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    Who Likes Tariffs? Some U.S. Industries Are Eager for Them.

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    Concern about the cost of materials has tempered business enthusiasm about taxing imports. But steel and aluminum makers say they welcome the help.The United States buys more steel from Canada than from any other country, and those imports will become much more expensive under tariffs President Trump intends to impose this week.That’s good news to Stephen Capone, president of Capone Iron Corporation of Rowley, Mass., which makes steel stairs, handrails, gratings and other products and has around 100 employees. For too long, he said, Canadian competitors have been flooding the New England market with cheap steel products, preventing his and other local companies from winning business.“No matter how low we bid, they can underbid us on any job,” Mr. Capone said, “They’re decimating our market.”Many companies oppose Mr. Trump’s tariffs, fearing that they will push up costs and provoke retaliation against their products by other countries. Ford Motor’s chief executive, Jim Farley, said last month that tariffs could “blow a hole” in the U.S. auto industry, and retailers have warned that they will lead to higher prices for consumers.But there are deep pockets of support for his trade policies in the business world, particularly among executives who say their industries have been harmed by unfair trade.In particular, the leaders of American steel and aluminum companies have long contended that foreign rivals undercut them because those rivals benefit from subsidies and other government support. And they say that tariffs, when imposed without loopholes, have been effective at spurring more investment in the United States.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Undocumented Workers, Fearing Deportation, Are Staying Home

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    Fearing roundups, many immigrants are staying home. Construction, agriculture, senior care and hospitality employers say labor shortages will worsen.The railroad tracks that slice through downtown Freehold, N.J., used to be lined by dozens of men, waiting for work. Each morning, the men — day laborers, almost all from Latin America and undocumented — would be scooped up by local contractors in pickup trucks for jobs painting, landscaping, removing debris.In recent weeks, the tracks have been desolate. On a gray February morning, a laborer named Mario, who came from Mexico two decades ago, said it was the quietest he could remember.“Because of the president, we have a fear,” said Mario, 55, who agreed to be interviewed on the condition that only his first name would be used because he is undocumented. His two sons are also in the United States illegally; one works in paving, the other in home construction. “We are in difficult times,” he said.This scene has been playing out on the streets of Freehold, on the farms of California’s Central Valley, in nursing homes in Arizona, in Georgia poultry plants and in Chicago restaurants.President Trump has broadcast plans for a “mass deportation,” and the opening weeks of his second term have brought immigration enforcement operations in cities across the United States, providing a daily drumbeat of arrests that, while so far relatively limited, are quickly noted in group chats among migrants.Fear has gripped America’s undocumented workers. Many are staying home.The impact is being felt not only in immigrant homes and communities, but also in the industries that rely on immigrants as a source of willing and inexpensive labor, including residential construction, agriculture, senior care and hospitality. American consumers will soon feel the pain.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump’s Immigration Crackdown Could Disrupt St. Louis’s Growth Strategy

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    At a high-traffic intersection on the south side of St. Louis, in a former bank building complete with a glassy atrium, it’s time for sewing class — held in Dari, the Afghan variant of Persian.Listen to this article with reporter commentaryThe walls are hung with photos of Afghanistan, from which most of the students have recently arrived. Before class starts, a handful of women in sneakers and head scarves first go to another room for prayer, while their younger children scamper around a well-equipped play room. They return to dated sewing machines, learning how to run tiny businesses from their homes as they acclimate to their new country.The two-year-old Afghan Community Center has been an anchor for Halima Osmani, 20, who arrived from Afghanistan last summer with her parents and seven siblings. She now runs her own tailoring business, selling to local women through an Instagram account, while she works on getting her G.E.D. Eventually, she wants to become a physician assistant, and St. Louis seems like a good place to fulfill her dreams.“Our first choice was Virginia, but we ended up here and liked it,” Ms. Osmani said through a translator; she is still learning English. “The first thing we noticed here was that it wasn’t crowded.”Not being crowded — that’s both a problem and an opportunity for the grand but diminished city, which has been losing population for decades. The city’s politicians, business community, religious institutions and philanthropists have embraced a push to reverse that trend through immigration. In addition to refugees like Ms. Osmani, they’re trying to attract people from Central and South America, as well as international students and highly skilled professionals on employment visas.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump’s Delay on Mexico and Canada Tariffs Came in Response to Market Revolt

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    With prices still high, the Trump administration is heeding the risks of fanning inflation with import duties.A month ago, President Trump announced that he would impose sweeping tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico before reaching a last-minute deal to delay them for 30 days.This week, after markets revolted when the tariffs were put in place, Mr. Trump watered them down with a monthlong reprieve for automakers.And then on Thursday, he opened up even broader exemptions for many other products that are imported from America’s neighbors to the north and south after intense lobbying from business groups that warned of rising prices.Mr. Trump has spent the last month or so bouncing between imposing sweeping tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico and delaying them because of last-minute deals.“There will,” he said, “always be changes and adjustments.”Despite Mr. Trump’s insistence that “tariff” is among his favorite words, the waffling over import duties reflects the reality that steep import taxes are not an antidote for every policy problem facing the nation.Mr. Trump’s economic advisers continue to contend that the tariffs are part of a broader agenda that will not damage the economy. However, the delays and loopholes reveal that they are beginning to see the risks of taking tariffs too far at a time when the economy is showing signs of strain and consumers are still reeling from inflation.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Jobs Report Is Steady, but Impact of Federal Cutbacks and Tariffs Looms

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    Employers added 151,000 jobs in February, the Labor Department said, based on surveys taken as Trump administration policies were still rolling out.It might be a moment of hush before chaos ensues, or it may be business as usual.U.S. employers added 151,000 jobs in February, the first full month under the new Trump administration, the Labor Department reported on Friday. The gain extended a streak of job growth to 50 months. The unemployment rate ticked up slightly, to 4.1 percent, from 4 percent in January.The report showed a decline of 10,000 in federal employment. But it was based on surveys conducted in the second week of February, as the Trump administration’s mass firings, buyouts and hiring freezes at federal agencies were still unfolding.The survey has likely not registered “more than a sliver of the full impact from federal government layoffs,” said Preston Caldwell, chief U.S. economist at Morningstar. “That should change in next month’s job report.”The monthly change in federal government jobs.

    Source: Bureau of Labor StatisticsBy The New York TimesA similar waiting game is in store for those hoping to ascertain the effects that President Trump’s tariffs — those imposed and those still threatened — may have on global trading partners, business investment and employment.Even without the shake-up in foreign trade and federal employment, private-sector hiring has slowed substantially from the blowout pace of 2021 to 2023. That has left labor market analysts and financial commentators gearing up for a potential cooling in economic growth this year.Unemployment rate More

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    Trump’s Policies Have Shaken a Once-Solid Economic Outlook

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    Economic forecasts have deteriorated in recent weeks, reflecting the upheaval from federal layoffs, tariff moves and immigration roundups.President Trump inherited an economy that was, by most conventional measures, firing on all cylinders. Wages, consumer spending and corporate profits were rising. Unemployment was low. The inflation rate, though higher than normal, was falling.Just weeks into Mr. Trump’s term, the outlook is gloomier. Measures of business and consumer confidence have plunged. The stock market has been on a roller-coaster ride. Layoffs are picking up, according to some data. And forecasters are cutting their estimates for economic growth this year, with some even predicting that the U.S. gross domestic product could shrink in the first quarter.Some commentators have gone further, arguing that the economy could be headed for a recession, a sharp rebound in inflation or even the dreaded combination of the two, “stagflation.” Most economists consider that unlikely, saying growth is more likely to slow than to give way to a decline.Still, the sudden deterioration in the outlook is striking, especially because it is almost entirely a result of Mr. Trump’s policies and the resulting uncertainty. Tariffs, and the inevitable retaliation from trading partners, will increase prices and slow down growth. Federal job cuts will push up unemployment, and could lead government employees and contractors to pull back on spending while they wait to learn their fate. Deportations could drive up costs for industries like construction and hospitality that depend on immigrant labor.“If the economy was starting out in quite good shape, it’s probably in less good shape after what we’ve seen the last few weeks,” said Donald Rissmiller, chief economist at Strategas, a research firm.A Strong FoundationThe U.S. economy has repeatedly shown its resilience in recent years, and there are parts of Mr. Trump’s agenda that could foster growth. Business groups have responded enthusiastically to Republican plans to cut taxes and reduce regulation. A streamlined government could, in theory, make the overall economy more productive.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Trump’s Tariffs by Whim Keep Allies and Markets Off Balance

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    On Tuesday, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick went on Fox Business to reassure nervous allies and even more twitchy investors that the Trump administration was negotiating a deal to avoid tariffs on goods from Mexico and Canada, and that the president is “gonna work something out with them.”“It’s not going to be a pause” for Mr. Trump’s on-again, off-again tariffs, he insisted. “None of that pause stuff.”On Thursday, the world got what the president characterized as more of that pause stuff.Mr. Trump’s announcement that he had a good conversation with Mexico’s president, and would delay most tariffs until April 2, was only the latest example of the punish-by-whim nature of the second Trump presidency. A few hours after the Mexico announcement, Canada got a break too, even as Mr. Trump on social media accused its departing prime minister, Justin Trudeau, of using “the Tariff problem” to “run again for Prime Minister.”“So much fun to watch!” he wrote.Indeed, it appears that Mr. Trump is having enormous fun turning tariffs on and off like tap water. But others are developing a case of Trump-induced whiplash, not least investors, who sent stock prices down again on Thursday amid the uncertainty over what Mr. Trump’s inconstancy means for the global economy. (A later rise in stock futures pointed to rosier expectations for Friday.)When the White House finally released the text of Mr. Trump’s orders on Thursday evening, it appeared that some of the tariffs — those covered in the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement that Mr. Trump negotiated and celebrated in his first term — were indeed permanently suspended. Other tariffs were merely paused.Most everyone involved was confused, which may well have been the point.As Mr. Trump hands down tariff determinations and then pulls them back for a month or so, world leaders call to plead their case, a bit like vassal states appealing to a larger power. Chief executives put in calls as well, making it clear that Mr. Trump is the one you need to deal with if you are bringing in car parts from Canada or chips from China.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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    Sweeping Tariffs Threaten to Undo a 30-Year Trade Alliance

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    When the United States signed a free-trade agreement with Canada and Mexico more than 30 years ago, the premise was that partnering with two other thriving economies would also benefit America.This week, President Trump abruptly scrapped that idea. He imposed a sweeping 25 percent tariff on Tuesday on the roughly $1 trillion of imports that Mexico and Canada send into the United States each year as part of that North American trade pact — before quickly walking them back. On Thursday, the president signed executive orders suspending the tariffs on Canada and Mexico for goods that trade under the rules of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, which is much of the trade that crosses North American borders.If the tariffs had gone into full effect, they would have significantly raised costs for Canadian and Mexican exports, undermining their economies and likely tipping them into recession.Mr. Trump’s flirtation this week with unwinding decades of economic integration raises big questions about the future of North America and the industries that have been built around the idea of an economically integrated continent. While some factories in Canada and Mexico might have moved to the United States to avoid tariffs, the levies would also have raised costs for American consumers and manufacturers that have come to depend on materials from their North American neighbors.“This is a day where the United States stopped seeing trade as force for mutual benefit, and began seeing it as a tool of economic warfare,” said Edward Alden, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. He added that the levies were “a fundamental attack on the economic well being of our closest neighbors.”While Mr. Trump suspended his tariffs on Thursday, any relief could be short lived. The president has said that he expects to issue more tariffs on Canada and Mexico next month, when he announces what he is calling “reciprocal” tariff measures.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More