Small business owners in the United States face closure, price rises and losses

president Donald TrumpThe announcement of new tariffs on April 2 triggered a shock wave in the global financial markets and continued to weigh market sentiment. Now, as the state responds to the U.S.’s obligation to retaliate, economists are now warning of the increased risk of recession. JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) raised the chances of a recession from 40% to 60% in April due to supply chain shocks caused by tariffs.

Now, tariffs and trade wars between major countries are causing real losses to businesses. In early April, an entrepreneur asked small business owners, especially those imported products and raw materials, to navigate the impact of tariffs.

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The original poster said that for the past 20 years he had been selling pottery products imported from Poland. He said tariffs on European products were about 20%, putting his business at risk. When asked if he could transfer production to the United States, Redit said he was selling traditional Polish folk art products that could not be developed elsewhere.

“Our products don't need them, so we can raise prices, but our customers may just stop buying,” he added.

His post received over 250 comments, with many small business owners sharing the problems and concerns faced by the new tariff policies.

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A small business owner called Trump’s tariffs is a “disaster” because his business’s core raw materials are subject to 25% to 46% of their responsibilities. He said he could not run domestic manufacturing plants for raw materials in the United States because Americans “just don't want to do the job again.” He said immigration-related restrictions also made it difficult to find the necessary labor.

“It is only ridiculous to try to encourage the concept of domestic production by setting tariffs, while also adopting immigration policies that make it impossible to find a reliable labor force in the United States,” he added.

Another commenter said he could go out of business and could not do anything about it.

“We are moving towards a major economic disaster. I can't do anything about it,” he wrote.

Another Redditor commented that he was closing his business and stop placing orders due to the tariffs. He added that because his production business is in China, the tariffs have made his wholesale business untenable due to its impact on profit margins.

“Not to mention unpredictable consumer behavior and people bringing their wallets close, it’s unlikely to buy non-essential goods,” he wrote. “Buying new stock at this point seems to be a responsibility for us.”

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Some business owners say they plan to pass on the impact of tariffs to higher-priced customers. One Redditor said he is planning to launch new prices for customers to reflect the impact of tariffs. He also believes that the United States lacks the necessary infrastructure and labor to develop its imported products.

“Companies that perform these processes in the United States are running a backlog of 2 years and support only billions of dollars in OEMs,” he said.

Redditor, who runs the commercial truck parts business, said he is preparing a strategy to address the impact of tariffs on goods he ships from China. Before the tariffs came into effect, he invested to acquire more stocks and believed that India was an alternative to manufacturing because he had production facilities in the country:

“Our Indian factory suffered 26% of attacks today. Now, due to the auto parts category, 67% in China, plus 25%.”

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Trump tariffs article “Major economic disaster”: Small business owners in the United States face closures, rising prices and losses that initially appeared on benzinga.com.