"Looking back on the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump boasts that he has resurrected the American economy by imposing big import taxes on foreign products. He made his case in a recent opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, chiding the paper and critics, including mainstream economists, who predicted that tariffs would backfire, raising prices and threatening growth. "Instead," he wrote, "they have created an American economic miracle."But the proof he offers is often off-base or wrong altogether."
"In 2024, the last year of the Biden presidency, American gross domestic product grew 2.8%, adjusted for inflation, faster than any wealthy country in the world except Spain. It also expanded at a healthy rate from 2021 through 2023. The numbers for all of 2025 aren't out yet. But during the first three quarters of the year, Trump's tariffs - or the threat of them - delivered mixed results for the American economy."
Large import tariffs were imposed with the goal of reviving the American economy. Critics warned tariffs would raise prices and hurt growth. The U.S. economy had been growing before tariffs: 2024 real GDP rose 2.8%, faster than nearly all wealthy countries except Spain, with expansion from 2021 through 2023. In early 2025, GDP contracted from January to March as firms rushed to import goods ahead of tariff changes, increasing imports which subtract from GDP. Growth rebounded in April–June (3.8%) and July–September (4.4%), aided in part by a drop in imports after prior stockpiling and tariff effects.
Read at Fast Company
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