Trump’s import-tariff proposal would cut 0.7% from US GDP, study says

Former President Donald Trump’s proposal to institute a 10% tariff on almost all imports would cost American consumers $300 billion a year, result in the loss of 550,000 US jobs, and cut growth by 0.7%, according to a new analysis from the nonpartisan Tax Foundation.

If other countries retaliate by imposing tariffs on US goods, the economic damage could be even greater. The Tax Foundation said the resulting trade war from retaliatory tariffs would further reduce growth by 0.4% and eliminate another 322,000 jobs.

Trump, who is seeking the 2024 presidential nomination, told Fox Business this month that he would impose the 10% tariff “automatically” for all countries. “I think we should have a ring around the collar,” he said, proposing what advisers call a “universal baseline tariff.” 

“When companies come in and they dump their products in the United States, they should pay, automatically, let’s say a 10% tax,” Trump told Fox Business’s Larry Kudlow, a former Trump economic adviser.

The tariffs would be an expansion of the levies on steel, aluminum and other goods Trump imposed during his presidency and that President Joe Biden has largely kept in place. 

The Tax Foundation, a Washington think tank that generally supports lower taxes, warned that the price tag on Trump’s tariffs would amount to “a tax increase rivaling the ones proposed by President Biden.”

But the Trump campaign pushed back, saying tariffs imposed during the Trump administration resulted in “effectively no inflation throughout his entire presidency.”

“This is an economically illiterate statement put forward by a globalist Washington think tank funded by multinational corporate interests that are totally opposed to President Trump’s pro-worker, pro-American trade agenda,” said Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung.