April 22, 2025 • 41 mins
U.S. stocks fell sharply, and the dollar index slid to a three-year low on Monday amid President Trump’s continued criticism of the Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell. While questioning Powell’s policy approach, the President has been urging the central bank to immediately lower interest rates, which is rattling investors. Gregory Stoller, professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business joined us to discuss the current state of the stock market and the economy.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's Night Side with Dan Ray on w b Z,
Boston's Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
All Right, welcome back everyone. We're going to change topics
here and we're going to welcome back to the program.
Professor Greg Staller, he teachers at Boston University School of Business,
the Questrum School of Business at Boston University. Professor Staller,
welcome back to Nightside. How are you.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Thank you, Dan, appreciate the opportunity to come back.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Well, you were my go to guy here. We talked
a couple of weeks ago about tariffs, which of course
have royaled the stock market. The market today had a
pretty good day. It was almost a mirror reflection of yesterday,
which was a pretty bad day.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
That was absolutely correct. It was about two point seven
percent today and it was down two point five percent yesterday.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yeah, and the future suggests it's opposed to open tomorrow
a little higher, which again some people believe that some
people don't. Well, we'll see how it works out. A
lot of people are worried at this point. I guess
what were the factors today that that perhaps helped quiet
(01:17):
the market. The market down It was up around a
thousand points middle of the day, and then in the
early afternoon, it slid back down about six hundred, about
four hundred points down into the six hundreds, and then
it came back up and end of the day, I
guess eleven hundred to the good. What was it the
(01:38):
president's comments that he's not going to fire Powell? Did
that make at least no plan scurrently to fire Powell?
Is that much?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Ballace bounced towards ballast towards the end of the day.
I think what caused the markets to go up in
the first part of the day was Trump gave an
indication that maybe the China related tariffs that are up
to one hundred and forty five percent at this point
might be coming down. And I think he's also getting
pressure from a variety of different advisors and constituents, and
(02:11):
I think he is rethinking his approaching.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Okay, now, of all the people who I know, nobody
has been to China with as many students on as
many trips as you have. You began this process how
long ago in your career as a professor.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
As a professor, from my first first trip to China
in two thousand and one, but as a civilian, if
you will, my first time was in nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Okay, so you got over there in nineteen ninety four.
Now it's thirty years later. We're in twenty twenty five,
so it's really almost thirty one years later. How substantially,
since China is our big economic competitor, how substantially has
China changed in the thirty years from the China that
(03:06):
you first arrived at in nineteen ninety four to the
China of today.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Remarkably so. In the late eighties early nineties, there was
something which is in Chinese called geigo kaifong or the
reform and opening that you know. Again, this is not
Nixon opening China with his historic trip, et cetera. But
this is more of an economic perstroika of sorts. Is
China decided that they wanted to embrace the West, and
(03:35):
they ended up having a really great system where they
would take foreign investor capital, and they would build factories,
they would use labor, and they would export those goods
and services to an extent, sort of like India did
with business process outsourcing to the rest of the world.
And everybody was happy until the wheels came off the bus.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Okay, let me take get back to ninety four when
did did China was? Was it at some point China
granted Favored nation status by the World Trade Organization?
Speaker 3 (04:10):
Yes, absolutely, the favored trade status came in the early
two thousands, and it u and I'm just checking the
exact date on that. And the fact of the matter
is that it further continued to let the good times
(04:31):
keep rolling off in the sense that back back in
ninety four, Dan labor rates were so cheap, and the
Chinese weren't concerned at that point about clean water, they
weren't concerned about providing living wages. They were looking at
themselves as sort of a direct competitor to Japan in
the in the in the decade of Japan inc. Produce
(04:53):
it for low dollars and sell it off and make
a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Okay. It also was a time, if I remember correctly,
with there was some political reform. With economic reform, there
was also some political reform. And actually I think that
churches were allowed to Chinese citizens were allowed to exercise,
(05:20):
you know, some limited form of free speech, and churches
were treated a little bit better, you know, after all
of the events of Tenement Square in nineteen eighty nine,
et cetera. So there was there not just there was
there was trade reform, economic reform, but there was also
some what we would view as political reform.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
That's my one hundred and by the way, beyond most
Favored Nation status they received they being China joined the
World Trade Organization in December of twenty oh one. So
you're right, it was the combination of everything. It was
political reform, I think what I would call cultural reform
and economic reform. And you know, to your point, we're
(06:00):
talking about two decades ago, right, two decades ago, everything
was coming. The United States was buying, the West was buying,
and China was manufactured.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
And there was there was a lot of Western money
that went into China to produce the manufacturing plants. And
there's I'm sure you know this stuff cold, but there
are a lot of American companies that took their manufacturing
over to China because they felt it was beneficial to
(06:31):
their stockholders and to their bottom line.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
One hundred percent. So if you think about just FBI
foreign direct investments, and you think about where it started
in the New millennium, it was forty billion US dollars.
A little more than a decade later, eleven years to
be specific it ballooned to one hundred and twenty four billion.
(06:55):
So think about that, in eleven years it went literally, yeah, tripled.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Okay, and we weren't worried about that at that time.
I don't recalled. I remember in the nineties people talked
about our trade in balance, but it was always our
trade in balance with the world. There was no focus
on China. It was we were we were buying too
(07:22):
much and exporting too little. I remember that was a
political issue. And then that political issue seemed to go away.
I don't know why the lact way, but correct. Did
we as the American public just lose interest in that?
Did the politicians decide, hey, this isn't driving the votes,
so therefore we'll, you know, we'll go off and highlight
(07:43):
other issues.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I think what shange good question. By the way, I
think what changed is that in those eleven years, China
kept improving its wages, that they moved from a living
wage to actually, as I mentioned earlier, providing infrastry ructure,
clean water, and opportunity for their citizens to not have
(08:06):
to take a train for thirteen hours over Chinese New
Year and live in a dorm like. Everything started to
improve for the People's Republic of China. The problem with
that is the labor rates that the West was relying
upon in Western companies in terms of getting good margins
steadily went down. And because they steadily went down, I
(08:26):
think people said, the emperor no longer has the economic clothes,
and why are we continuing to buy these products that
the margins aren't so good. Let's talk about domestic manufacturing.
And of course people said it's too expensive the United States.
And then all of a sudden, as if a switch
was flipped, people said, oh, by the way, we have
a trade of balance, and the politicians just absolutely jumped
(08:48):
on it like a shark who senses blood.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Right. But I think this is something that President Trump
has believed in for a long time. I think if
you go back to his first term, you'll see there
was some tariffs that were imposed. I don't know how
successfully they resulted, But this is not his first rodeo
in terms of tariffs.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Correct, Oh, not at all, not at all. In you know, again,
if you think about history. Right back in twenty nineteen,
the CDP, the Customs and Border Protection Office, raised seventy
three billion in tariff revenue that was in the fiscal
(09:29):
year of twenty nineteen. To put that into perspective, since
January twentieth of this year, they've raised twenty one billion dollars.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
So on a percentage on a on a basis, it's
almost the.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Same one hundred percent, correct.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
I mean if they raised seventy three billion in tariffs
in twelve months, that's six billion a month, which sounds
like a lot of money. But compared to you and
you said, it's twenty one billion and we're almost four
months in, that's about six billion. It's the same. What
(10:11):
was it? What was it in the interregnum, if you will,
when Biden was in the White House? That did tariff
stay pretty much this where Trump had placed them.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Or tariff stayed the same, Yeah, stayed the same.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
So so now he the president, with his you know,
conversation about Liberation Day, he's dramatically increased the tariffs correct
across the globe.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
Correct his bowl is And again you know me, Dan,
hopefully your listeners know me. I'm always trying to be objective,
so I can speak in support of President Trump's approach.
I can speak against President Trump's approach in support of
his approach. He's hoping that number is two billion a day.
(11:02):
I don't think we're getting anywhere close to that. Again,
according to CNBC, as I said earlier, we might be
at around two hundred and fifty million a day. But
last I checked my map, two hundred and fifty million
is a lot different than two billion dollars.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, even if you get two hundred and fifty million
a day, that that's maybe two billion a week. You're
now at eight billion a month roughly, so correct, you know? Obviously? Well, okay, listen,
don't want to get too deep into the weeds. When
I come back, I want to ask you about your
most recent trips there and what you're hearing, what China
(11:45):
is thinking. I want to put you in the position
of interpreting for us what China is thinking. At this point,
I don't think China has budged. I know that that
President Trump says he has a great relationship with Chairman
g Presidents. I get all of that, but I haven't
seen them moving. And at this point, I don't know
(12:09):
how long the President can hang with this without some
significant results. And I don't think we've seen the results
that he had hoped for this quickly. We're about a
month in not quite a month, and.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
I would agree with that. And by the way, to
prepare for tonight, I have read multiple articles in Mandarin
in the Chinese business press.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
I all interview I understanding is you speak seven languages.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Yes, that's correct. I also talked with the Chinese journalist.
So I would like to believe that I have a
little bit of insight into what China is thinking right
now in response to the reciprocal tariffs that have been
placed upon them.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
All right, that is exactly what we're going to talk about.
If you would like to ask my guests. He's a
great friend. He's been on this program many many times
over the years. Uh, he is really one of my
go to guests on anything. Oh, he is my go
to guest on China. Professor Greg Styler with the Questum
(13:16):
School of Business at Boston University. He has led delegations
of students, both undergrads and on graduate students to China
dozens of times. We'll get to all of that, and
your phone calls six one, seven, two, five, four to
ten thirty. If you really want to talk to someone
who has spent time in China, who understands China's view,
(13:39):
they are not as impetuous. I think, as we are
as a society, we look for a turnaround within forty
eight hours. They think of a turnaround, I think in
terms of a short term turnaround, in terms of like
forty eight years. We'll get to that as well with
my guest professor Greg Styller right after this break six one, seven, two, five, four,
ten thirty or six months seven nine three to one,
(14:01):
ten thirty. Great opportunity for you to ask a question
of someone who will give you a straight answer about
a very complicated issue.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Night Side Thought with Dan Ray. I'm WBZ Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
My guest professor Gregg Staller. He is with the Boston
University's Master lecturer at the Boston University Questrum School of Business.
How many times have you taken students to China over
the years.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
I've been to China over fifty times.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
Okay, in many of those with accompanying students. We can
talk about that a little bit so so from China's perspective.
I know you sent me a little summary which I
really appreciated. The time you spent today you were checking
out China television news, financial times in China, and in
another website called Caxon, which I'm not familiar with. That
(15:02):
is a Chinese based newspaper or.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
Is it a correct It's in Chinese, it's pronounced I seen,
and it is the probably equivalent of Yahoo Finance here
in the States.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Gotcha? Okay? Perfect? Okay? So so they obviously representing many
their articles represent the philosophy of the government more so
than say, the New York Times and ABC and yeah,
you know, Yahoo Finance represents the philosophy necessarily of the
incumbent administration here. So when you read them, you're really
(15:37):
reading what the Chinese government believes it. Am I correct
when I say that? Or is that too correct?
Speaker 3 (15:41):
And obviously you know we can we can split hairs.
I'm not necessarily sure that all three of those articles
are direct mouthpieces for the Chinese government, right, not I
but I but I think they are directionally correct.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
Yes, okay, and so so cumulatively, what do you think
Chinese position here is when when when President Trump sits
down with his advisors and he says to them, you
know what's going on? What are they thinking? How come
they haven't folded their tent here? We'll hit him with
one hundred and tariff of one hundred and forty five percent.
What's going on?
Speaker 3 (16:14):
Would I tak Yeah, I would tell them that there
are three things going on. One is they are displaying
a show of confidence. Second is that they are displaying
a show of pragmatism. And third is they are calling
President Trump's bluff, saying that he overestimated his bargaining approach
(16:36):
on the terifficient.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Okay, so how long are they willing to to steer
him down? At what point does either side give or
could this go one now for months?
Speaker 3 (16:49):
So that was the epicody that I had as I
finished my third article and actually checked this with a
Chinese national to make sure that my translation was correct.
There are in the process of rejiggering their supledging. They
are already in advanced discussions with German companies in China.
They're already in discussions with Latin American companies in China.
(17:11):
And they basically said, we gave the United States, for
all intents and purposes, a right of first trading refusal.
We love working with the United States. We worked with
the United States since you know they got into the
World Trade Organization in twenty oh one. But if times
are going to change, and a direct translation from the article.
If the US is proving to be unreliable, we still
(17:32):
have a job to do.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
So in in layman's terms. In Layman's terms, what is
the impact on us if that is not a bluff,
but that is what they really believe in, what they
really intend to follow through with.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
I think to your point before you went into a break,
that the Chinese perspective of time is a lot different
than we have it here in the United States, so
they're in no particular rush. I think that President Trump
was hoping for a quick turnaround on this, and it
certainly is not happening as quickly as he would like.
(18:12):
So I think that China is taking the pack of
We'll keep talking and hopefully we can broker some sort
of settlement, but we're not going to rush the process.
And if you guys aren't making a decision, we are
going to rejigger our supply chain. And it's sort of
the game of musical economic chairs, and we hope the
United States still has a chair when the music stops.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Okay, when we get back, I'd like to talk about
what is it that we so desperately need from China
that that would would be a pressure point.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Great, great question.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Yeah, and how long can we do without before a
real crisis. I mean we're in a crisis now, but
the crisis intensifies, that will be where we'll start on
the other side of the news at the bottom of
the hour. My name is Dan Ray. This is Nightside
listening to my guest, Boston University professor at the School
(19:13):
of at the School the Question School of Business. He's
a master lecturer there. I was stunned that you speak
seven languages. Greg. I've known you and I have a
tough time speaking one and I'm the talk show host.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Well, I'll keep in mind there. I stick at sports
and I don't do hold improvement on the weekend, so
I need something to keep myself.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
In the.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Professor Greg Staller, the Boston University Question School of Business.
If you'd like to join the conversation, you have the numbers,
love to hear your questions. I'm trying to think of
the best questions I can come up with, but I'm
sure you have some better questions, So feel free to
join our conversation at six month seven two five four
to ten thirty six month seven nine three one tenth
(20:00):
Already Professor Staller was telling me that it was with
us just two or three weeks ago. I can go
back and find the date. He said that he never
had such response in all his times here on Nightside
to this topic, which is in very large part why
I want him to come back tonight and stay with
us on a regular basis, because I think, just as
(20:20):
COVID was the story of twenty twenty, this my instinct
political instinct tells me this is the story of twenty
twenty five. We'll be back on Nightside right after the
news at the bottom of the hour.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
You're on Nightside with Dan Ray on WBZY, Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
You are indeed on night Side with Dan Ray, but
you were also on with Professor Greg Staller. He is
a master lecturer at the Boston University Questum School of Business.
It's been back and forth to China dozens of times
in the last thirty years. Knows that economy as well
as anyone I could imagine. So Greg, the question we
(21:06):
left with on the other side of the break was,
we're a We're an impatient We are impatient people in America.
We want things done quickly and effectively and efficiently. At
what point is this going to start to. Right now,
we're worried about the fluctuations in the stock market, and
(21:26):
people to worry about their fro one ks and their
iras and all of that sort of stuff, their wroth accounts.
They're worried about the value of their investments. When does,
when does this get better anytime soon? And how do
you see it getting better? Let's look positively, does the
(21:47):
President Trump announced deals with sixty or seventy five major
nations and isolate China or the China just hang out
and effect make us uh so uncomfortable that that we're
missing medications or we're missing computer chips. So whatever, what
(22:11):
how does this end? Do you think?
Speaker 4 (22:13):
Again?
Speaker 3 (22:13):
Good question, Dan. You you might think I know a
lot about China. You know more about politics than I
could ever know in probably two lifetimes. It's my understanding
at that's true, Uh, Craig if I'm wrong, but I
believe that a number of elections, either at the local,
the state or the national level, are often decided by
people in terms of the impact of their pocketbook. And
(22:35):
I think if if I think, if it's and you
can you know, give all of the statistics that you
want as a political candidate of how well you've done,
But if the economy isn't humming along, people are going
to use that against you. That's my understanding, right.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
And there are special elections that have come up recently.
Even though the Republicans held two congressional seats in Florida,
the margin of victory in those seats are pretty disquieting
for the Republican Party because these were districts that in
northern Florida, which President Trump carried by some thirty two
or thirty four points, big, big, big victories, and they
(23:14):
were within March, they were within ten point margins, huge difference,
trending in the wrong way for the Republicans. So those
would be a couple of canaries in the coal mine
for the Republicans. And you know, at some point there'll
be more of this, so that you know the politics
very well as well. I'm more interested in the economic
(23:35):
impact here.
Speaker 3 (23:36):
So the economic impact is that, according to a number
of sources that I've been reading for the past three
or four weeks, this could represent this being the tariffs,
a loss of almost five thousand dollars per household if
things continue unchanged.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
Is that worst case scenario.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
That is worst case scenario, and even though he's put
a pause on it for ninety days, multiple outlets have
reported that it could go anywhere from a low of
three thousand to a higher seven thousand. I splewit the
difference at five as the worst case scenario, and it
could be a problem.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Okay. Meanwhile, China sits back and there's nothing that we
have or that they need that they now cannot afford.
I mean, I assume that's part of the White House strategy.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Right, I mean, the White House strategy is saying, let's
have this be a test of wills, and let's outstair
one another and hopefully one side will blink. I mean
to an extent. You know, I'm reminded by a great
quote by Woody Allen that the definition of a good
compromise is when both parties walk away dissatisfied. So I
(24:53):
think that sure, you know, if President Trump is willing
to give in a little, if President She is willing
to give it a little, I don't think either side
is going to declare victory. But don't don't forget Dan
that China, only second to Japan, holds over seven hundred
and fifty billion of US treasuries. Okay, oh yeah, they
are not about to just you know, say goodbye and
(25:17):
and just dismiss out of hand the United States and
say see you later. It's the nice doing business with you.
They know that a lot is invested in our economy.
But I think the biggest thing that is concerning to
me is there is no other nation on Earth where
saving face is more important than in China. And I
think that is the canary in the coal mine that
(25:40):
you mentioned earlier, is that President she cannot just capitulate
because that would be a cultural disaster. And by the way,
I'm not so sure that President Trump could easily capitulate.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
It him right, which again would point you towards a
compromise of some sort. Let's let's work some phone calls
in here. Let me go to Dennis Dennis, Dennis, appreciate
your calling in. Professor Greg Staller is with us. What's
your question of comment, Dennis.
Speaker 4 (26:09):
Good evening, gentlemen. I believe that could you tell me
the advantage in precious metals and how much in an
advent is to China have over the US and precious metals.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
A huge advantage. A lot of what we take for
granted in our cell phones are precious metals or or
if you will, that exists in China, and that's part
of the reason why the United States needs access to that.
It's no longer a situation Dennis, that it is a
lower labor costs, but it's rather access to minerals, it's
(26:48):
access to components, and it's access to supply chain.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
And one other question, okay, energy, how much you're going
to do does the Chinese have over the US and
solar energy.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Not as much as rare minerals. But again I think
that you know, and this is the example Dan and
Dennis that I use in my classes all the time.
I wear a regular run of the male pair of
dress shoes whenever I teach, and that is probably one
hundred and fifty one hundred and seventy five dollars a pair. Right,
(27:27):
It's not gooky, it's not some design or brand. If
the tariffs continue and that cost increases to three hundred dollars,
I'm going to start working sneakers. I'm going to start
going there for it. I mean, I'm not going to
pay three hundred dollars for a regular pair of everyday shoes.
And I think that's the problem right now, whether it's solar,
(27:47):
whether it's cell phones or everything else. To Dan's point
a few minutes ago, everybody's dealing with it, and so
far we have hope that it's a ninety day reprieve.
Blah blah blah blah blah. If that ninety day reprieve
expires and we go back to where we were a
couple of weeks ago, then I think Americans are going
to get really, really frustrated in terms of ballooning prices.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
All right, Hey, thank you very much, gentlemen, and we'll
tell you later. Dan, appreciate your call.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Dennis, talk soon. Let me go to Doreen and Chelsea Dorain.
You're professor Greg Staller.
Speaker 5 (28:20):
Go right ahead, Dorian, good evening to both, Hie, Dan,
I think everybody should just buy the cheap brand and
everybody will be equal.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
I don't know that that's going to necessarily work that way,
but I guess that's that's one strategy individual should use.
Are you feeling any any crunch y at Doreen and you're,
you know, going to the grocery store or anything like that.
What's what's what's your economic status? No?
Speaker 5 (28:55):
I don't because i'll uh, i'll buy products that uh
not named brands.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
Okay, so.
Speaker 5 (29:09):
Yes, because you see, for instance, can I mention Campbell soup?
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (29:15):
Absolutely good, all right, it's on the shelf.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
Right if you buy all of Campbell soup tonight for dinner,
as a matter.
Speaker 5 (29:22):
Of fact, go right ahead, nothing wrong with it. If
you look towards your right, you'll see, well, I don't
know now how they display them on a shelf, the
name brand like stopping shop Rand, it'll.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
Be a little less expensive. I got your point.
Speaker 5 (29:41):
Yeah, and then the next next to that might be
higher than Campbell.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Right, yeah, So you're a shopper and you'll you'll adjust accordingly.
That's just you know, that's what probably a lot of
people are going to try to do.
Speaker 4 (29:53):
Yeah, so.
Speaker 5 (29:56):
About a car, like for instance, I don't care when
everybody says, and anybody does about what car they want
to drive, But I'll take a forward any old time.
Speaker 3 (30:10):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
That's that's one of the things that maybe will result here.
Maybe people will.
Speaker 5 (30:15):
Be doing well because again, if you know, we don't
really know where the paths.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
I understand that.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Yeah, but I understand that. But it may be an
impetus for some of the car manufacturers to do more
work here and have less tariffs than the car I
don't know Greg on that question. How quickly can we
adjust our automotive industry in this country. It seems to
me that's not something that we can get get it
(30:45):
turned around overnight.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
So during a great question or great comment. By the way, again,
based on multiple outlets that I researched, even US made
cars have fort of foreign parks, So it's not this
is not binary, this is not what we should buy
American and we'll solve all of our problems. I will
agree with you, Doreen that it certainly will help. And again,
(31:08):
as I said earlier Dan, towards the top of the hour,
I can speak for a same amount of time and
support of what President Trump's trying to do and against
what President Trump's trying to do, and support of what
he's trying to do. To Doreen's point is get more
Americans to invest in our own industry and buying American pros. Right,
and by the way, sixty percent is still a majority.
(31:29):
So even if you buy a forward, you're still investing
in the USA because you've got sixty percent of the
parts manufactured here. So, Doreen, you're making a lot of sense.
But Dan, as you said, you can't just up and
move a supply chain. You might be able to do
it with I don't know, carpeting or flooring. You might
be able to do it with other components that aren't
(31:50):
as technologically complicated, but you can't do it with computers
or phones. I mean that could take years.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yeah. Yeah. And also I'll be going back to the
car thing. If if there's a car that that is
hit with tariff because it's made totally overseas, that's going
to be a pretty more expense more expensive car. If
an American car, domestic car is hit with a fort tariff,
(32:18):
meaning forty percent of the value of the car, is
it gets hit tariff of some level that's better than
one hundred percent tariff, so that that might be a
sufficient savings for some people. Do rein them up. My break,
I gotta let you go is always. Thank you so much.
I appreciate you, Chris.
Speaker 5 (32:35):
Thank you, good night, great night, by bye bye, thank you.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
My guest is a professor Greg Staller of the Questrum
School of Business at Boston University. I have some other
questions we have some other callers. Let's we'll keep rolling
here right after this break, we'll try to get everyone in.
I'm going to ask quick direct questions of Professor Staller,
and I haven't even touched upon the experiences that he
(33:00):
has had. We have talked about them before, of him
taking American students US students to China and interacting with
Chinese companies and which has been a great, great success
for various schools, including obviously Professor Staller's classes. And I
guess that also might grind to a halt, but we'll
(33:23):
talk about that as well. Coming back on Nightside, It's
Night Side with Dan Ray on.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
My guests Professor Greg Staller, Boston University, Question School of Business,
Greg real quickly and again we're getting tired on time here.
I want to get some more callers in. Give me
your assessment of the economic team that Trump has assembled
around him. You must have a sense of who these
(33:52):
men and women are.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
I think that to President Trump's credit, he has assembled
a team of loyalists, and I think in the world
of politics, again, I want to stay in my lane, Dan,
I'm not a political scientist. I don't teach that stuff.
But from my understanding, there is so much at stake
in terms of running a country that some presidents obviously
have people who are not necessarily fourth right in terms
(34:17):
of being a team player. I think to President Trump's credit,
he's tried to assemble two types of people on the team.
One is loyalist and people who come from extremely large
business backgrounds that have run publicly traded companies, that are
captains of industry who's hoping that their industry experience is
going to affect meaningful change, as opposed to President Biden,
(34:39):
who took more of a politically savvy approach to getting
legislation done.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Okay, And I also just quickly want to where are
you on consumers are going to have a big impact.
There'll be an impact on our consumers, but probably it'd
be small business owners. So we're going to feel it first.
How quickly will have they already begun to feel it?
Speaker 3 (35:06):
It's already happened. It's already happened over the past ten days.
And I think that's the area of this that I'm
most concerned about, is that people. A good friend of
mine is in the carpeting, it's flooring business, and he
called all of his customers and said, because of the tariffs,
the quotes that I gave you are essentially going to
expire in five or six days, So if you'd like
(35:29):
to have that original quote honored, please pay in full
over the next five or six days. And he had
something like a ninety five percent positive response rate because
he knows that as of day seven he isn't in
a position to absorb the increases. And I think, once
again that's the area that concerns me. Apple, Walmart, picked
whatever large publicly traded company you want. Obviously Wall Street's
(35:53):
going to scream and yell if their margins go down,
but for a quarter or two they could take the hit.
Small business, this is their vocation, this is their livelihood.
They're not about to absorb a thirty percent increase in
cost or twenty ten percent, pick whatever number you want.
They're going to try and pass it on to the consumer.
And the average consumer isn't going to be able to
afford that. And to Doriam's point, you don't find maybe
(36:16):
you buy a local brand, but that's assuming the local
brand hasn't been impacted by a place.
Speaker 2 (36:21):
Yeah, all great points. Let me go real quickly, Joel
and Newton. Joel, we're fast running out of time here
with unfortunately with Professor Staller, every hour with him goes
by real quickly. It got you in here quickly, go
right ahead.
Speaker 6 (36:34):
That's a I appreciate it. So I just had a
hypothetical to run by us a Staller. So I did
know Trump diminished the terrorists for cell phones and computers?
Speaker 4 (36:48):
Correct?
Speaker 3 (36:49):
Yes, that's correct.
Speaker 6 (36:51):
Yeah, but does that promote like us building it in
the United States of America when somebody that computer. So
that's the pay one hundred and forty percent terriff on battery.
Speaker 3 (37:06):
Very important. Ye, that that's exactly the point is, Joel,
is that he is hoping through no fault of his own.
By the way, I respect what the President is trying
to do, which is to have US buy American made products.
The problem is that so much of what we use
is either a car or electronics. As I said earlier,
(37:26):
you can't just up and move the supply chain in
ten minutes and say, oh, we're just gonna we're going
to inshore back to the United States. This stuff takes time.
Now companies have been gradually doing that. They've been de
risking by getting out of China. They've been going to Vietnam,
They've been going to Laos, They've been going to Cambodia,
they've been going to Puerto Rico, They've been going to
(37:47):
all other locations. But a the process takes time, and
something that the Chinese should be very proud of is
they have a lot of infrastructure built so it's never
a problem to get the stuff from the factory floor
to a port of call and then exported out other countries.
That's a evolving process.
Speaker 6 (38:07):
Noah, I appreciate that, but I just feel he's going
about it willy nilly, and we're going to pay for it,
that's all.
Speaker 3 (38:14):
I Again, I'm trying to be objective. I think I will.
I will turn that question over to Dan, But I
see what you're saying. Angel.
Speaker 7 (38:21):
Well, let me just say this, Joel, if if, if
you're correct and and we end up paying for it
in the end, he and the Republican Party will pay
for a big time correct.
Speaker 3 (38:32):
Yeah, And I hope people realize that.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
But well, I think I think it's just they vote
with their pocketbook. As as Professor Stallas said earlier, I'm
going to try to get one more in here. Thank you.
Joel Warren, I got you really ted on time here.
I got about a minute quick comment or quick question
for professor.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
That's a quick question.
Speaker 8 (38:53):
I have the Man Street that was created before President
Trump came in with all the imbalances. Why was that
accepted by every other administration for Trump?
Speaker 3 (39:08):
I think it was accepted because, as we said earlier,
people vote with their pocketbooks. I think if goods are affordable,
I think if inflation has been tannted down, I think
that if the average person so their summer vacation, aren't
paying higher gas prices and everything else, people just choose
to kick the can down the road, and nobody wants
(39:28):
to deal with you know what I call the political
third rail of trade and balances. But now, of course,
as I said earlier, people are waking up and saying
the emperor has no economic clothes, and now everything's open
to debate and amendments.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
Well, and great question, great answer, Thanks buddy, appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
Okay, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
You're very welcome, Professor Staalad. My final question is is
this going to impact your student trips to China?
Speaker 3 (39:55):
Do you think that is something that literally has started
to me up at night, is we are relying on
so many be you is very very fortunate that we
have close to twenty five percent of our students being
non American students, and a lot of those students enroll
in my classes and look forward to these field studies,
oversee these treks. I'm concerned that they are worried about
(40:19):
not getting back into the US. If the average American
student cannot afford the cost of these trips anymore, that
is what is concerning me. But again, the same way
that I'm telling business owners to take it one day
at a time, I've got to heed my own advice
and just take it one week at a time and
get through the spring semester and hope that cooler heads
(40:40):
prevail on the full.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
Okay, So I said my last question, this is my
last one. When is your next trek schedule? I assume
you're done with them for this year?
Speaker 3 (40:50):
Correct? I am done, right, I'm done with the trek
the latest trip. I changed the countries, the cities, and
the companies every year. So twenty twenty five we went
to Hong Kong and Vietnam. We are hosting an international
case competition in Sweden in early June. So that's the
next official case competition trip. The next trek is going
(41:10):
to be in hopefully late twenty twenty five, in the
fall or early twenty twenty six, and we're just hoping
that we can continue to do this.
Speaker 2 (41:19):
All right, Professor Starer, once again, immense thanks. We'll get
you back soon. I just want to continue to follow
this story and you want to be our guide.
Speaker 3 (41:27):
Thank you again, Dan for the opportunity. I keep saying it,
but it's true. I really appreciate the chance to come on.
I'm a huge thank you to your listeners from earlier
in April. I received so many follow on questions and
I'm just very lucky to be able to do what
I do.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Well, we're likely to happy. We'll talk again, all right,
Thanks thanks, professor. All Right, we are done for this hour.
We have the news. I'm sorry I'm a little bit late,
but I think the hour was well worth it. Back
right after the news, not exactly sure what we're going
to talk about. Stay with us, back on Night's side.
It's Night Side with Dan Ray on w b Z,
Boston's Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
All Right, welcome back everyone. We're going to change topics
here and we're going to welcome back to the program.
Professor Greg Staller, he teachers at Boston University School of Business,
the Questrum School of Business at Boston University. Professor Staller,
welcome back to Nightside. How are you.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Thank you, Dan, appreciate the opportunity to come back.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Well, you were my go to guy here. We talked
a couple of weeks ago about tariffs, which of course
have royaled the stock market. The market today had a
pretty good day. It was almost a mirror reflection of yesterday,
which was a pretty bad day.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
That was absolutely correct. It was about two point seven
percent today and it was down two point five percent yesterday.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yeah, and the future suggests it's opposed to open tomorrow
a little higher, which again some people believe that some
people don't. Well, we'll see how it works out. A
lot of people are worried at this point. I guess
what were the factors today that that perhaps helped quiet
(01:17):
the market. The market down It was up around a
thousand points middle of the day, and then in the
early afternoon, it slid back down about six hundred, about
four hundred points down into the six hundreds, and then
it came back up and end of the day, I
guess eleven hundred to the good. What was it the
(01:38):
president's comments that he's not going to fire Powell? Did
that make at least no plan scurrently to fire Powell?
Is that much?
Speaker 3 (01:47):
Ballace bounced towards ballast towards the end of the day.
I think what caused the markets to go up in
the first part of the day was Trump gave an
indication that maybe the China related tariffs that are up
to one hundred and forty five percent at this point
might be coming down. And I think he's also getting
pressure from a variety of different advisors and constituents, and
(02:11):
I think he is rethinking his approaching.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
Okay, now, of all the people who I know, nobody
has been to China with as many students on as
many trips as you have. You began this process how
long ago in your career as a professor.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
As a professor, from my first first trip to China
in two thousand and one, but as a civilian, if
you will, my first time was in nineteen ninety four.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Okay, so you got over there in nineteen ninety four.
Now it's thirty years later. We're in twenty twenty five,
so it's really almost thirty one years later. How substantially,
since China is our big economic competitor, how substantially has
China changed in the thirty years from the China that
(03:06):
you first arrived at in nineteen ninety four to the
China of today.
Speaker 3 (03:11):
Remarkably so. In the late eighties early nineties, there was
something which is in Chinese called geigo kaifong or the
reform and opening that you know. Again, this is not
Nixon opening China with his historic trip, et cetera. But
this is more of an economic perstroika of sorts. Is
China decided that they wanted to embrace the West, and
(03:35):
they ended up having a really great system where they
would take foreign investor capital, and they would build factories,
they would use labor, and they would export those goods
and services to an extent, sort of like India did
with business process outsourcing to the rest of the world.
And everybody was happy until the wheels came off the bus.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
Okay, let me take get back to ninety four when
did did China was? Was it at some point China
granted Favored nation status by the World Trade Organization?
Speaker 3 (04:10):
Yes, absolutely, the favored trade status came in the early
two thousands, and it u and I'm just checking the
exact date on that. And the fact of the matter
is that it further continued to let the good times
(04:31):
keep rolling off in the sense that back back in
ninety four, Dan labor rates were so cheap, and the
Chinese weren't concerned at that point about clean water, they
weren't concerned about providing living wages. They were looking at
themselves as sort of a direct competitor to Japan in
the in the in the decade of Japan inc. Produce
(04:53):
it for low dollars and sell it off and make
a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Okay. It also was a time, if I remember correctly,
with there was some political reform. With economic reform, there
was also some political reform. And actually I think that
churches were allowed to Chinese citizens were allowed to exercise,
(05:20):
you know, some limited form of free speech, and churches
were treated a little bit better, you know, after all
of the events of Tenement Square in nineteen eighty nine,
et cetera. So there was there not just there was
there was trade reform, economic reform, but there was also
some what we would view as political reform.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
That's my one hundred and by the way, beyond most
Favored Nation status they received they being China joined the
World Trade Organization in December of twenty oh one. So
you're right, it was the combination of everything. It was
political reform, I think what I would call cultural reform
and economic reform. And you know, to your point, we're
(06:00):
talking about two decades ago, right, two decades ago, everything
was coming. The United States was buying, the West was buying,
and China was manufactured.
Speaker 2 (06:10):
And there was there was a lot of Western money
that went into China to produce the manufacturing plants. And
there's I'm sure you know this stuff cold, but there
are a lot of American companies that took their manufacturing
over to China because they felt it was beneficial to
(06:31):
their stockholders and to their bottom line.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
One hundred percent. So if you think about just FBI
foreign direct investments, and you think about where it started
in the New millennium, it was forty billion US dollars.
A little more than a decade later, eleven years to
be specific it ballooned to one hundred and twenty four billion.
(06:55):
So think about that, in eleven years it went literally, yeah, tripled.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Okay, and we weren't worried about that at that time.
I don't recalled. I remember in the nineties people talked
about our trade in balance, but it was always our
trade in balance with the world. There was no focus
on China. It was we were we were buying too
(07:22):
much and exporting too little. I remember that was a
political issue. And then that political issue seemed to go away.
I don't know why the lact way, but correct. Did
we as the American public just lose interest in that?
Did the politicians decide, hey, this isn't driving the votes,
so therefore we'll, you know, we'll go off and highlight
(07:43):
other issues.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I think what shange good question. By the way, I
think what changed is that in those eleven years, China
kept improving its wages, that they moved from a living
wage to actually, as I mentioned earlier, providing infrastry ructure,
clean water, and opportunity for their citizens to not have
(08:06):
to take a train for thirteen hours over Chinese New
Year and live in a dorm like. Everything started to
improve for the People's Republic of China. The problem with
that is the labor rates that the West was relying
upon in Western companies in terms of getting good margins
steadily went down. And because they steadily went down, I
(08:26):
think people said, the emperor no longer has the economic clothes,
and why are we continuing to buy these products that
the margins aren't so good. Let's talk about domestic manufacturing.
And of course people said it's too expensive the United States.
And then all of a sudden, as if a switch
was flipped, people said, oh, by the way, we have
a trade of balance, and the politicians just absolutely jumped
(08:48):
on it like a shark who senses blood.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Right. But I think this is something that President Trump
has believed in for a long time. I think if
you go back to his first term, you'll see there
was some tariffs that were imposed. I don't know how
successfully they resulted, But this is not his first rodeo
in terms of tariffs.
Speaker 3 (09:09):
Correct, Oh, not at all, not at all. In you know, again,
if you think about history. Right back in twenty nineteen,
the CDP, the Customs and Border Protection Office, raised seventy
three billion in tariff revenue that was in the fiscal
(09:29):
year of twenty nineteen. To put that into perspective, since
January twentieth of this year, they've raised twenty one billion dollars.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
So on a percentage on a on a basis, it's
almost the.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Same one hundred percent, correct.
Speaker 2 (09:48):
I mean if they raised seventy three billion in tariffs
in twelve months, that's six billion a month, which sounds
like a lot of money. But compared to you and
you said, it's twenty one billion and we're almost four
months in, that's about six billion. It's the same. What
(10:11):
was it? What was it in the interregnum, if you will,
when Biden was in the White House? That did tariff
stay pretty much this where Trump had placed them.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
Or tariff stayed the same, Yeah, stayed the same.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
So so now he the president, with his you know,
conversation about Liberation Day, he's dramatically increased the tariffs correct
across the globe.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
Correct his bowl is And again you know me, Dan,
hopefully your listeners know me. I'm always trying to be objective,
so I can speak in support of President Trump's approach.
I can speak against President Trump's approach in support of
his approach. He's hoping that number is two billion a day.
(11:02):
I don't think we're getting anywhere close to that. Again,
according to CNBC, as I said earlier, we might be
at around two hundred and fifty million a day. But
last I checked my map, two hundred and fifty million
is a lot different than two billion dollars.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, even if you get two hundred and fifty million
a day, that that's maybe two billion a week. You're
now at eight billion a month roughly, so correct, you know? Obviously? Well, okay, listen,
don't want to get too deep into the weeds. When
I come back, I want to ask you about your
most recent trips there and what you're hearing, what China
(11:45):
is thinking. I want to put you in the position
of interpreting for us what China is thinking. At this point,
I don't think China has budged. I know that that
President Trump says he has a great relationship with Chairman
g Presidents. I get all of that, but I haven't
seen them moving. And at this point, I don't know
(12:09):
how long the President can hang with this without some
significant results. And I don't think we've seen the results
that he had hoped for this quickly. We're about a
month in not quite a month, and.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
I would agree with that. And by the way, to
prepare for tonight, I have read multiple articles in Mandarin
in the Chinese business press.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
I all interview I understanding is you speak seven languages.
Speaker 3 (12:39):
Yes, that's correct. I also talked with the Chinese journalist.
So I would like to believe that I have a
little bit of insight into what China is thinking right
now in response to the reciprocal tariffs that have been
placed upon them.
Speaker 2 (12:54):
All right, that is exactly what we're going to talk about.
If you would like to ask my guests. He's a
great friend. He's been on this program many many times
over the years. Uh, he is really one of my
go to guests on anything. Oh, he is my go
to guest on China. Professor Greg Styler with the Questum
(13:16):
School of Business at Boston University. He has led delegations
of students, both undergrads and on graduate students to China
dozens of times. We'll get to all of that, and
your phone calls six one, seven, two, five, four to
ten thirty. If you really want to talk to someone
who has spent time in China, who understands China's view,
(13:39):
they are not as impetuous. I think, as we are
as a society, we look for a turnaround within forty
eight hours. They think of a turnaround, I think in
terms of a short term turnaround, in terms of like
forty eight years. We'll get to that as well with
my guest professor Greg Styller right after this break six one, seven, two, five, four,
ten thirty or six months seven nine three to one,
(14:01):
ten thirty. Great opportunity for you to ask a question
of someone who will give you a straight answer about
a very complicated issue.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
Night Side Thought with Dan Ray. I'm WBZ Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (14:18):
My guest professor Gregg Staller. He is with the Boston
University's Master lecturer at the Boston University Questrum School of Business.
How many times have you taken students to China over
the years.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
I've been to China over fifty times.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
Okay, in many of those with accompanying students. We can
talk about that a little bit so so from China's perspective.
I know you sent me a little summary which I
really appreciated. The time you spent today you were checking
out China television news, financial times in China, and in
another website called Caxon, which I'm not familiar with. That
(15:02):
is a Chinese based newspaper or.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
Is it a correct It's in Chinese, it's pronounced I seen,
and it is the probably equivalent of Yahoo Finance here
in the States.
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Gotcha? Okay? Perfect? Okay? So so they obviously representing many
their articles represent the philosophy of the government more so
than say, the New York Times and ABC and yeah,
you know, Yahoo Finance represents the philosophy necessarily of the
incumbent administration here. So when you read them, you're really
(15:37):
reading what the Chinese government believes it. Am I correct
when I say that? Or is that too correct?
Speaker 3 (15:41):
And obviously you know we can we can split hairs.
I'm not necessarily sure that all three of those articles
are direct mouthpieces for the Chinese government, right, not I
but I but I think they are directionally correct.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
Yes, okay, and so so cumulatively, what do you think
Chinese position here is when when when President Trump sits
down with his advisors and he says to them, you
know what's going on? What are they thinking? How come
they haven't folded their tent here? We'll hit him with
one hundred and tariff of one hundred and forty five percent.
What's going on?
Speaker 3 (16:14):
Would I tak Yeah, I would tell them that there
are three things going on. One is they are displaying
a show of confidence. Second is that they are displaying
a show of pragmatism. And third is they are calling
President Trump's bluff, saying that he overestimated his bargaining approach
(16:36):
on the terifficient.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Okay, so how long are they willing to to steer
him down? At what point does either side give or
could this go one now for months?
Speaker 3 (16:49):
So that was the epicody that I had as I
finished my third article and actually checked this with a
Chinese national to make sure that my translation was correct.
There are in the process of rejiggering their supledging. They
are already in advanced discussions with German companies in China.
They're already in discussions with Latin American companies in China.
(17:11):
And they basically said, we gave the United States, for
all intents and purposes, a right of first trading refusal.
We love working with the United States. We worked with
the United States since you know they got into the
World Trade Organization in twenty oh one. But if times
are going to change, and a direct translation from the article.
If the US is proving to be unreliable, we still
(17:32):
have a job to do.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
So in in layman's terms. In Layman's terms, what is
the impact on us if that is not a bluff,
but that is what they really believe in, what they
really intend to follow through with.
Speaker 3 (17:50):
I think to your point before you went into a break,
that the Chinese perspective of time is a lot different
than we have it here in the United States, so
they're in no particular rush. I think that President Trump
was hoping for a quick turnaround on this, and it
certainly is not happening as quickly as he would like.
(18:12):
So I think that China is taking the pack of
We'll keep talking and hopefully we can broker some sort
of settlement, but we're not going to rush the process.
And if you guys aren't making a decision, we are
going to rejigger our supply chain. And it's sort of
the game of musical economic chairs, and we hope the
United States still has a chair when the music stops.
Speaker 2 (18:35):
Okay, when we get back, I'd like to talk about
what is it that we so desperately need from China
that that would would be a pressure point.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
Great, great question.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Yeah, and how long can we do without before a
real crisis. I mean we're in a crisis now, but
the crisis intensifies, that will be where we'll start on
the other side of the news at the bottom of
the hour. My name is Dan Ray. This is Nightside
listening to my guest, Boston University professor at the School
(19:13):
of at the School the Question School of Business. He's
a master lecturer there. I was stunned that you speak
seven languages. Greg. I've known you and I have a
tough time speaking one and I'm the talk show host.
Speaker 3 (19:28):
Well, I'll keep in mind there. I stick at sports
and I don't do hold improvement on the weekend, so
I need something to keep myself.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
In the.
Speaker 2 (19:37):
Professor Greg Staller, the Boston University Question School of Business.
If you'd like to join the conversation, you have the numbers,
love to hear your questions. I'm trying to think of
the best questions I can come up with, but I'm
sure you have some better questions, So feel free to
join our conversation at six month seven two five four
to ten thirty six month seven nine three one tenth
(20:00):
Already Professor Staller was telling me that it was with
us just two or three weeks ago. I can go
back and find the date. He said that he never
had such response in all his times here on Nightside
to this topic, which is in very large part why
I want him to come back tonight and stay with
us on a regular basis, because I think, just as
(20:20):
COVID was the story of twenty twenty, this my instinct
political instinct tells me this is the story of twenty
twenty five. We'll be back on Nightside right after the
news at the bottom of the hour.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
You're on Nightside with Dan Ray on WBZY, Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
You are indeed on night Side with Dan Ray, but
you were also on with Professor Greg Staller. He is
a master lecturer at the Boston University Questum School of Business.
It's been back and forth to China dozens of times
in the last thirty years. Knows that economy as well
as anyone I could imagine. So Greg, the question we
(21:06):
left with on the other side of the break was,
we're a We're an impatient We are impatient people in America.
We want things done quickly and effectively and efficiently. At
what point is this going to start to. Right now,
we're worried about the fluctuations in the stock market, and
(21:26):
people to worry about their fro one ks and their
iras and all of that sort of stuff, their wroth accounts.
They're worried about the value of their investments. When does,
when does this get better anytime soon? And how do
you see it getting better? Let's look positively, does the
(21:47):
President Trump announced deals with sixty or seventy five major
nations and isolate China or the China just hang out
and effect make us uh so uncomfortable that that we're
missing medications or we're missing computer chips. So whatever, what
(22:11):
how does this end? Do you think?
Speaker 4 (22:13):
Again?
Speaker 3 (22:13):
Good question, Dan. You you might think I know a
lot about China. You know more about politics than I
could ever know in probably two lifetimes. It's my understanding
at that's true, Uh, Craig if I'm wrong, but I
believe that a number of elections, either at the local,
the state or the national level, are often decided by
people in terms of the impact of their pocketbook. And
(22:35):
I think if if I think, if it's and you
can you know, give all of the statistics that you
want as a political candidate of how well you've done,
But if the economy isn't humming along, people are going
to use that against you. That's my understanding, right.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
And there are special elections that have come up recently.
Even though the Republicans held two congressional seats in Florida,
the margin of victory in those seats are pretty disquieting
for the Republican Party because these were districts that in
northern Florida, which President Trump carried by some thirty two
or thirty four points, big, big, big victories, and they
(23:14):
were within March, they were within ten point margins, huge difference,
trending in the wrong way for the Republicans. So those
would be a couple of canaries in the coal mine
for the Republicans. And you know, at some point there'll
be more of this, so that you know the politics
very well as well. I'm more interested in the economic
(23:35):
impact here.
Speaker 3 (23:36):
So the economic impact is that, according to a number
of sources that I've been reading for the past three
or four weeks, this could represent this being the tariffs,
a loss of almost five thousand dollars per household if
things continue unchanged.
Speaker 2 (23:55):
Is that worst case scenario.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
That is worst case scenario, and even though he's put
a pause on it for ninety days, multiple outlets have
reported that it could go anywhere from a low of
three thousand to a higher seven thousand. I splewit the
difference at five as the worst case scenario, and it
could be a problem.
Speaker 2 (24:17):
Okay. Meanwhile, China sits back and there's nothing that we
have or that they need that they now cannot afford.
I mean, I assume that's part of the White House strategy.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
Right, I mean, the White House strategy is saying, let's
have this be a test of wills, and let's outstair
one another and hopefully one side will blink. I mean
to an extent. You know, I'm reminded by a great
quote by Woody Allen that the definition of a good
compromise is when both parties walk away dissatisfied. So I
(24:53):
think that sure, you know, if President Trump is willing
to give in a little, if President She is willing
to give it a little, I don't think either side
is going to declare victory. But don't don't forget Dan
that China, only second to Japan, holds over seven hundred
and fifty billion of US treasuries. Okay, oh yeah, they
are not about to just you know, say goodbye and
(25:17):
and just dismiss out of hand the United States and
say see you later. It's the nice doing business with you.
They know that a lot is invested in our economy.
But I think the biggest thing that is concerning to
me is there is no other nation on Earth where
saving face is more important than in China. And I
think that is the canary in the coal mine that
(25:40):
you mentioned earlier, is that President she cannot just capitulate
because that would be a cultural disaster. And by the way,
I'm not so sure that President Trump could easily capitulate.
Speaker 2 (25:51):
It him right, which again would point you towards a
compromise of some sort. Let's let's work some phone calls
in here. Let me go to Dennis Dennis, Dennis, appreciate
your calling in. Professor Greg Staller is with us. What's
your question of comment, Dennis.
Speaker 4 (26:09):
Good evening, gentlemen. I believe that could you tell me
the advantage in precious metals and how much in an
advent is to China have over the US and precious metals.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
A huge advantage. A lot of what we take for
granted in our cell phones are precious metals or or
if you will, that exists in China, and that's part
of the reason why the United States needs access to that.
It's no longer a situation Dennis, that it is a
lower labor costs, but it's rather access to minerals, it's
(26:48):
access to components, and it's access to supply chain.
Speaker 4 (26:53):
And one other question, okay, energy, how much you're going
to do does the Chinese have over the US and
solar energy.
Speaker 3 (27:07):
Not as much as rare minerals. But again I think
that you know, and this is the example Dan and
Dennis that I use in my classes all the time.
I wear a regular run of the male pair of
dress shoes whenever I teach, and that is probably one
hundred and fifty one hundred and seventy five dollars a pair. Right,
(27:27):
It's not gooky, it's not some design or brand. If
the tariffs continue and that cost increases to three hundred dollars,
I'm going to start working sneakers. I'm going to start
going there for it. I mean, I'm not going to
pay three hundred dollars for a regular pair of everyday shoes.
And I think that's the problem right now, whether it's solar,
(27:47):
whether it's cell phones or everything else. To Dan's point
a few minutes ago, everybody's dealing with it, and so
far we have hope that it's a ninety day reprieve.
Blah blah blah blah blah. If that ninety day reprieve
expires and we go back to where we were a
couple of weeks ago, then I think Americans are going
to get really, really frustrated in terms of ballooning prices.
Speaker 4 (28:11):
All right, Hey, thank you very much, gentlemen, and we'll
tell you later. Dan, appreciate your call.
Speaker 2 (28:16):
Dennis, talk soon. Let me go to Doreen and Chelsea Dorain.
You're professor Greg Staller.
Speaker 5 (28:20):
Go right ahead, Dorian, good evening to both, Hie, Dan,
I think everybody should just buy the cheap brand and
everybody will be equal.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
I don't know that that's going to necessarily work that way,
but I guess that's that's one strategy individual should use.
Are you feeling any any crunch y at Doreen and you're,
you know, going to the grocery store or anything like that.
What's what's what's your economic status? No?
Speaker 5 (28:55):
I don't because i'll uh, i'll buy products that uh
not named brands.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
Okay, so.
Speaker 5 (29:09):
Yes, because you see, for instance, can I mention Campbell soup?
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Sure?
Speaker 5 (29:15):
Absolutely good, all right, it's on the shelf.
Speaker 2 (29:17):
Right if you buy all of Campbell soup tonight for dinner,
as a matter.
Speaker 5 (29:22):
Of fact, go right ahead, nothing wrong with it. If
you look towards your right, you'll see, well, I don't
know now how they display them on a shelf, the
name brand like stopping shop Rand, it'll.
Speaker 2 (29:37):
Be a little less expensive. I got your point.
Speaker 5 (29:41):
Yeah, and then the next next to that might be
higher than Campbell.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Right, yeah, So you're a shopper and you'll you'll adjust accordingly.
That's just you know, that's what probably a lot of
people are going to try to do.
Speaker 4 (29:53):
Yeah, so.
Speaker 5 (29:56):
About a car, like for instance, I don't care when
everybody says, and anybody does about what car they want
to drive, But I'll take a forward any old time.
Speaker 3 (30:10):
That's it.
Speaker 2 (30:11):
That's that's one of the things that maybe will result here.
Maybe people will.
Speaker 5 (30:15):
Be doing well because again, if you know, we don't
really know where the paths.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
I understand that.
Speaker 2 (30:24):
Yeah, but I understand that. But it may be an
impetus for some of the car manufacturers to do more
work here and have less tariffs than the car I
don't know Greg on that question. How quickly can we
adjust our automotive industry in this country. It seems to
me that's not something that we can get get it
(30:45):
turned around overnight.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
So during a great question or great comment. By the way, again,
based on multiple outlets that I researched, even US made
cars have fort of foreign parks, So it's not this
is not binary, this is not what we should buy
American and we'll solve all of our problems. I will
agree with you, Doreen that it certainly will help. And again,
(31:08):
as I said earlier Dan, towards the top of the hour,
I can speak for a same amount of time and
support of what President Trump's trying to do and against
what President Trump's trying to do, and support of what
he's trying to do. To Doreen's point is get more
Americans to invest in our own industry and buying American pros. Right,
and by the way, sixty percent is still a majority.
(31:29):
So even if you buy a forward, you're still investing
in the USA because you've got sixty percent of the
parts manufactured here. So, Doreen, you're making a lot of sense.
But Dan, as you said, you can't just up and
move a supply chain. You might be able to do
it with I don't know, carpeting or flooring. You might
be able to do it with other components that aren't
(31:50):
as technologically complicated, but you can't do it with computers
or phones. I mean that could take years.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yeah. Yeah. And also I'll be going back to the
car thing. If if there's a car that that is
hit with tariff because it's made totally overseas, that's going
to be a pretty more expense more expensive car. If
an American car, domestic car is hit with a fort tariff,
(32:18):
meaning forty percent of the value of the car, is
it gets hit tariff of some level that's better than
one hundred percent tariff, so that that might be a
sufficient savings for some people. Do rein them up. My break,
I gotta let you go is always. Thank you so much.
I appreciate you, Chris.
Speaker 5 (32:35):
Thank you, good night, great night, by bye bye, thank you.
Speaker 2 (32:39):
My guest is a professor Greg Staller of the Questrum
School of Business at Boston University. I have some other
questions we have some other callers. Let's we'll keep rolling
here right after this break, we'll try to get everyone in.
I'm going to ask quick direct questions of Professor Staller,
and I haven't even touched upon the experiences that he
(33:00):
has had. We have talked about them before, of him
taking American students US students to China and interacting with
Chinese companies and which has been a great, great success
for various schools, including obviously Professor Staller's classes. And I
guess that also might grind to a halt, but we'll
(33:23):
talk about that as well. Coming back on Nightside, It's
Night Side with Dan Ray on.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Boston's News Radio.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
My guests Professor Greg Staller, Boston University, Question School of Business,
Greg real quickly and again we're getting tired on time here.
I want to get some more callers in. Give me
your assessment of the economic team that Trump has assembled
around him. You must have a sense of who these
(33:52):
men and women are.
Speaker 3 (33:54):
I think that to President Trump's credit, he has assembled
a team of loyalists, and I think in the world
of politics, again, I want to stay in my lane, Dan,
I'm not a political scientist. I don't teach that stuff.
But from my understanding, there is so much at stake
in terms of running a country that some presidents obviously
have people who are not necessarily fourth right in terms
(34:17):
of being a team player. I think to President Trump's credit,
he's tried to assemble two types of people on the team.
One is loyalist and people who come from extremely large
business backgrounds that have run publicly traded companies, that are
captains of industry who's hoping that their industry experience is
going to affect meaningful change, as opposed to President Biden,
(34:39):
who took more of a politically savvy approach to getting
legislation done.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Okay, And I also just quickly want to where are
you on consumers are going to have a big impact.
There'll be an impact on our consumers, but probably it'd
be small business owners. So we're going to feel it first.
How quickly will have they already begun to feel it?
Speaker 3 (35:06):
It's already happened. It's already happened over the past ten days.
And I think that's the area of this that I'm
most concerned about, is that people. A good friend of
mine is in the carpeting, it's flooring business, and he
called all of his customers and said, because of the tariffs,
the quotes that I gave you are essentially going to
expire in five or six days, So if you'd like
(35:29):
to have that original quote honored, please pay in full
over the next five or six days. And he had
something like a ninety five percent positive response rate because
he knows that as of day seven he isn't in
a position to absorb the increases. And I think, once
again that's the area that concerns me. Apple, Walmart, picked
whatever large publicly traded company you want. Obviously Wall Street's
(35:53):
going to scream and yell if their margins go down,
but for a quarter or two they could take the hit.
Small business, this is their vocation, this is their livelihood.
They're not about to absorb a thirty percent increase in
cost or twenty ten percent, pick whatever number you want.
They're going to try and pass it on to the consumer.
And the average consumer isn't going to be able to
afford that. And to Doriam's point, you don't find maybe
(36:16):
you buy a local brand, but that's assuming the local
brand hasn't been impacted by a place.
Speaker 2 (36:21):
Yeah, all great points. Let me go real quickly, Joel
and Newton. Joel, we're fast running out of time here
with unfortunately with Professor Staller, every hour with him goes
by real quickly. It got you in here quickly, go
right ahead.
Speaker 6 (36:34):
That's a I appreciate it. So I just had a
hypothetical to run by us a Staller. So I did
know Trump diminished the terrorists for cell phones and computers?
Speaker 4 (36:48):
Correct?
Speaker 3 (36:49):
Yes, that's correct.
Speaker 6 (36:51):
Yeah, but does that promote like us building it in
the United States of America when somebody that computer. So
that's the pay one hundred and forty percent terriff on battery.
Speaker 3 (37:06):
Very important. Ye, that that's exactly the point is, Joel,
is that he is hoping through no fault of his own.
By the way, I respect what the President is trying
to do, which is to have US buy American made products.
The problem is that so much of what we use
is either a car or electronics. As I said earlier,
(37:26):
you can't just up and move the supply chain in
ten minutes and say, oh, we're just gonna we're going
to inshore back to the United States. This stuff takes time.
Now companies have been gradually doing that. They've been de
risking by getting out of China. They've been going to Vietnam,
They've been going to Laos, They've been going to Cambodia,
they've been going to Puerto Rico, They've been going to
(37:47):
all other locations. But a the process takes time, and
something that the Chinese should be very proud of is
they have a lot of infrastructure built so it's never
a problem to get the stuff from the factory floor
to a port of call and then exported out other countries.
That's a evolving process.
Speaker 6 (38:07):
Noah, I appreciate that, but I just feel he's going
about it willy nilly, and we're going to pay for it,
that's all.
Speaker 3 (38:14):
I Again, I'm trying to be objective. I think I will.
I will turn that question over to Dan, But I
see what you're saying. Angel.
Speaker 7 (38:21):
Well, let me just say this, Joel, if if, if
you're correct and and we end up paying for it
in the end, he and the Republican Party will pay
for a big time correct.
Speaker 3 (38:32):
Yeah, And I hope people realize that.
Speaker 2 (38:35):
But well, I think I think it's just they vote
with their pocketbook. As as Professor Stallas said earlier, I'm
going to try to get one more in here. Thank you.
Joel Warren, I got you really ted on time here.
I got about a minute quick comment or quick question
for professor.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
That's a quick question.
Speaker 8 (38:53):
I have the Man Street that was created before President
Trump came in with all the imbalances. Why was that
accepted by every other administration for Trump?
Speaker 3 (39:08):
I think it was accepted because, as we said earlier,
people vote with their pocketbooks. I think if goods are affordable,
I think if inflation has been tannted down, I think
that if the average person so their summer vacation, aren't
paying higher gas prices and everything else, people just choose
to kick the can down the road, and nobody wants
(39:28):
to deal with you know what I call the political
third rail of trade and balances. But now, of course,
as I said earlier, people are waking up and saying
the emperor has no economic clothes, and now everything's open
to debate and amendments.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
Well, and great question, great answer, Thanks buddy, appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (39:47):
Okay, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
You're very welcome, Professor Staalad. My final question is is
this going to impact your student trips to China?
Speaker 3 (39:55):
Do you think that is something that literally has started
to me up at night, is we are relying on
so many be you is very very fortunate that we
have close to twenty five percent of our students being
non American students, and a lot of those students enroll
in my classes and look forward to these field studies,
oversee these treks. I'm concerned that they are worried about
(40:19):
not getting back into the US. If the average American
student cannot afford the cost of these trips anymore, that
is what is concerning me. But again, the same way
that I'm telling business owners to take it one day
at a time, I've got to heed my own advice
and just take it one week at a time and
get through the spring semester and hope that cooler heads
(40:40):
prevail on the full.
Speaker 2 (40:42):
Okay, So I said my last question, this is my
last one. When is your next trek schedule? I assume
you're done with them for this year?
Speaker 3 (40:50):
Correct? I am done, right, I'm done with the trek
the latest trip. I changed the countries, the cities, and
the companies every year. So twenty twenty five we went
to Hong Kong and Vietnam. We are hosting an international
case competition in Sweden in early June. So that's the
next official case competition trip. The next trek is going
(41:10):
to be in hopefully late twenty twenty five, in the
fall or early twenty twenty six, and we're just hoping
that we can continue to do this.
Speaker 2 (41:19):
All right, Professor Starer, once again, immense thanks. We'll get
you back soon. I just want to continue to follow
this story and you want to be our guide.
Speaker 3 (41:27):
Thank you again, Dan for the opportunity. I keep saying it,
but it's true. I really appreciate the chance to come on.
I'm a huge thank you to your listeners from earlier
in April. I received so many follow on questions and
I'm just very lucky to be able to do what
I do.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Well, we're likely to happy. We'll talk again, all right,
Thanks thanks, professor. All Right, we are done for this hour.
We have the news. I'm sorry I'm a little bit late,
but I think the hour was well worth it. Back
right after the news, not exactly sure what we're going
to talk about. Stay with us, back on Night's side.
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