The other 49 states have between 1% to 8% of their labor force working in industries getting hit by retaliatory tariffs. Nearly 10% of the Wisconsin workforce stands to be affected.
President Trump’s first-term trade wars hit Wisconsin farmers hard, but they and other workers in the state may be on the verge of even deeper punishment as America’s trading partners impose retaliatory tariffs in response to Trump’s latest tariffs. An analysis by the New York Times shows that tariffs imposed by Canada, China, and the European Union in response to Trump’s latest tariffs are concentrated on industries that account for 9.5% of the Wisconsin workforce, leaving them exposed to the reduced sales, exports, and potential job losses that can occur during a trade war.
While Trump is imposing mostly across-the-board tariffs – 20% on goods from China, 25% on all steel and aluminum from Canada, and all imports from European Union nations — the response from other countries is more specific, targeting products made or grown in specific states, including many swing states. Wisconsin is the state with the highest percentage of its jobs in industries targeted by these retaliatory tariffs.
“Canada was prepared, they expected it, and they have come back with reprisals,” said Sean O’Malley, a Hudson native whose Wall Street career specialized in financial compliance and risk assessment. “One that’s going to be most impactful to Wisconsin farmers is the tariff on potash, one of the major ingredients in agricultural fertilizer.
“So when farmers go to buy their fertilizer,” O’Malley said on UpNorthNews Radio, “it will be more expensive. And those prices will be passed on in terms of higher food prices as well.”
“When we got into a trade war with China, that really hurt the price of our corn and soybeans,” said Cadott farmer Les Danielson. “They both were well below the cost of production.”
“If China decides they want to buy soybeans from Brazil and not buy ours, it really hurts—it hurts on-the-farm prices,” Danielson said.
“With our crops, especially soybeans, it’s going to really hurt. A majority of the corn grown in the US goes to Mexico, and if we have tariffs with them, it hurts us and it’s going to be a tax on people,” Rick Geske of Geske Family Farms said to WKBT-TV during an event with state Sen. Brad Pfaff (D-Onalaska).
Tanner Johnson, a soybean farmer in northwest Wisconsin, reminded Wisconsin Public Radio that Trump cost the US Treasury $27 billion in his first term—in support payments to keep farmers afloat while their export markets disappeared because of his trade wars.
“It certainly was not a fun time back in those days,” Johnson said.
Along with soybeans, corn, and poultry, the Times analysis shows the retaliatory tariffs will also hit manufacturing in automobile, car parts, air conditioning, and other products.
The pain is a far cry from what Trump promised on the campaign trail.
“Starting on day one, we will end inflation and make America affordable again, to bring down the prices of all goods,” he said at an August rally in Bozeman, Montana.
“We will bring our auto-making industry to the record levels of 37 years ago, and we’ll be able to do it very quickly through tariffs,” he told the Economic Club of New York in September. “We will eliminate regulations that drive up housing costs with the goal of cutting the cost of a new home in half. We think we can do that.”
Instead, Trump’s tariffs on lumber and appliances are already driving homebuying and remodeling costs higher. The tariffs are projected to raise the costs that go into building a single-family home in the US by $7,500 to $10,000, according to the National Association of Home Builders.
Like many Americans, Dana Schnipper, a building materials supplier in New York, told the Associated Press he thinks the tariffs will give American manufacturers cover to raise prices on steel components.
“These prices will never come down,” Schnipper said. “Whatever is going to happen, these things will be sticky.”
While Trump could again try to offset the pain of retaliatory tariffs through support payments, Danielson notes it is still a cost Americans pay—in taxes, if not on store shelves.
“I think that’s one reason a lot of farmers really like Trump—because they received all of these ‘Trump payments,’ as they’re referred to,” Danielson said. “But you know, the man who destroys our market really shouldn’t be rewarded for using government money, all of which is borrowed, to backfill the farmers’ income.”
UP NORTH NEWS