05-03-2025
Tampa Bay area businesses, economists share potential impacts of tariffs
TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — New U.S. tariffs kicked in today on Canadian, Chinese and Mexican imports.
President Donald Trump has said the tariffs are meant to address fentanyl and other drug trafficking, and illegal immigration.
But Tampa Bay area businesses and everyday people are expected to feel the impact with higher prices.
Tampa Steel & Supply in Ybor City is a major metal supplier for the area.
'We service about 3,500 customers in the Bay area. We essentially stock and inventory all that material it comes mostly domestically, but we do get some stuff that's imported from different parts of the world. Then we cut that to the sizes that our customers need,' said Troy Underwood, CEO/Owner of Tampa Steel & Supply.
Underwood said he's closely preparing and managing his inventory.
In recent weeks he's already seen prices going up.
'In the last two weeks we've had increases from our domestic mills,' said Underwood.
So how will other Tampa Bay area businesses and consumers be impacted by the tariffs?
'Domestic producers of those products they get to sell at a higher price, so that means they get to sell more, that means that their profits will go up, that means they can hire more, they'll produce more so they will hire more people. That's a positive,' said Brad Kamp, USF Associate Professor of Economics. 'The negative is, people have to pay more for it.'
Kamp said the price for in-season produce will likely increase in the coming days.
'We import a lot of our fruits and vegetables from Mexico, particularly this time of year. the perishable things like those, you'll probably see those go up in price fairly quickly,' said Kamp.
Prices on other items like lumber and vehicles will likely increase in the coming months, according to Kamp.
'I've seen ranges for car prices increase anywhere from $2,500 to upwards of $12,000. So that's probably where we're going to see the biggest hit,' said Kamp.
'It's been about 20% so far,' Underwood said when asked how much of an increase he is seeing so far. 'We have to pass those on. You know and that's just an unfortunate thing. As we get replacement material we're having to increase those costs and increase that pricing and pass it on to our customer, who's then passing it on to their customer,' said Underwood.
Experts say tariffs will have the greatest impact on the poor.
'From a pure welfare standpoint, tariffs lower welfare. The loss to consumers eventually becomes more than the gains of the producers,' said Kamp.
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