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Congressional Report Warns Trump Tariffs Could Stymie US Manufacturing for 'Years to Come'
Democrats on the Joint Economic Committee said that "continued uncertainty" caused by the president's policies could reduce manufacturing investments by nearly half a trillion dollars by the end of this decade.
Aug 18, 2025
US President Donald Trump's tariff whiplash has already harmed domestic manufacturing and could continue to do so through at least the end of this decade to the tune of nearly half a trillion dollars, a report published Monday by congressional Democrats on a key economic committee warned.
The Joint Economic Committee (JEC)-Minority said that recent data belied Trump's claim that his global trade war would boost domestic manufacturing, pointing to the 37,000 manufacturing jobs lost since the president announced his so-called "Liberation Day" tariffs in April.
"Hiring in the manufacturing sector has dropped to its lowest level in nearly a decade," the Democrats on the committee wrote. "In addition, many experts have noted that in and of itself, the uncertainty created by the administration so far could significantly damage the broader economy long-term."
"Based on both US business investment projections and economic analyses of the UK in the aftermath of Brexit, the Joint Economic Committee-Minority calculates that a similarly prolonged period of uncertainty in the US could result in an average of 13% less manufacturing investment per year, amounting to approximately $490 billion in foregone investment by 2029," the report states.
"The uncertainty created by the administration so far could significantly damage the broader economy long-term."
"Although businesses have received additional clarity on reciprocal tariff rates in recent days, uncertainty over outstanding negotiations is likely to continue to delay long-term investments and pricing decisions," the publication adds. "Furthermore, even if the uncertainty about the US economy were to end tomorrow, evidence suggests that the uncertainty that businesses have already faced in recent months would still have long-term consequences for the manufacturing sector."
According to the JEC Democrats, the Trump administration has made nearly 100 different tariff policy decisions since April—"including threats, delays, and reversals"—creating uncertainty and insecurity in markets and economies around the world. It's not just manufacturing and markets—economic data released last week by the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that businesses in some sectors are passing the costs of Trump's tariffs on to consumers.
As the new JEC minority report notes:
As independent research has shown, businesses are less likely to make long-term investments when they face high uncertainty about future policies and economic conditions. For manufacturers, decisions to expand production—which often entail major, irreversible investments in equipment and new facilities that typically take years to complete—require an especially high degree of confidence that these expenses will pay off. This barrier, along with other factors, makes manufacturing the sector most likely to see its growth affected by trade policy uncertainty, as noted recently by analysts at Goldman Sachs.
"Strengthening American manufacturing is critical to the future of our economy and our national security," Joint Economic Committee Ranking Member Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) said in a statement Monday. "While President Trump promised that he would expand our manufacturing sector, this report shows that, instead, the chaos and uncertainty created by his tariffs has placed a burden on American manufacturers that could weigh our country down for years to come."
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UK Nuclear Arsenal Plan Slammed as 'Irresponsible, Dangerous' Violation of International Law
"As the world wrestles with the pandemic and climate chaos, it beggars belief that our government is opting to increase Britain's nuclear arsenal."
Mar 16, 2021
In a move that peace campaigners say violates Britain's disarmament commitment under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Tuesday unveiled a plan that would increase the size of the nation's nuclear arsenal by up to 40%.
"A decision by the United Kingdom to increase its stockpile of weapons of mass destruction in the middle of a pandemic is irresponsible, dangerous, and violates international law."
--Beatrice Fihn, ICAN
The integrated defense review--entitled Global Britain in a Competitive Age--describes the Conservative-led government's vision for post-Brexit Britain's role in the world over the next decade.
Under the 2010 Strategic Defense and Security Review (pdf), the U.K. had previously planned to reduce its nuclear stockpile to not more than 180 warheads by the mid-2020s. However, the latest review states the policy has changed "in recognition of the evolving security environment, including the developing range of technological and doctrinal threats," and now "the U.K. will move to an overall nuclear weapon stockpile of no more than 260 warheads."
Britain's nuclear arsenal consists entirely of Trident II D-5 submarine-launched ballistic missiles manufactured by Lockheed Martin in Sunnyvale, California. The missiles--which can each carry as many as 12 independently targeted thermonuclear warheads--are carried by the Royal Navy's four Vanguard-class submarines.
\u201cUNA-UK is alarmed at today\u2019s announcement of a dramatic increase in the UK nuclear arsenal.\n\nThis decision reverses Britain\u2019s longstanding principles and commitments to nonproliferation, disarmament and international security. \n\n#IntegratedReview \n\nRead the @ICAN_UK statement:\u201d— United Nations Association - UK (UNA-UK) (@United Nations Association - UK (UNA-UK)) 1615902111
Anti-nuclear activists argue Britain's planned nuclear expansion is a violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), under which signatories must commit to gradual disarmament and to which successive British administrations have adhered.
"A decision by the United Kingdom to increase its stockpile of weapons of mass destruction in the middle of a pandemic is irresponsible, dangerous, and violates international law," Beatrice Fihn, executive director of the Geneva-based, Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), said in a statement.
"While the majority of the world's nations are leading the way to a safer future without nuclear weapons by joining the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, the United Kingdom is pushing for a dangerous new nuclear arms race," added Fihn, referring to the landmark accord ratified earlier this year by over 50 nations--but none of the world's nine nuclear powers.
\u201cDeeply dissapointing to see Britain end its nuclear weapons reduction policy and instead join the nuclear arms race by increasing its nuclear weapons stockpile from less than 200 to 260. https://t.co/f0aZdsE7TG\n\nThis will put Britain in violation of its NPT Article 6 obligations.\u201d— Hans Kristensen (@Hans Kristensen) 1615848044
\u201c\u262e\ufe0f The UN is actively seeking to negotiate nuclear disarmament.\n\n\u2622\ufe0f But the government is trying to increase our stockpile of nuclear weapons.\n\n\ud83d\udc9a This isn't the Global Britain we want to see - let's end Trident instead.\n\nhttps://t.co/u4dHb8MdqF\u201d— The Green Party (@The Green Party) 1615896059
Noting last month's agreement between the United States and Russia to extend the New START Treaty by five years, Kate Hudson, general secretary of the U.K.'s Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, told the Financial Times that "ratcheting up global tensions and squandering our resources is an irresponsible and potentially disastrous approach."
"As the world wrestles with the pandemic and climate chaos, it beggars belief that our government is opting to increase Britain's nuclear arsenal," Hudson added.
The Scottish National Party (SNP), which governs the part of Britain where the nation's nuclear arsenal is based, also condemned the government's planned proliferation.
"Renewing Trident nuclear weapons was already a shameful and regressive decision, however, increasing the cap on the number of Trident weapons the U.K. can stockpile by more than 40% is nothing short of abhorrent," SNP defense spokesperson Stewart McDonald told The Independent.
McDonald added that "it speaks volumes of the Tory government's spending priorities that it is intent on increasing its collection of weapons of mass destruction--which will sit and gather dust unless the U.K. has plans to indiscriminately wipe out entire populations--rather than address the serious challenges and inequalities in our society that have been further exposed by the pandemic."
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The European Union: Free at Last
The goal of 'ever closer union', anathema to English exceptionalists, is back on the agenda.
Dec 27, 2020
Blaming the victims is never a good look. As Britain finally leaves the European Union, 1,651 days after the Brexit referendum of 2016, we should try to remember that 48% of the turkeys didn't vote for Christmas.
Brexit was not exactly a national act of self-harm; it was really an attack by the nostalgic and nationalist old on the young. 60% of British over-65s voted to leave the E.U., but 61% of the under-35s voted to remain. Having had four years to think it over, most British now think it was a mistake--by a 48-39 majority, according to a YouGov poll in October.
Too late. Boris Johnson is prime minister and he dares not anger the English ultra-nationalists on the right of his own Conservative party. After months of the amateur dramatics that accompany any Johnson decision, on Christmas Day the United Kingdom concluded a pathetically thin 'free trade' deal that reflects the real balance of power between the E.U. and the U.K.
It looks pretty good for manufactured goods and commodities, which make up 20% of Britain's GDP: no tariffs, no quotas. But the E.U. sells far more stuff to the U.K. than the other way around: it has a $45 billion trade surplus in goods. Of course it made a deal on that.
By contrast there is no trade deal at all in services, which account for 80% of the U.K. economy and used to produce a $112 billion surplus for the U.K. The U.K. is entirely vulnerable to whatever restrictions the E.U. may choose to apply to its banks, insurance companies and providers of other professional services.
Johnson will smear lipstick all over this pig of a deal and declare it a triumph. Those who want to believe it will do so, and the only early evidence of the huge defeat that it really is will be some delays at the ports as customs officers learn their new jobs. The real bill will come in later and almost invisibly, in lost trade, investment and opportunities.
The last official British government estimate was that 15 years from now the British economy will be between 5% and 7% smaller than it would have been as an E.U. member (but still a bit bigger than it is now).
That's not the raw material for a counter-revolution--and besides, any projection about the economic situation in 2035 is really pure guesstimate. One Covid more or less could make just as much difference as Brexit.
All one can say is that the British economy will not "prosper mightily" outside the E.U., as Johnson promised, but it won't collapse either. And then, in due course, the younger, pro-E.U. Brits will become the majority thanks to the magic of generational turnover. But until then, if Britain comes knocking at the E.U.'s door asking to be allowed back in, Brussels should say 'no'.
What really happens on December 31 is that the European Union is finally freed to develop in the way that its other major members clearly want. The goal of 'ever closer union', anathema to English exceptionalists, is back on the agenda.
There is ambivalence in every member country about the idea of creating a semi-federal European super-state, but in a world where democracy and the rule of law are under siege most people can see the need to strengthen the European Union. Last July the E.U.'s leaders took a huge step in that direction: for the first time they agreed to borrow collectively on the financial markets.
France and Germany were all for it, and Italy and Spain needed the money to finance a trillion-euro aid program to help them through the coronavirus crisis. Those four countries now contain more than half the E.U.'s population, and they outvoted the 'frugal four' (the Netherlands, Austria, Sweden and Denmark) that opposed taking on debt to support 'feckless' Mediterranean members.
If Britain had still been a member, it would have vetoed the measure because it infringed on the U.K.'s sacred 'sovereignty'. French President Charles de Gaulle, who vetoed British membership applications twice in the 1960s, was right: England does not have a 'European vocation', and it should not be allowed in.
The financial precedent that was set in July opens the door to a future E.U. that acts much more like a state. Even a common defense budget is now within reach--not something vital in military terms, but a European army would be a hugely important symbol of unity.
The United States may be back soon, but the world could certainly use a second powerful advocate for democracy and the rule of law. Brexit may be giving us just that by freeing the E.U. to move on, and we should be grateful.
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