Cargo ship entering the Columbia River from the Pacific. Photo: Jeffrey St. Clair.
As the Trump Administration continues to push ineffective tariff policies and ignite trade wars, America’s working families hang in the balance — caught between rising prices and a weakening job market, and worrying about what comes next.
It’s tempting to blame tariffs alone for the larger chaos of Trump’s mismanaged economy. But that critique ignores the fact that working families and communities throughout the United States have been harmed by decades of damaging trade agreements designed to protect corporate interests.
Now more than ever, pro-worker advocates have a critical role in showing how progressive fair trade policies — including strategic, targeted tariffs — can build a better future for workers and communities. Here are six points of broad agreement among progressive, pro-worker advocates:
The status quo is not acceptable.
Corporate-dominated trade agreements like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and its successor, the Trump-negotiated United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), have been a disaster for workers and communities. So-called “free trade” policy has failed to protect working families, devastated American communities, and sparked a race to the bottom, accelerating economic inequality.
Corporate-centered trade policy hurts workers across lines of race, age, andgeography. The auto industry alone has lost 65 “big three” U.S. plants since NAFTA passed. Despite the USMCA’s promises to raise labor standards in Mexico, Mexican autoworkers still are paid one-tenth the wages of their U.S. counterparts.
Where factories have not yet closed, bosses use offshoring threats to undermine collective bargaining, bust unions, and diminish worker power. Workers are right to critique the rigged trade deals of the past, and to expect better from our elected leaders.
Tariffs are not inherently good or bad.
Like taxes, tariffs are a tool — their effectiveness depends on how they are used. It matters a lot how and when tariffs are applied, and whether their use is targeted to achieve a specific outcome.
Strategic and targeted tariffs, like those conducted under Sections 232 and 301, can promote high labor standards, protect the environment, build supply chain resilience, and promote national security interests. For workers in industries hurt by unfair trade practices, tariffs can be a lifeline to level the playing field, preserving domestic production and good jobs. Still, tariffs are just one element of the broader industrial policy strategy needed to grow U.S. manufacturing.
