Trump’s Favorite Boast Expensively Blows Up in His Face
“Americans are footing the bill,” Kiel Institute Research Director Julian Hinz said.
Mr. Tariff’s eponymous policy is causing Americans more harm than good.
Contrary to President Donald Trump’s favorite economic claim, U.S. import tariffs are almost exclusively paid for by Americans, new research has found.

Trump holds up a chart of "reciprocal tariffs."
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
The study, published on Monday by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, a German think-tank, reports that American consumers and importers bear 96 percent of the burden from Trump’s aggressive tariff policy.
Trump, 79, has spent the majority of his second term boasting that his tariffs are bringing in billions in revenue from other nations.
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“The tariffs are an own goal,” Kiel Institute Research Director and a co-author of the study, Julian Hinz, said. “The claim that foreign countries pay these tariffs is a myth. The data show the opposite: Americans are footing the bill.”
The research examined over 25 million shipment records for U.S. imports between January 2024 and November 2025, totaling nearly $4 trillion in value, and found that foreign exporters paid only about four percent of the tariff burden, while U.S. buyers absorbed the rest.
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Instead of taxing foreign producers, the tariffs serve more as a domestic consumption tax, the report says, predicting that American consumers will face higher prices going forward.

A sign inside a grocery store explains that American-made wine is no longer available for sale due to U.S. President Donald Trump's tariffs amid the Canada-America trade war in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on April 6, 2025.
NurPhoto/NurPhoto via Getty Images
The data showed that rather than countries reducing their prices to offset the tariffs, they reduced their shipping to the U.S.
“We compared Indian exports to the US with shipments to Europe and Canada and identified a clear pattern,” Hinz said. “Both export value and volume to the US dropped sharply, by up to 24 percent. But unit prices—the prices Indian exporters charged—remained unchanged. They shipped less, not cheaper.”
“Tariffs ultimately disadvantage everyone,” he added.
White House deputy press secretary Kush Desai told the Daily Beast: “The average tariff imposed by America has increased by almost tenfold under President Trump, and inflation has continued to cool from Biden-era highs.”

CLERMONT, KY - FEBRUARY 17: Jim Beam Master Distiller Fred Noe (L), Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (C) and Freddie Now, Beam Distiller, fill the distillery's 16 millionth barrel of bourbon at the Jim Beam Distillery on February 17, 2020 in Clermont, Kentucky. U.S. whiskey exports have fallen by 27 percent to the European Union, the product's largest export market, caused by retaliatory tariffs imposed by the 27-nation alliance, a trade group said last week. (Photo by Bryan Woolston/Getty Images)
Bryan Woolston/Getty Images
“The Administration has consistently maintained that foreign exporters who depend on access to the American economy, the world’s biggest and best consumer market, will ultimately pay the cost of tariffs, and that’s exactly what’s playing out,” Desai said.
Trump’s obsession with tariffs has heightened global tensions throughout his second term, as his unpredictable threats and follow-through have led to volatile market conditions.
In a lengthy post to Truth Social on Saturday, the president threatened a 10 percent import tax against eight European nations that have opposed his takeover of Greenland, which would take effect on February 1.

A January 17 Truth Social post from President Donald Trump detailing new tariffs on U.S.'s closest allies.
Screenshot/Donald Trump/Truth Social
“These Countries, who are playing this very dangerous game, have put a level of risk in play that is not tenable or sustainable,” Trump wrote. “Therefore, it is imperative that, in order to protect Global Peace and Security, strong measures be taken so that this potentially perilous situation end quickly, and without question.”
The Supreme Court is set to rule on the legality of Trump’s global tariffs, to which Trump said the U.S. would be “SCREWED” if the court did not rule in his favor.
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