Tariff This

By Michael Randle, Editor

Kind of wild out there, huh? Been to Walmart lately?

After less than six months, many are tired (for legal reasons, I am not, of course) of hearing from this administration’s supporters that “Maybe what this administration plans to do is to finally fix the economy and the supply chain for the long-run. Fix it for good, dammit!” 

“Maybe?” “Long-run?” “Fix?” “For good?” “Dammit!” Reinventing worldwide supply chains in less than four years or in a final term? Whoa! Good luck with that. 

“Tired?” Yes, just months into this administration’s rule, I am tired; tired of uncertainty. And believe me, talking to prospects wanting to relocate to the South (our specialty), they are tired, too. 

There ain’t much “good” to write about out there, as job- and investment-generating deals have taken a nosedive so far this year in the South, the “World’s Third Largest Economy.” How the South goes, goes the nation, bucko! 

But wait, wait, over at Walmart, plenty of “good” is happening for Coinstar kiosk owners when this issue dead-lined. We extended it a few weeks because we were not going to miss the migration of millions descending on Coinstar kiosks across the land after “Liberation Day,” Wednesday, April 2nd. 

Two days later, by Friday, April 4th (this writing), some had lost up to 30 percent of their life-long savings in three days, only to rediscover their furnishings are vaults full of Coinstar riches! 

I mean, before you sell your sofa to drum up some cash in tough times, you double-check every crevice for anything you might be giving away to the new owner. 

By now, and over the course of mere months, Coinstar machine owners have been sitting on the beach in Costa Rica, earning 13.9 percent on chump change from tens if not hundreds of thousands of recently fired workers. 

Coinstar owners don’t even have to work. They have robot cashiers that are earning more than your 401k earns right now. 

After all, Coinstar’s marketing lines are pretty catchy: “Would you choose a $50 bill or a jar of random coins? Not so simple. The coins could be #MoreMoneyThanYouThink.” Note the hashtag. Cute. And yes, in times like these, we could all use #MoMoney. 

Yes, we are tired and we are all barely making the walk up to Walmart right now, where Southern hospitality, cheap gas and super-easy coin conversions are king in this brave new world order! 

You can even bring your loot in a burlap bag while wearing a burlap bag if that’s all you got left after “Liberation Day.” No one will notice at Walmart. 

“Maybe?” That’s a chump word. And we are the chumps. 

“Maybe” the dingo ate your baby. “Maybe” your 401k in 120 days is now “chump change,” all in an effort to “fix” the economy in the “long run.” Nope, this is more like a dash to “coin-to-dollar” bliss in the “short-run,” with a 13.9 percent Coinstar tariff off the top.

Fix? Fix what?

In the last 14 years, the value of manufacturing production in the U.S. has skyrocketed after essentially evaporating soon after free trade laws were signed a quarter century ago. In over 40 years, until the last three years, I had never heard of a $5 billion “automotive supplier plant.” Ten years ago, $5 billion would buy you two final assembly plants. Dang inflation. 

The manufacturing comeback began in 2011 when Hal Sirkin of the Boston Consulting Group and I promoted his book titled, “Made in America, Again.” Manufacturing peaked in 2015 in the South and again in 2022 and 2023, when massive battery and EV plants planted their flags in the region. Read Sirkin’s book! It focuses on the reasons why the U.S., and especially the South and Mexico, have become so competitive, even some years, beating the pants off China in FDI. 

Apparently this administration has not read “Made in America, Again.” This administration’s policies are right out of the Ross Perot playbook of the early 1990s. That would have worked then. Not now. 

So much has changed since then in positive ways, and the supply chains are pointing in the South’s and Mexico’s favor. . .which has been the case for decades when making something for U.S. consumption. 

In 2011, one of the most horrible natural disasters in world history occurred. The 2011 Tōhoku earthquake, which occurred on March 11, 2011, at 14:46:24 JST (05:46:24 UTC) with a magnitude of 9.0 to 9.1, triggered the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster (tsunami).

Days after that disaster, which disrupted supply chains all over the world, CEOs in the U.S. began to talk: “So, tell me? Why are we making things for North American consumption on the other side of the world?” 

And while we “fix” 100 years of world order that this nation has benefited and profited from through two world wars where we came out smelling like a rose from East to West. . .yes, the “long runs” to the Coinstar machine at your local Walmart have commenced in earnest.

While at Walmart today (April 4, 2025, at 1300 hours), I observed a “chump change infantry charge” to the Coinstars at the front of the store. No one could get there fast enough. There were more people lined up at Coinstar than in the store shopping.

I asked one person in line at the kiosks what all the fuss was about. 

Bob from Bessemer explained, “I had a job with the federal government. I got fired. Then I got rehired because my job was not on the termination list. Then I got fired again when they eliminated my entire department. All in one week.” 

Me: “Bob, what do you think of Coinstar’s tariffs of 13.9 percent to exchange coins for bills in a crisis? I mean, you told me you already lost your job of 34 years.” 

Bob from Bessemer: “We are so lucky that we don’t live in Madagascar.”

Me: “Madagascar?” Bob: “Those poor people are paying 47 percent tariffs and by God they should! Madagascar has been ripping off ’merica for hundreds of years.” 

The lines at the Coinstar machines were so long that I gave up. 

So, I bought two gallons of gas with quarters, dimes and nickels and took my burlap bag holding the remains of my 401k back to the office, where I immediately began in earnest the selling of my media properties after 44 years of one owner (me) before they are closed and erased by this administration or devoured by a “dingo.” 

This is my first job. I started this company at age 24. I am now 69. 

I have covered every recession since 1981, and this is not a recession. Recessions are not purposely planned. 

April 2nd, Liberation Day, was it for me, too. I have worked too hard to retire on “chump change.”

And I won’t. “Dammit!” 

Editor’s note: This is Michael Randle’s op-ed piece. He can be reached by email at michael@sb-d.com.