What is the story about?
Since returning to the White House in January, President Donald Trump has overturned decades of US trade policy, building a wall of tariffs around what used to be a wide open economy.
His double-digit taxes on imports from almost every country have disrupted global commerce and strained the budgets of consumers and businesses worldwide. They have also raised tens of billions of dollars for the US Treasury.
Trump has argued that his steep new import taxes are necessary to bring back wealth that was “stolen” from the US He says they will narrow America's decades-old trade deficit and bring manufacturing back to the country. But upending the global supply chain has proven costly for households facing rising prices.
And the erratic way the president rolled out his tariffs, announcing them, then suspending or altering them before conjuring up new ones, made 2025 one of the most turbulent economic years in recent memory.
Here's a look at the impact of Trump's tariffs over the last year, in four charts.
A key number for the overall impact of tariffs on US consumers and businesses is the “effective” tariff rate, which, unlike headline figures imposed by Trump for specific trade actions, provides an average based on the actual imports coming into the country.
Also read: Zelenskyy says will meet with Trump in Florida on Sunday for talks on Ukraine security guarantees
In 2025, per data from the Yale Budget Lab, the effective US tariff rate peaked in April. But it's still far higher than the average seen at the start of the year. Before finalising shifts in consumption, November's effective tariff rate was nearly 17% — seven times greater than January's average and the highest seen since 1935.
Among selling points to justify his tariffs, Trump has repeatedly said they would reduce America's longstanding trade deficit and bring revenue into the Treasury.
Trump's higher tariffs are certainly raising money. They've raked in more than $236 billion this year through November, much more than in years past. But they still account for just a fraction of the federal government's total revenue. And they haven't raised nearly enough to justify the president's claim that tariff revenue could replace federal income taxes, or allow for windfall dividend checks for Americans.
The US trade deficit, meanwhile, has fallen significantly since the start of the year. The trade gap peaked to a monthly record of $136.4 billion in March, as consumers and businesses hurried to import foreign products before Trump could impose his tariffs on them. The trade gap narrowed to $52.8 billion in September, the latest month for which data is available. But the year-to-date deficit was still running 17% ahead of January-September 2024.
Trump's 2025 tariffs hit nearly every country in the world, including America's biggest trading partners. But his policies have had the biggest impact on US trade with China, once the biggest source of American imports and now No. 3 behind Canada and Mexico US tariffs on Chinese imports now come to 47.5%, according to calculations by Chad Bown of the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
The value of goods coming into the US from China fell nearly 25% during the first three-quarters of the year. Imports from Canada also dropped. But the value of products from Mexico, Vietnam and Taiwan grew year-to-date.
For investors, the most volatile moments on the stock market this year arrived amid some of the most volatile moments for Trump's tariffs.
The S&P 500, an index for the biggest public companies in the US, saw its biggest daily and weekly swings in April, and largest monthly losses and gains in March and June, respectively.
His double-digit taxes on imports from almost every country have disrupted global commerce and strained the budgets of consumers and businesses worldwide. They have also raised tens of billions of dollars for the US Treasury.
Trump has argued that his steep new import taxes are necessary to bring back wealth that was “stolen” from the US He says they will narrow America's decades-old trade deficit and bring manufacturing back to the country. But upending the global supply chain has proven costly for households facing rising prices.
And the erratic way the president rolled out his tariffs, announcing them, then suspending or altering them before conjuring up new ones, made 2025 one of the most turbulent economic years in recent memory.
Here's a look at the impact of Trump's tariffs over the last year, in four charts.
A key number for the overall impact of tariffs on US consumers and businesses is the “effective” tariff rate, which, unlike headline figures imposed by Trump for specific trade actions, provides an average based on the actual imports coming into the country.
Also read: Zelenskyy says will meet with Trump in Florida on Sunday for talks on Ukraine security guarantees
In 2025, per data from the Yale Budget Lab, the effective US tariff rate peaked in April. But it's still far higher than the average seen at the start of the year. Before finalising shifts in consumption, November's effective tariff rate was nearly 17% — seven times greater than January's average and the highest seen since 1935.
Among selling points to justify his tariffs, Trump has repeatedly said they would reduce America's longstanding trade deficit and bring revenue into the Treasury.
Trump's higher tariffs are certainly raising money. They've raked in more than $236 billion this year through November, much more than in years past. But they still account for just a fraction of the federal government's total revenue. And they haven't raised nearly enough to justify the president's claim that tariff revenue could replace federal income taxes, or allow for windfall dividend checks for Americans.
The US trade deficit, meanwhile, has fallen significantly since the start of the year. The trade gap peaked to a monthly record of $136.4 billion in March, as consumers and businesses hurried to import foreign products before Trump could impose his tariffs on them. The trade gap narrowed to $52.8 billion in September, the latest month for which data is available. But the year-to-date deficit was still running 17% ahead of January-September 2024.
Trump's 2025 tariffs hit nearly every country in the world, including America's biggest trading partners. But his policies have had the biggest impact on US trade with China, once the biggest source of American imports and now No. 3 behind Canada and Mexico US tariffs on Chinese imports now come to 47.5%, according to calculations by Chad Bown of the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
The value of goods coming into the US from China fell nearly 25% during the first three-quarters of the year. Imports from Canada also dropped. But the value of products from Mexico, Vietnam and Taiwan grew year-to-date.
For investors, the most volatile moments on the stock market this year arrived amid some of the most volatile moments for Trump's tariffs.
The S&P 500, an index for the biggest public companies in the US, saw its biggest daily and weekly swings in April, and largest monthly losses and gains in March and June, respectively.
