On Tariffs And Jobs

Can tariffs boost our local communities?

Yesterday, as the sun was shining brightly and I was planning to BBQ our dinner, I bought an extremely heavy wool coat.

My young granddaughter was with me, I think she thought I was nuts, and she opted to get an ice cream instead of a coat.

From sometime in the 1930’s until sometime in the 20XX’s we had a small manufacturing plant here in my little city. I don’t know exactly when it closed, because it was before I lived here. But, I’ve always been rather fascinated by the way that it closed. They seemingly just locked the doors one day. The little shop sits on the main roadway into town, with big front windows. Within those windows, one can really plainly see the works in progress. All I can imagine from looking within is that one day they just all stood up at the end of their shift, locked the doors, and no one ever returned.

Photo by Jørgen Håland on Unsplash

My little City is served by a big Home Depot store, and a little local chain of Ace Hardware stores. I do my best to avoid them both. Home Depot is for crap, and the folks at the local Ace don’t seem to have an affinity for customer service.

So, whenever I can, I do my hardware buying at a little old hardware store located in our city’s downtown. It’s run by a father and son. While the prices might be a bit higher than the other places, they generally have what I need, and when I don’t know what that is, they can direct me to it.

A few weeks ago, I started seeing clothing from the old manufacturing concern show up for sale at the little hardware store.

A bit of research informed me that this little concern specialized in two different lines. Traditional letterman’s jackets for athletes, and shooting clothing for outdoorsmen. A bit more research indicated that their clothing was long considered the very best available at any price. Indeed vintage shooting sweaters from them seem widely available for sale online, in used condition.

They used to employ between 25 and 30 people in my little City, and apparently sold their high end garments throughout the country and around the world.

A week or two ago I bought one of their ball caps. Probably it is the only Made in the USA ball cap that I’ve ever encountered or owned.

Yesterday, while buying a can of WD-40 in my favorite little hardware store, I spotted the extremely heavy wool coat.

I asked the son, whose father owns the store what was going on. How they got these unsold garments that they were selling.

He explained that his dad was friends with the family that owned the little manufacturer. That the building had sold after all these years, so all the old garments went to the hardware store to be sold.

Looking at the coat I was eyeballing, he said that the owner had actually made it for himself, but it hadn’t worked out because he’d made it far too large, and there was some mumbling about how he’d have to put on 40 pounds or so for it to fit. Maybe that’s a true story, maybe not, but it’s fun anyway.

Well, I’m a fat ass, so I tried that baby on! Lo and behold, it fit perfectly.

I told him I’d think about it.

I need another coat about as much as I need a hole in the head. And I really don’t need such a heavy warm coat. I didn’t think very long. My granddaughter and I wandered outside, ate our ice cream (how cool to have a hardware store that sells ice cream) then I wandered back inside and bought the coat.

Like everything else from that old manufacturer, it was made right here in the United States. Here in Washington, out of wool from Oregon.

What happened to that little garment manufacturer years ago?

That little place that was apparently quite famous around the nation for the quality of its really specialized clothing? Famous with shooters, people who are generally willing to spend a lot on their favorite activity?

Well, who can know for certain? I can’t.

But, I’d be willing to bet.

I’d be willing to bet that NAFTA passed, and that encouraged other manufacturers from south of our border to begin creating similar garments. Garments that could be sold much cheaper because of greatly lesser regulation, and greatly lower wages.

Companies in Asia and Central America probably got into the game as well. The last pair of jeans I purchased were made in Honduras, with a very old and venerable American name attached.

I’d be willing to bet that is exactly what happened.

That lower quality versions of the garments from overseas flooded into our market, putting 25 or 30 people in my little city out of work, not to mention the family that started the business way back in the 1930’s.

Would tariffs have prevented this?

Will the imposition of tariffs bring small manufacturers like this back?

I don’t know.

Maybe, maybe not.

But this is exactly what is driving support for tariffs.

That’s the thing though. No one knows. No one can know. No one can know because tariffs on such a large scale have never been implemented by a nation with an economy as large as that of ours. What we are seeing now is unique, because the current economic conditions of our country are unique.

Will tariffs be good or bad for the United States? I don’t know. No one knows.

Only time will reveal the truth.

It is truly absurd to see so many talking heads on the television and on social media either screaming how tariffs will be a panacea that will result in the greatest economic boom of all time, or screaming how they will plunge us into unrecoverable economic disaster.

They are all lying, because they can’t know. They are lying to get our attention. Attention that they can then convert into dollars.

Because nothing sells like division.