Sweeping taxes on imports have cost the average American household nearly $1,200 since Donald Trump returned to the White House this year, according to calculations by Democrats on Congress’ Joint Economic Committee.
Using Treasury Department numbers on revenue from tariffs and Goldman Sachs estimates of who ends up paying for them, the Democrats’ report Thursday found that American consumers’ share of the bill came to nearly $159 billion — or $1,198 per household — from February through November.
“This report shows that (Trump’s) tariffs have done nothing but drive prices even higher for families,” said Sen. Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, the top Democrat on the economic committee. “At a time when both parties should be working together to lower costs, the president’s tax on American families is simply making things more expensive.”
And even if the tariffs were revoked today, prices are effectively permanently higher. There is no mechanism to lower prices in the way tariffs have raised them.
Subsidies.
Subsidies are coarse and indirect, and unfortunately unless you build in explicit price controls (and would either party even consider that?) the market will not stop charging prices that now people have demonstrated they will pay.
At best they will slightly lower prices but nowhere near as reliable as tariffs raised them, and also inefficiently divide that benefit of the subsidy with the business that will skim extra profit now at the expense of taxpayers. I.e., a citizen still paying more for less.
You have sales, which is an easy way to do that. And discounts can be basically permanent.
Yes, there are technically ways to lower prices. The impossibility is due to the complete lack of incentive for corporations to do so. So, it won’t be happening.