What does the 36% Trump tax affect?

On July 8, 2025, US President Trump 🇺🇸 announced a policy of tariffs on imported goods from Thailand of up to 36% (from the original collected only 2-10%) and will come into effect on August 1, 2025, and that will inevitably affect us all and may last for at least 2 years or more.

Now let's see who this policy will affect, and I'll do a Macro analysis for my friends to read.

🚢 Declining exports

Thailand, we will lose our competitiveness in price competition. There will be many countries that will win negotiations for a tax reduction. That will make their products sell at a much cheaper price than products imported from Thailand. When Thailand exports less, that is, companies and factories in Thailand will also reduce their capacity, especially in the parts of industries that rely heavily on the US market, such as clothing, appliances, electronics, rubber, furniture, seafood, etc., they will have a heavy impact.

👷🏻‍♀️ Fewer exports = lower employment rate

Factory Must Reduce Production Power → Reduce OT → Disengage Workers

That means that unemployment will rise, and the population will earn less, and that will contribute to the decline in purchasing power. Domestic spending will also fall as well, because people will turn to each other more tightly (from the same tightly tightened). And that will affect SMEs, general businesses, small-scale stores.

🏛️ SME businesses and chain-affected stores

When people don't have money, it also decreases their purchasing power, and that results in small businesses not selling → closing → losing more jobs (loop like that).

And it becomes a negative loop cycle until new government measures or events revive the crisis.

📉 The domestic economy will stagnate heavily.

Thailand's GDP, which used to rely on exports by nearly 60%, will shrink. The baht may depreciate to support exports, but that will drive up the cost of importing goods from abroad.

💹 may hit the Thai stock market (especially the export industry).

Investors would flock to sell stocks and move money into safer assets like gold.

💡, how do we deal with this situation?

What I would like to advise my friends to deal with this coming crisis is...

1. Hold the job and hold the cash in hand.

If anyone still has a job, I would recommend keeping that job because we have no idea how long this crisis will last.

2. Survive with Emergency funding

I would like to encourage my friends to make a revenue-expenditure account each month for how much they spend per month. Then, they aim to save money for emergency funds or providence funds. Generally, it is recommended to keep enough money to pay for 3, 6, 12 months. But if anyone collects more, it will be great, because that means we will be able to cover the expenses to survive a crisis.

3. Tight your belt

Besides saving, there's another technique I've always used, especially time to spend, that is the Urgent and Important principles.

Let's say if I want to buy a pair of shoes, I'm going to think about whether it's "necessary" and "urgent." If I have to buy them for a job interview in the next three days, that means that they have both components: 1. It's necessary because we have to wear them for a job interview, and 2. It's urgent because in the next three days we have a job interview.

But if it is necessary, but it is not urgent, like a wristwatch, I will not buy it, because I can pull the phone out to see the time, even if it is a little difficult.

What about your friends? How to survive or deal with this economic crisis? Share a comment.

# Big money story# Tax # Economy # Save costs # Personal finance

Latest update: Main from Thailand, we accelerated tariff negotiations with Trump. This resulted in Trump cutting the tariff on imported goods from Thailand to only 19%.