President Donald Trump’s trade tariffs are already claiming their first American victims. But duties on Chinese goods aren’t the ones causing the damage ― at least, not yet.
Tariffs imposed by the U.S. Commerce Department on Canadian newsprint in January and increased in March have caused the price of the paper product to skyrocket as much as 32 percent, hitting an already cash-strapped newspaper industry.
As a result, the Tampa Bay Times, which has won 12 Pulitzer Prizes, is being forced to lay off about 50 staffers, the Tampa Bay Business Journal reported Wednesday.
The paper’s CEO, Paul Tash, offered a frank assessment of the duties’ effect in a letter to readers published late last month, noting the Times uses 17,000 tons of newsprint a year. Thanks to Trump’s tariffs, the cost per ton of newsprint is now $800 instead of $600, upping the paper’s yearly bill by $3.4 million.
“Payroll is the only expense that is bigger than newsprint,” Tash wrote. “To help offset the extra expense of paper, publishers will eliminate jobs
Source