<p>According to <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.33.4.187" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2019</a> Trump’s tariffs raised domestic prices by 10-30% depending on which of 6 waves of his tariffs we are talking about.</p>
<p><a href="https://i.sstatic.net/xkR6OuiI.jpg" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/xkR6OuiI.jpg" alt="enter image description here" /></a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>If it's net positive (as I expect), is the quoted statement not true or an example of misinterpreted data?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>You don’t provide any context for that random quote. The premise of that quote is that these tariffs lowered commodity prices which the quote doesn’t bother to back up by some causal inference and then the claim it resulted in 89 billion lower prices doesn’t make sense at all. What does it even mean 89 billion lower prices? We measure aggregate prices using aggregate indices and there we can only talk about percentage changes. So the statement is based on premises that are unsupported and it’s not even clear how the decline in prices was measured and hence there is no reason why anyone should entertain it unless you cropped out supports for those claims.</p>
<p>Also prices alone are not sufficient to determine if the net effect on household is positive or negative, since they also affect the employment and domestic output and other variables. According to <em>ibid</em>;</p>
<blockquote>
<p>full incidence of the tariffs has fallen on domestic consumers and importers so far, and our estimates imply a reduction in aggregate US real income of $1.4 billion per month by the end of 2018. We see similar patterns for foreign countries that have retaliated with their own tariffs against the United States, which suggests that the trade war has also reduced the real income of these other countries.</p>
</blockquote>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-11-17T15:43:27.870Z
Thank you. There [isn't](https://www.quora.com/As-a-Trump-voter-do-you-actually-not-realize-that-Trumps-tariffs-are-going-to-make-inflation-worse/answer/Alan-McCaslin?ch=15&oid=1477743826507436&share=ba94080b&srid=5m8Fl&target_type=answer) really any context
Sergey Zolotarev
CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-11-17T13:07:31.793Z
2024-11-17T13:07:31.793Z
1muflon1
<p><em>Someone in the internet</em> said this to me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>[Trump's] tariffs actually lowered the Import Price Index for All Commodities 3.73%, which translated into <span class="math-container">$89.2 billion of lower prices vs. the $</span>80 billion in tariffs collected.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It's been a while, so the jury must me in. On the whole, what is the net effect of Trump's tariffs on the prices for consumer goods in the US? By &quot;Trump's tariffs&quot; I mean the tariffs he imposed during his first term (most notably on Chinese imports).</p>
<p>If it's net positive (as I expect), is the quoted statement not true or an example of misinterpreted data?</p>

<inflation><united-states><tariffs>
What is net effect of Trump's imposed tariffs on prices?
Sergey Zolotarev
# What is net effect of Trump's imposed tariffs on prices?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2024-11-17)

*Someone in the internet* said this to me:

> [Trump's] tariffs actually lowered the Import Price Index for All Commodities 3.73%, which translated into $89.2 billion of lower prices vs. the $80 billion in tariffs collected.

It's been a while, so the jury must me in. On the whole, what is the net effect of Trump's tariffs on the prices for consumer goods in the US? By "Trump's tariffs" I mean the tariffs he imposed during his first term (most notably on Chinese imports).

If it's net positive (as I expect), is the quoted statement not true or an example of misinterpreted data?

**Tags:** inflation, united-states, tariffs


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2024-11-17. Score: 2

According to [Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2019](https://www.aeaweb.org/articles?id=10.1257/jep.33.4.187) Trump’s tariffs raised domestic prices by 10-30% depending on which of 6 waves of his tariffs we are talking about.

[![enter image description here](https://i.sstatic.net/xkR6OuiI.jpg)](https://i.sstatic.net/xkR6OuiI.jpg)

> If it's net positive (as I expect), is the quoted statement not true or an example of misinterpreted data?

You don’t provide any context for that random quote. The premise of that quote is that these tariffs lowered commodity prices which the quote doesn’t bother to back up by some causal inference and then the claim it resulted in 89 billion lower prices doesn’t make sense at all. What does it even mean 89 billion lower prices? We measure aggregate prices using aggregate indices and there we can only talk about percentage changes. So the statement is based on premises that are unsupported and it’s not even clear how the decline in prices was measured and hence there is no reason why anyone should entertain it unless you cropped out supports for those claims.

Also prices alone are not sufficient to determine if the net effect on household is positive or negative, since they also affect the employment and domestic output and other variables. According to *ibid*;

> full incidence of the tariffs has fallen on domestic consumers and importers so far, and our estimates imply a reduction in aggregate US real income of $1.4 billion per month by the end of 2018. We see similar patterns for foreign countries that have retaliated with their own tariffs against the United States, which suggests that the trade war has also reduced the real income of these other countries.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thank you. There [isn't](https://www.quora.com/As-a-Trump-voter-do-you-actually-not-realize-that-Trumps-tariffs-are-going-to-make-inflation-worse/answer/Alan-McCaslin?ch=15&oid=1477743826507436&share=ba94080b&srid=5m8Fl&target_type=answer) really any context  

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