New tariffs will impact Utah businesses and consumers, local trade experts say
Feb 3, 2025, 1:59 PM
FILE: A cashier counts cash at Thread at City Creek Center in Salt Lake City on Friday, Nov. 24, 2023. Utah experts warn that the tariffs President Donald Trump is threatening to bring against countries like Canada and China will directly affect local businesses, and in-turn Utah consumers. (Megan Nielsen, Deseret News)
(Megan Nielsen, Deseret News)
SALT LAKE CITY — Utah experts warn that the tariffs President Donald Trump is threatening to bring against countries like Canada and China will directly affect local businesses, and in-turn Utah consumers.
“[Tariffs are] just a broad tax on all Americans,” said Jonathan Freedman, president and CEO of World Trade Center Utah.
Related: University of Utah economic professor explains goal of tariffs
Freedman explained, for example, that if a Utah business manufactures a good in a country with a 25% tariff, the Utah business will have to pay 25% more to bring that product back into the United States. And he said if the company has to pay that bill up front, it’ll likely charge consumers 25% more for that product.
“Because [tariffs] make everything more expensive, it naturally reduces our buying power,” Freedman told KSL NewsRadio. “I think that it will hurt overall orders to [countries with tariffs imposed from the U.S.]”
On the plus side, Freedman noted that tariffs do help inject more money into the economy. They can also help reduce our nation’s deficit.
He said we’ve seen some tariffs last for years, and if other countries retaliate and issue tariffs of their own, he said consumers outside the U.S. will suffer too.
“Trade wars are real and they’re expensive,” Freedman said.
World trade, the Utah economy, and tariffs
International trade is a big part of Utah’s economy.
According to a report from the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute, Utah exported $17.4 billion in goods to other countries in 2023. The returns contributed over $8 billion or 2.9% of the state’s total gross domestic product that year.
The state’s most common exports are primary metals, especially gold, as well as electronic products and chemicals, according to the report.
The report also notes Utah’s biggest international trade partners are, first, the United Kingdom, followed by Canada, Mexico and China. President Trump has threatened tariffs against all of those countries except the U.K.
