Trump's 'Golden Age' killed another American company's factory in a red state

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“Translating … P.R.-speak a bit easier when you look at what company executives have been telling investors,” said Eric Boehm. “Goodyear lost $249 million during the first three months of the year — after earning a $115 million profit during the same three months last year, just prior to Trump's tariffs being announced. Along with that announcement, CEO Mark Stewart said that "higher raw material costs" due to the war would force Goodyear to take "meaningful actions to strengthen our cost structure. The 1,700 employees in Fayetteville would appear to be on the receiving end of that action — and for them, it certainly will be meaningful.”

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“Simply put: you can't make tires without rubber, and it is impossible to buy rubber that isn't imported — because rubber trees do not grow in the United States,” said Boehm. “That means American tire companies import rubber from places like Thailand [which] exports a lot of … excess rubber to other parts of the world, including the United States.”

But Trump sees other countries with a surplus of rubber production as a threat to be targeted with tariffs, Boehm said. In March, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative claimed that Thailand's "trade surplus in sectors such as … rubber" was grounds for slapping higher tariffs on those imports.

It was a wooden-headed move considering tariffs on natural rubber won't bring rubber-tree plantation jobs to Minnesota or North Carolina, wrote Ed Gresser, a former assistant U.S. Trade Representative.

More worth reading at:

https://www.alternet.org/trump-tariffs-businesses-pain/