Why do I have this sickening feeling that in a few years anyone doing anything with hardware is going to be ordering everything direct from China, like we're some kind of undeveloped client state?
You are already living in this reality. And it has already been happening for quite a few years by now.
People that are especially vocal and badly hit by tarrifs at the moment, are the people who have already been doing just that.
This transition happened so quickly that most people haven't fully cought up to the implications to the full extent.
In my mind, China is already the center of gravity.
We've still got local US distributors though, regardless of everything being made in China. Like if you decide you need something tomorrow, you can go on Amazon and get most things pretty quick (despite overpaying 1.5-2x compared to Aliexpress). And there's a whole cottage industry of 3d printing shops selling canned solutions to people who don't want to hunt Aliexpress themselves.
It's been well over a decade since I was doing embedded design professionally, so my perspective is coming more from a hobby/3d printing/"maker" place. But it feels like one of the main results of these tariffs is that the bottom is going to drop out on Chinese and Chinese-adjacent sellers preloading so much stuff into US warehouses ahead of sale, and instead just shipping orders direct from China. Using a US warehouse means the seller has to front the money for the tariffs as well and takes a risk of them being lowered depending on Krasnov's whims. Whereas shipping direct from China, even if the seller is handling the tariffs (eg Aliexpress Choice), they've already got the cash in hand from a confirmed purchase.
I was just being facetious about the general pain we're feeling from the US's new tariff-based national sales tax. And I haven't been following any reciprocal actions for what is now expensive to get into China. Are -C5's only made in Taiwan or something?
Ah, well that's handy to know. For this week, at least. I've just been watching the 3d printer parts I just squeaked in under the de minimis wire triple in price due to the new taxes.
Why do I have this sickening feeling that in a few years anyone doing anything with hardware is going to be ordering everything direct from China, like we're some kind of undeveloped client state?