On the first day of the US imposing high tariffs on its biggest trading partners, business people in Colorado said actions from the Trump administration pose an existential threat to their livelihood.
Business owners and agricultural representatives conveyed their fears of the consequences during a city style meeting organized by free trade farmers and received by the World Denver Trade Center on Tuesday. The forum came while the US started 25% tariffs on products from Mexico and Canada and doubled tariffs in China to 20%.
Canada pledged to hit more than $ 100 billion American goods with tariffs and Beijing retaliated with up to 15% tariffs in a series of US farm products.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said she will announce on Sunday what American products will aim for her country in response.
A new turn came on Tuesday evening when the trade secretary Howard Lutnick said in an interview on the Fox business network that taxes in Canada and Mexico could be reduced after the two countries pledged to do more to curb Fentanil’s flow in SH.BA
Whatever the trade dispute is returned, the speakers in the city hall said the result will not be good for consumers or their business if taxes remain.
“These tariffs pose a threat not only to consumer prices, but they pose a threat to companies like mine,” said Jeremy Petersen, the founder, president and CEO of Kolorado -based Identity PET.
Petersen and his brother started the company in 2018. The company, which is small but rapidly growing, receives 100% of its products from Canada. Petersen estimated that 25% tax increase would increase the price of retail by 32.6%.
“We have no choice but to overcome that cost to the consumer,” he added.
More than 80% of potase fertilizers used by US farmers come from Canada, said Nicholas Colglazier, Executive Director of the Corn Promotion Council in Colorado. Other products such as pharmaceuticals for livestock and pesticides for crops are imported from China and Canada.
“We are seeing the costs to raise corn, overcome what you can do for hectares,” Colglazier said. “This will exacerbate the problem.”
President Donald Trump campaigns to become harsh with US trading partners. His reasons for tariffs have changed: to persuade Canada and Mexico to hit the illegal border crossings and Fentanil’s course in the US; raises money for the place; and promote the return of production in America.
Trump was set to accept 25% tariffs in Mexico and Canada in February, but called a 30-day period. A 10% tax from China went forward as planned.
Brian Kuehl, the Executive Director of Farmers for Free Trade, called the fees “unnecessary and harmful”.
“Canada and Mexico are two of our closest trading partners and of course our two closest neighbors,” Kuehl said. “We have entered into a trade agreement with them in 2019 that President Trump negotiated. A major trade agreement is and today it seems that we are breaking that trade agreement.”
Kuehl Foam pushing Trump to set fees for what he believes is a picture of the world as a lot of zero game. “It is the idea that I only earn if it loses. This is not just the way the world works anymore. Our chains of trade supply with Canada and Mexico are strongly intertwined, and we all win because of this. “
If the tariffs were limited to finished goods only, this would be less harmful than if they were applied to inputs, or the ingredients used in production. From a steak to a plate on a Ford truck sitting on a car road, there are many back and forth between Canada, the US and Mexico, and if the fees hit many times, it would push costs too beyond 25%.
When it comes to US countries most vulnerable to the last round of tariffs, Colorado ranks 20th, with nearly half of its $ 17.8 billion in imports coming from Canada, Mexico and China, according Montana is the most vulnerable state with 94% of its imports coming from those three countries.
Colorado importers pay $ 459 million last year tariff and this amount could increase to $ 1.4 billion a year, according to an analysis by farmers for free trade and World Denver Trade Center. Fees for steel and aluminum imports can only add $ 35 million to purchase costs.
“None of my lessons, none of my lessons, has ever taught me that import fees will improve economic well -being,” said Kishore Kulkarni, a professor of economics at Denver State Metropolitan University who has specialized in international trade for the last 45 years.
Tariffs can protect local producers, but over time protected industries become less competitive. And trading partners respond to their tariffs, making general trade shrink and reduce global economic production, Kishore said.
“An eye for one eye makes the whole world blind,” church, reciting a quotation attributed to Mahatma Gandhi.
Gail Ross, the main Operational Office for Crimeson Klover, a buller boutique, said the company looked at the Movement of its production at the SH.BA in 2019 when Trump raised tariffs in China during its first term as president.
The factories in Los Angeles were not interested in the business of Crimeson Clover because the volume was very small. The priest of a Denver company was close to what Crimeson Klover could pay, but “what could I get out of China in four months what would last nine months.”
Sandra Payne is the president of Denver Concrete Vibrator, who makes equipment that solves and strengthens concrete for such large trading projects as bridges, dams and stadiums. The company once imported most of steel, aluminum, rubber and other goods from China, but now it receives many products from Canada and Mexico.
“Which is okay, is great,” Payne said, “but that means all these fees will now seriously affect us.”
And Payne worries about its customers if the company’s prices rise. “We don’t want to raise our prices all the time. We raised them several times in the last two years, but the borders are narrow and we will be forced to deal with this somehow. “
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