The most beautiful word in the dictionary is “tariff.”
That is, if you ask President Donald Trump.
The most important issue to Americans in the recent 2024 election was the economy. During his campaign, Trump pointed to inflation during the COVID-19 pandemic, and used it as a tool to sway voters. However, despite his insistence that he would bring down inflation, in January, consumer prices were skyrocketing at the fastest rate we’ve seen in almost one and a half years, and this is likely to increase in the coming months.
Why?
One big reason is tariffs.
In an effort, according to the White House, to slow illegal immigration and the drug trade, Trump rolled out 25% tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico as well as a 10% tariff on Chinese goods starting Feb. 1. Canada and Mexico reached deals to temporarily pause them, but on March 4, they were reinstated, and Chinese tariffs were raised to 20%. The next day, tariffs on Mexican and Canadian cars were put on pause for a month.
This situation is very likely to continue changing in the future, and its uncertainty speaks to the fact that our president has no idea what he’s doing with this risky economic policy.
Many people are confused on what exactly a tariff is.
A common misconception is that it is a tax paid on goods a country is exporting by the country exporting them. Trump himself plays a role in spreading this misinformation, stating that they are “a tax on a foreign country.”
In reality, private companies — who import goods into the United States — pay the tax. For example, if the U.S. places a 20% tariff on trade with China, the cost is not paid by China, but rather by American companies. Before entering the U.S., those companies pay an extra 20% of what they’ve already paid for. They then have to raise prices to cover the cost of the tariff and still make a profit.
In other words, it’s us — the consumers — who end up paying for Trump’s tariffs. That’s not what so many millions voted for.
This has serious implications for students at La Salle.
Take the cafeteria lunch prices, for example. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as of 2021, nearly two-thirds of America’s vegetable imports and almost half of our fruit and tree nut imports come from Mexico. For someone who claims to care so much about grocery prices, Trump isn’t doing a great job actually lowering them.
The La Salle cafeteria has to be self-sustaining, and the price students pay for school lunch depends almost completely on the price the cafeteria pays to buy ingredients for meals.
With Trump’s now-active tariffs on Mexico, it’s possible students will have to pay more for lunch.
Another price that we can expect to rise steeply is technology. According to the Associated Press, 79% of America’s laptop and tablet imports come from China, where U.S. tariffs are currently being enforced.
While technology isn’t an immediate issue for most Lasallian students — iPads obviously aren’t purchased nearly as frequently as lunch, for example — things still happen. Technology breaks or just stops working. Not to mention, the incoming class of 2029 will soon be rushing to buy iPads.
Technology is expensive enough already, but with Trump’s tariffs, the price will begin to rise significantly. We can already predict their potentially harmful impacts on iPhones, which will need to be priced higher to cover the costs of the tax.
The tariffs on China aren’t the only ones that could have a negative impact on consumers. The United States imports nearly 4 million barrels of oil from Canada each day, and while curbing this industry may eventually benefit the environment, the cost of gas is set to rise significantly as tariffs on Canada become active.
NBC News reported that tariffs on Canadian and Mexican crude oil imports mean “higher costs for making finished fuels like gasoline, much of which is likely to be passed along to U.S. consumers.” This is obviously a problem for us here, especially for students who live further away from our school.
How many students at La Salle drive to school instead of walking, biking, or using public transit?
I don’t know the exact number, but I think it is safe to say it’s the majority of the student body. Tariffs on Mexican and Canadian gasoline will obviously be a problem for students and parents, especially those who live further from the school.
In the coming years, we at La Salle should prepare for a higher cost of living under Trump’s presidency because his economically dangerous tariffs are not making the future look cheap.
