President Trump has long promised that tariffs would bring about a manufacturing renaissance. As factory employment continued to sink in recent months, he assured Americans it would just take a little time before jobs and investment started pouring in.
A year into his second term, there is little sign of a change in direction. Some manufacturers are benefiting from new protections, but most are taking a hit, paying higher taxes on their imported components and wondering whether tariffs will be around long enough for restructured supply chains to pay off.
Overall, the factory sector is neither collapsing nor booming. Employment has fallen by 68,000 jobs over the past year and remains at just 8 percent of the work force, but production is slightly up. Manufacturers remain downbeat in surveys. Spending on factory construction has fallen from the end of the Biden administration, but it’s still near record highs.
The mixed picture bears out the opinion of some economists: Tariffs can help protect favored industries, but often by imposing high costs.
“It creates this patchwork effect,” said Bradley Saunders, a North America economist for the consulting firm Capital Economics. “It creates a lot of unintended consequences.”
Among the beneficiaries are people like Drew Greenblatt, owner of the Baltimore-based company Marlin Steel Wire Products, which makes metal racks and baskets for food processors and aerospace companies. After being battered by cheaper imports from China, Mr. Greenblatt became a cheerleader for tariffs. Now he thinks they are paying off. He recently bought the priciest piece of equipment in the company’s history — a TruMatic 3000 punch laser machine that will speed up production.
“You don’t buy expensive things if you’re not going to hire a lot of talent. We’re a microcosm of that,” said Mr. Greenblatt, who employs 130 people and says he plans to hire at least 20 more in the next year. “I’m going to be buying 10 times more steel, so my steel company is going to be sending me valentines early.”
