Memorial Wealth Group

Let’s talk about the President floating the idea of taking over Canada, Greenland, and now Gaza.

President Trump has been in office for only four weeks, and already he’s suggested taking control of three separate territories. Is this a wild speculation or something more serious? When you consider the global economy behind the scenes, it becomes clear he might not be joking. In short, there’s a fight for natural resources, and those who secure them - especially rare earth minerals - are most likely to succeed in the emerging economy.

China and Russia already control a large portion of these resources and can use them as leverage. Whether we like it or not, they’re adversaries and competitors on the global economic stage. Greenland makes sense as a target because it’s largely uninhabited and loaded with natural resources. Gaza has the Gaza gas fields (look them up), and Canada, while unlikely, is also rich in natural resources and rare earth minerals.

As one of my political science professors used to say, politics is fundamentally about the fight for natural resources. And as we’re seeing, that principle holds true on the global stage.

Because the incoming Trump administration likes tariffs so much, I think it’s important to discuss proposals that will be on the table in the next couple of years. Both parties have used tariffs in the past. President Trump put tariffs on goods coming from China. President Biden in some cases increased the tariffs enacted by the Trump administration.

One such proposal is to reduce or eliminate the income tax by enacting a 20% tariff on all goods coming into the United States and a special 40% tax on goods coming from China. In short, according to the Congressional Budget Office, this tariff proposal would raise almost 1 trillion dollars which would not be enough to eliminate the income tax because that brings in 2.5 trillion dollars. This is something that needs to be looked at as a possible revenue source to stop or reduce countries that dump cheap goods in the USA thereby harming our labor force.

Lastly, I recognize both the benefits and the risks of tariffs, and I’ll be talking about them quite extensively in the future. Next week we will examine the risks.