Tariffs are a sales tax and operate essentially the same way. [View all]

Tariffs are levied on Americans who buy goods from other counties.

Sales taxes are levied on Americans who sell goods and services.

In both cases, the cost is invariably passed on to end consumers, whether it's explicitly listed on the receipt or not.

With sales taxes, it's pretty universal to explicitly note the sales tax on the receipt, but this is just the retailer's way of blaming part of the cost on the government. A retailer is free to just say "we'll take care of sales tax" as long as they pay the government the right amount. It's not a direct tax on consumers, it's a tax on retailers.

Tariffs are really the same, they're just levied a little upstream, on the importer. But the cost is passed on, it's just less common to explicitly note the separate out the tariff when passing the cost on.

So call it a tax. As a practical matter, it operates the same way. The government collected from Americans, and the consumer ends up paying more to cover it.


So there you have it. Donnie just announced one of the most massive taxes ever imposed on American consumers.