Tampa businesses preparing for more tariffs by President Trump

Economic impact of President Trump's new tariffs

FOX 13’s Evyn Moon reports on the potential economic impacts of the Trump Administration's new tariffs on foreign goods.

TAMPA, Fla. - President Trump says more tariffs will come on Wednesday, potentially on all imports from any country.

"The main thing to know about tariffs is that a tariff is a tax, and, regardless of what politicians tell you, a tariff is a tax paid by American companies that import goods for their production," said Victor Claar, an FGCU economist. "Whatever it is, construction, retail, if they buy it from a foreign country, they pay that producer in the foreign country for the product."

These price hikes, 20% or more on all foreign-made goods, will affect tens of thousands of businesses in Florida.

Local perspective:

FOX 13 spoke with the owner of a construction company in Tampa Bay, who said this would be the third set of tariffs hitting their imports in less than a year.

READ: University of Tampa economist shares how Trump's tariffs could impact Floridians

"This is really becoming quite a price adjustment that we're going to have to pass on to our clients, our end users. As of tomorrow, no one knows 100% yet, right? But I mean, we're expecting another 25% [increase]," said Albert Jasuwan of JAS Builders.

These prices are already worrying his customers, especially amid hurricane rebuilds.

"Our customers have been saying over the last couple of months, 'What's going to happen to the price of my job? How is this going to affect me? You guys gave me an estimate,’ and unfortunately, we have to tell them, look, your estimate is good for only 30 days," Jasuwan said. "Honestly, we are looking at changing that to about 10 days now."

What they're saying:

He says they ship a lot of their building materials from India, China and Canada, but that will need to change.

PICTURED: Albert Jasuwan speaking to FOX 13.

Jasuwan is planning to start buying more domestically, in bulk, which is ultimately the goal of the Trump Administration's tariffs.

READ: Economists warn Tampa residents of price spikes from new tariffs

"A 70% price increase is definitely pushing us to go a different route. The route we're taking here is we're going to start fabricating and manufacturing some of our own parts," said Jasuwan. "I think in the long goal of what's going on, it's going to benefit us all, and actually bring a lot more manufacturing back here [to the U.S.]. Not just from our small scale, but also in larger companies like auto companies."

Big picture view:

Still, Claar thinks these tariffs are bad news:

"Anything you do to reduce trade between trading partners, whether it's me and my barber or me and Walmart – anything you do to interfere with that normally makes people worse off than they would otherwise be," said Claar.

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The National Retail Federation says tariffs would be applied to roughly $3.3 trillion of imported goods as soon as Wednesday and could cost each American nearly $3,500 more throughout the year.

What's next:

President Trump is set to speak about the new tariffs on Wednesday at 4 p.m. from the White House.

The Source: FOX 13's Evyn Moon collected the information in this story.

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