Report: Trump Tariffs Mean Higher Prices, Lost Jobs in Washington State

Efrem Fesaha was riding high on the coffee boom in Seattle. Starting in 2012, he opened four Boon Boona coffeeshops, several cafes in local businesses and built a thriving wholesale business focused on African coffee. But President Donald Trump’s stiff tariffs on coffee and other imports is casting a cloud over his business, causing “constant worry’’ over coffee prices and stalling his expansion plans. 

Fesaha’s business is just one of many across Washington State shocked by Trump’s tariffs.  As the nation’s most trade-reliant state, our economy is particularly vulnerable to the impacts of tariffs, which are passed along to consumers in the form of higher prices for imported goods.  

With a new economic analysis, Gov. Bob Ferguson has attempted to quantify tariffs’ long-term effects on prices, cargo flows through maritime ports, and job growth in the state.  

“The Trump Administration’s chaotic tariff implementation is already wreaking havoc on Washington’s economy and our businesses’ ability to plan for the future,” Ferguson said at a press conference Sept. 4. “This report makes it clear: The full implementation of President Trump’s tariffs will be devastating for Washington state families, businesses and our state budget.” 

Ferguson, who rode into the governor’s office in part because of his success in suing the Trump Administration as Attorney General, is once again fighting Trump by joining the legal fight against tariffs.  

The economic analysis, prepared by the Office of Financial Management, examined the effects of the tariffs if fully implanted by 2029. The report found tariffs will touch almost every sector of the economy: 

• Food: 16% higher prices cumulatively over two years. 
• Clothes and shoes: Clothing and footwear prices are projected to rise around 7% in one year and then ease. 
• Cars: Used car prices are projected to rise about 20–25% over two years. New cars are projected to rise 6–8%. 
• Jobs at risk: With agriculture, food processing, and aerospace the hardest hit, the state will lose about 31,900 jobs by 2029.  

The state’s budget, already reeling from deficits, will come under even greater pressure from lower tax revenue. The report estimates lower sales and business activity will result in $2.2 billion in lost revenue by 2029. Overall, state GDP will drop by close to 2 percent. 

In recent decades, international trade spurred significant economic growth for Washington’s exporters of wheat, tree fruit and other commodities, and aerospace. Boeing, the biotech industry, and other businesses export billions in manufactured goods. Ports expanded rapidly to handle burgeoning Asian trade. But as the report states, “Washington state’s heavy reliance on international trade makes it especially vulnerable to new tariffs and countermeasures.” 

In 2024, the state ranked 9th in exports ($58 billion) and 15th in imports ($62 billion) among all U.S. states. “This high level of trade intensity amplifies the economic risks posed by the recent surge in U.S. tariffs and likely foreign retaliation,” the report said. 

Boeing’s aircraft sales appear to be rebounding, but it is difficult to determine if trade policy is affecting the company’s market. “Those planes might have been sold anyway,” regardless of trade tariffs, said Neil Strege, vice president of the Washington Roundtable.  

To Strege and the Roundtable’s business members, the biggest concern around tariffs is the uncertainty about costs and retaliatory measures. 

There is plenty of evidence from past trade wars that protectionist U.S. trade policies result in countermeasures by other countries, such as restrictions on imports of U.S. agricultural products or the shifting of purchases to competing countries. 

“The vulnerability of Washington’s agriculture sector was evident during the 2018–19 trade conflict, when India imposed a 20% tariff on U.S. apples, causing a 99% drop in Washington apple exports to that market and resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in lost sales,” the OFM report said. “U.S. tariffs on imports from Japan pose significant risk to Washington’s potato sector—its largest export market—by increasing the likelihood of Japanese retaliation and reduced market access for state growers.” 

Times were tough for the state’s farmers and ranchers before Trump took office. Tariffs, inflation, and labor-supply uncertainty are reducing already thin margins.  

“The farm economy is not well. Inputs (labor, fuel, and other costs) are up, and prices are low,’’ said Michelle Hennings, executive director of the Washington Wheat Growers Association. “Farmers are using the equity in their farms just to stay in business.” 

Growers are at the mercy of the global marketplace for the commodity. “We haven’t had any recovery for a while,’’ she said. “It’s hard on the farmers. This is bad. Really bad, actually.” 

So far, Washington wheat growers have not suffered from foreign retaliation. Indonesia and Bangladesh recently both signed agreements to boost purchases of U.S. wheat, according to the Washington Grain Commission. 

The apple industry has not seen significant retaliation so far, except from China where few apples are sold because of barriers imposed during the first Trump administration. Growers are buoyed by recent trade deals with Asian countries, but those agreements have yet to be signed. The industry is also apprehensive about trade with India, now subject to crushing U.S. tariffs, and the industry’s two largest trading partners, Mexico and Canada. 

“The industry is very stressed right now as the cost or production has risen significantly over the last five years, but apple prices have not been able to rise commensurately,’’ said Michael Schadler, president of the Washington Apple Commission. “Growers are getting squeezed. It hasn’t helped that we’ve had very large crops the last two years, and that the new crop being harvested right now looks to be near-record volume.’’ 

But the nation’s soybean growers, who relied heavily on sales to China, are now facing the possibility of losing the entire market to Chinese retaliation, reports The New York Times.  

Trump’s immigration crackdown could make it even harder for growers to attract workers for upcoming harvests. Apple orchardists and other farmers have been able to use a special short-term visa for farm workers, but court rulings that allow immigration officers to stop and question anyone they suspect could scare away workers. 

Another vital element of Washington’s tourism industry, visitors from Canada, continues to fall with Trump’s threats against our neighbor to the north. In April, 294,978 Canadians returned from the U.S., only half as many as the year before. Shuttered shops on the Washington side of the border are testimony to the loss of Canadian visitors. 

Ports are on the front line of the tariff wars. Seattle and Tacoma ports, operating together as the Northwest Seaport Alliance, are still struggling to regain cargo business lost during the pandemic. As of July, total container traffic for the year was 15.9% below the volume six years ago.  The big California ports, Los Angeles and Long Beach, are also still suffering effects of the pandemic. The port in Vancouver, B.C., however, has managed to boost volume beyond its 2019 level. 

Cargo volumes in Seattle continue to slump compared to Tacoma. Before the pandemic, cargo volumes in Seattle and Tacoma harbors were roughly equal. Since then, Seattle gradually has lost ground to Tacoma. Tacoma’s 2024 container volume was nearly twice Seattle’s volume: 2.2 million containers in Tacoma compared to 1.3 million containers in Seattle. 

Two of Seattle’s smaller container terminals, T-46 and T-30, are closed due to legal issues and a lack of business.  

The reasons for the slump are complex. Cargo owners and shipping lines determine ports of entry, and their decisions are based on terminal and railroad costs, cargo speed through terminals, reliability, and many other factors.  

“Trade depends on market certainty,’’ said Port Commissioner Ryan Calkins. “Uncertainty is not good for business, for the state, port and the people.” 

The tariff wars only add to the challenges for Seattle and Tacoma, which primarily are way stations for goods destined for the Midwest, unlike Los Angeles, which has a huge local market for goods. “Seattle and Tacoma are the last to get discretionary cargo, and the first to lose it,” Calkins said. 

The Alliance staff has been working hard to secure new business and has been successful in attracting new auto shipments to Tacoma. The Alliance also created financial incentives for ocean carriers to increase their shipments through the gateway. 

But in light of the tariff challenges, leaders of Seattle longshore union Local 19 say much more needs to be done to diversify the ports’ business and bring more container cargo to the gateway. “The sentiment at Local 19 is absolute disappointment,’’ said Mark Elverston, the local’s president. ‘‘These are scary times in Seattle.” 

Even harder hit is the Port of Everett to the north, which specializes in handling large military, aerospace and infrastructure cargo, termed break-bulk and project cargo.  

Unlike the Seattle and Tacoma ports, which get most of their revenue through long-term terminal leases, Everett operates its own facilities. Every dollar lost in business comes off the port’s bottom line.  

“The tariffs essentially create so much uncertainty, these large infrastructure projects are not moving forward,” said Lisa Lefeber, Everett’s executive director. The port’s business is down 20 percent, she said, and may lead to layoffs. 

There is no immediate relief in sight for Washington’s battered economy. The state has filed an amicus brief in support of litigation that alleges tariffs imposed without Congressional authorization are illegal. A trial court declared the tariffs unconstitutional, and an appeals court agreed. But the case is in the hands of the U.S. Supreme Court, which largely has accommodated Trump’s unprecedented expansion of presidential powers.  

Ferguson was asked if the state might withhold federal income taxes as a strategy to battle tariff impacts. He didn’t answer directly, but said conversations are underway with the Legislature “to deal with the chaos of the Trump Administration.” 

As Trump remakes the global marketplace, he is shaking the pillars of Washington’s trade-based economy. So far, the state’s leaders have no good answers about what comes next in a world where historic trade partnerships are shattered, and economic warfare becomes the norm.