numbers, take the USA's trade deficit with the European Union in 2024 ($235.6 billion), divide it by exports to the US ($605.8 billion), and you get 39%. If you divide that by two, it neatly rounds to the 20% tariff that's just been imposed.
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Economic journalist James Surowiecki took to X and vented: "Instead, for every country, they just took our trade deficit with that country and divided it by the country's exports to us. What extraordinary nonsense this is."
Even though the White House maintains that the formula for the reciprocal tariffs was created by the Council of Economic Advisers and based on factors including trade barriers and tariff pass-through rates. Now, that's all being called into question.
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Many on X have noted that if you ask ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, or Grok about an 'easy' way to solve trade defecits, they all come up with the same 'formula'.
There's been a notable backlash, with the Journal of Public Economics editor Wojtek Kopczuk posting: "Confirmed, ChatGPT. Exactly what the dumbest kid in the class would do, without edits."
Someone else pointed out: "I suspect this is also why countries like Iran, which we basically do not trade with, gets off so easily. No trade = no trade deficit!"
A third suggested: "They didn't even care enough about the American economy to do any of the work themselves. It almost feels... impeachable? How could sloppily using AI to create domestic policy, then hiding it, be consistent with the Oath of Office?"
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It's all a bit awkward, especially considering Trump was accused of using AI to create some of his executive orders.
Whether Trump was just copying someone's homework or there was some genuine working out done ahead of these tariffs, it seems like our fears of World War III have been put on hold as we deal with this global trade war.