Last Updated 6 days by Amnon J. Jobi | Amnon Front Page
How Trump’s tariffs could impact your wallet
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Indiana’s workers won’t be immune to the impact of President Donald Trump’s newly imposed tariffs on Canada, Mexico, and China, or to the retaliatory tariffs promised by those countries, one economic expert says.
The president’s tariffs could impact Indiana jobs specifically, according to Micah Pollak, an associate professor of economics at Indiana University Northwest.
“Canada, Mexico, and China are our three largest trading partners, and roughly a quarter of all of our economic output is due to global trade. So when you add in a tax or an additional cost that firms must pay, any time a good travels through these countries, that adds a cost at every level of production and manufacturing. And it really affects every company, nationally and in Indiana,” Pollak said.
Pollak says these additional costs will raise the cost of production of certain items, which companies will pass on to consumers.
“It’s going to have an impact on food prices, gas prices,” Pollak explained. “Prices will go up. The question is, how much? And, unfortunately, I think we could see prices going back up to the point where we are talking about inflation again, something that we hopefully thought we’d put behind ourselves.”
Indiana will also feel the sting of retaliatory tariffs that Canada, China, and Mexico have promised to place on American-made goods, according to Pollak.
“We produce a lot of agricultural products, and so a lot of the tariffs that Canada has already announced they’re putting in place will be on agricultural products. So that’s going to affect farmers and a lot of the more rural community in Indiana.”
President Trump has previous experience with tariffs — he ordered a tariff on steel during his first administration — but these new tariffs are more widespread, according to Pollak.
“Here, we’re seeing widespread tariffs, not just on individual goods. Tariffs are useful when you target them and you’re very deliberate and you use them strategically. But when you have a widespread tariff like this on everything from your three largest trading partners, it’s really hard to find any economic upside of this other than the biggest impact being higher prices for consumers.”
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