Just before the election, Donald Trump spoke to Joe Rogan for a three hour interview where he discussed his love for tariffs.

“To me, the most beautiful word — I’ve said this for the last couple of weeks — in the dictionary today is the word tariff,” Trump said. “It’s more beautiful than love, more beautiful than anything. It’s the most beautiful word.”

Since becoming president elect, Trump has already begun hinting at the sort of tariffs he wishes to impose against Mexico and China, among other countries.

Simply stated, a tariff is just an extra cost put on a good. For example, suppose that Mexico wants to export cars to the United States and Trump places a tariff. Suddenly those cars cost Mexico more money to import.

In the short term, this makes cars produced in Mexico more expensive to consumers. However, this also helps domestic car manufacturers and allows them to become more competitive in the automobile industry.

There are economic reasons and political reasons for tariffs. For example, Mexico’s poor control of drug cartels and the illegal immigration crisis has had a major impact on the U.S. in terms of drug deaths, violence at the border and unfettered illegal immigration.

Trump threatened a major set of tariffs against Mexico, threatening to make it virtually impossible to get Mexican goods. As a result, Mexico was suddenly ready to play ball and work together to solve those issues. Funny how that works!