When I was 18 (2004), I got my first real job at Nordic Furniture of Markdale ON. We made danish-style minimalist chairs and tables. In early 2005 I and other lower seniority workers in the factory were laid off. It hobbled on for another few years before going out of business for good. The furniture was high quality, the prices didn’t change, but people’s willingness to pay for quality had dropped. This story is not an uncommon one in Southern Ontario.12
I have for a long time liked the idea of tariffs for two reasons They would make a lot of manufactured goods more expensive and they would begin to allow the independent evolution of design in countries again both of which I think would be a good thing. As for the downside, food and housing are domestically produced so that would mostly be unaffected, so clothes, electronics and that sort of thing would be the main source of the price increases.
We throw away too much of clothing, appliances, electronics etc. and the incentives are toward the poorly made and the disposable. A tariff would increase the price, and then quality components and fabrics would make a smaller percentage of the bill of goods as either labour or tariffs would necessarily make up a larger part. Thus, there would be a smaller percent difference between higher quality goods and lower quality goods, which should do something to drive customers toward buying things that last longer and thus have a lower overall environmental impact. Further, if you pay more, it might be worth repairing some of what we currently dispose.
The environmental aspect of the production and disposal of these items has been in many cases shifted overseas to places with fewer environmental regulations and thus the net pollutants per item made is higher than it would be if it stayed at home. 3
From an ecological and evolutionary perspective, seperation has its benefits. Isolated, small populations evolve quickly to fill new niches, and weird things happen. The platapus requires Australia; the rat can conquor the world. I think something similar happens culturally. In order for weird ideas to flourish, there can’t be constant migrations of the latest rat idea smashing through and taking up mind space. Now, I think the internet is the main source for the mind rats, but even when you had print going around the world, it still allowed some level of idea transfer and that didn’t eliminate cultural diversion in areas such as woodworking tools, vehicles or media as each culture puts their own spin on things. Eventually, with sufficient superiority, one can break through even with the tariffs, but it allows a sort of honing of two seperate styles to their heighest level before the clash happens, creating in my opinion cool stuff like the original Honda Civic and the Camero.
That’s my case for tariffs. The case against is that it makes the economy smaller than it would otherwise be,4 which I think is an accurate criticism, just one that I don’t think should dominate all other concerns. In the United States, one of the candidates is proposing a 10% across the board tariff and a 60% tariff on Chinese goods.5 You can guess which one. On one hand he’s proposing to implement one of my most dear and neglected policies and on the other he’s somewhat erratic and reactive. I can’t vote anyway, but I will be watching this space with interes.
Note regarding the 1st 2 sources. You need to read between the lines a little to see the effects of tariffs on the industries.