What will reciprocal tariffs mean for Chattanooga

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (WDEF) — Thomas Fellows is a local economic commentator and believes these new tariffs will hurt Chattanooga businesses, especially the automotive industry.

Fellows says, “If you look at places like Volkswagen Group, Mueller Company, American bicycle group, Novenix, a lot of these companies rely on imported parts and materials from other countries. A tariff would essentially raise the production cost and that raised cost would be past on the the consumer.”

Fellows still acknowledged some good that came from Tariffs.

He says, “One good thing that came from that was increased border patrol from Canada and Mexico. Obviously there are a lot of Fentanyl going across the border and there are a lot of undocumented immigrants who have entered the United States under the Biden Administration.”

One worry is that company’s won’t move their business operation back to the U.S.

“A lot of these CEOS are not a big fan of these tariffs because they are not sure how long they are going to last. It takes a very long time to set up manufacturing in the United States,” says Fellows.

President Trump believes the Tariffs will create new jobs.

The president says, “I think what is going to go up is jobs are going to go up. Prices could go up short term but they will also go down.”

Yet Fellows believes those new jobs will go to A.I and not working people.

“A lot of these jobs are going to be automated over the next few years as AI gets further in the workplace and automation gets further in the workplace for sure.”

Ultimately the end result of what the tariffs will cause is unknown.