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Six months into tariffs, businesses have no idea how to price anything

(www.wsj.com)
462 points JumpCrisscross | 5 comments | 30 Aug 25 20:56 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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lazarus01 ◴[30 Aug 25 22:32 UTC] No.45078568[source]▶
In NYC, for the first 6 months of 2025, 994 new private sector jobs were created [1]. During the same period last year, there were 66,000 new jobs created.

Higher cost of doing business from tariffs has frozen hiring. With a frozen job market, there’s less revenue coming in.

NYC is a leading indicator for the rest of the country.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/13/nyregion/nyc-jobs.html

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macintux ◴[30 Aug 25 22:37 UTC] No.45078595[source]▶
I’m curious whether it’s more the tariffs, or the uncertainty. No one knows what will happen on a day-to-day basis: the chaotic (and illegal) decision-making leaves everyone wondering what’s next.
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1. PeterStuer ◴[31 Aug 25 07:42 UTC] No.45081223[source]▶
It is more the volatility for sure. Tarrifs have existed forever and business has always coped with them.
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2. pstuart ◴[31 Aug 25 07:58 UTC] No.45081332[source]▶
This is different -- the tariffs are being applied and changed chaotically, with no direction on actually serving the point of protecting native industry. The goal of the tariffs is to replace income tax, everything else is a smokescreen.

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/04/22/trump-tariffs-replace-income...

3. whatevaa ◴[31 Aug 25 11:11 UTC] No.45082280[source]▶
They didn't change monthly.
4. ldoughty ◴[31 Aug 25 11:24 UTC] No.45082339[source]▶
You can't write a business plans/proposals and get loans/management approval on these kinds of tariffs.

Imagine trying to get a loan from a bank to make a USA manufacturing plant, pointing to the 150% Chinese tariff. A week later the tariff is 25%. Does your math still work? Probably not. Will that bank continue the loan? Nope. Will the bank even entertain a similar proposal from someone else right now? Nope.

If you want to grow USA manufacturing you need to subsidize it, or give private industry confidence it's not going to lose them money. If you can't do that, your relying on charity / non-profit / philanthropy... And I don't see many of those in manufacturing.

5. infecto ◴[31 Aug 25 17:37 UTC] No.45085110[source]▶
I would say more about general uncertainty than volatility but similar thought. Disagree on the reason though, tariffs like we are experiencing have not been in our existence for a couple generations. And especially not in the modern connected global market.

I don’t believe most if not all of us have experienced such an immature and erratic administration. We are taxing trade partners, flip flopping on rules and nobody knows what to make of it.