At Issue: Trump’s Trade War is an attempt to turn back the clock. It’s going to cause massive disruption. Manufacturing in the US was at one point as high as 30% of the economy. It’s now down to 7%. The manufacturing sector is just simply gone and the sooner that Trump recognizes this the sooner he will realize what is the financial driving force behind today’s America: digital services. As the world negotiates its way through Trump’s disastrous walk down memory lane, there is another solution that is likely to take place. Trump has nothing to lose at this point. And if Trump just stops listening to the ideologues in his midst, he can achieve what he really wants: make his rich friends happy and be the biggest champion of trickle down economics. Milton Friedman would be smiling from the surly ground upon where he and his nutty ideas rest.

Donald Trump’s across-the-board trade war with the world is not just economically reckless—it’s backward-looking folly. The idea that manufacturing, especially high-value manufacturing, is going to return to the United States at scale is a fantasy rooted in nostalgia, not reality.

Let’s take semiconductors. When a Taiwanese firm proposed building a chip plant in Arizona, the plan included staffing it with Taiwanese nationals. Why? Because the U.S. doesn’t train people to do this kind of work anymore. It’s not just about factory space—it’s about a pipeline of talent, infrastructure, and long-term investment in technical education. America hasn’t built that, and tariffs won’t change that.

Instead of revitalizing U.S. industry, Trump’s trade war is more likely to ignite a global economic downturn—or worse, stagflation. Higher prices from tariffs combine with weak job growth, leaving consumers squeezed and growth sluggish. This isn’t winning. It’s a slow bleed.

The irony? The same Silicon Valley titans who have hollowed out much of the traditional economy—Meta, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft—were front row at Trump’s inauguration. They’ve become the sacred cows of American capitalism: untouchable, borderless, and obscenely profitable. Yet they continue to route profits through tax havens, contributing a pittance in return for their domination of global markets.

If Trump really wants to fund the kinds of big tax cuts that defined his first term—and avoid the embarrassment of adding another trillion to the debt—there’s a simple, elegant solution: end the trade war and impose a modest digital services surcharge on global revenue.

Even a 0.5% to 2% surcharge on digital services provided by U.S. tech giants around the world would generate substantial federal revenue. Europe has floated similar taxes and been met with U.S. resistance—not because the idea is wrong, but because it targets our “national champions.” But these sacred cows aren’t helping Main Street. They’re operating above and beyond national tax systems, all while using U.S. infrastructure, U.S. legal protections, and U.S. consumers as their base.

Would tech giants push back? Absolutely. But if Trump wants a headline-grabbing way to raise revenue, reduce the deficit, and pivot away from a self-defeating trade war, this is the move. It’s also politically viable—Trump, of all people, could sell this as a win for America without being labeled anti-business.

The truth is, Trump’s economic policy suffers from a mismatch between rhetoric and reality. We can’t recreate a post-war industrial boom in a digitized world. But we can adapt to the economy we do have—and start taxing the digital titans who profit most from it.

It’s time to stop fighting the last war. End the trade war. Tax the sacred cows.