The conservative Cato Institute: Trump’s tariffs are "ignorant'" and "dangerous.” Be wary, South Dakota farmers.

That standard-bearer of conservative thought, the Cato Institute, couldn’t be more clear and succinct. Trump’s tariff plan is “economically ignorant, geopolitically dangerous, and politically misguided,” says Scott Lincicome, head of Cato’s Herbert A. Stiefel Center for Trade Policy Studies.

I’ve already talked about the stupidity of Donald Trump’s tariff plan should he return to the White House. My focus in that piece from last week was on American consumers and  manufacturers in general, but given our locale, South Dakotans could use some specifics about how the intellectually and historically bankrupt plan that Trump (seen above signing a deal with China in a public domain image posted on wikimedia commons) is putting forward will affect us here.  

Trump’s plan is to impose an across-the-board 10% tariff on all goods imported to the United States, with the exception of those that come from China. He wants to slap a 60% tariff on Chinese products entering this country. As a South Dakotan who spent some productive years trading, brokering and producing ag products (I fed cattle for a few years in the ‘90s and brokered and traded ag futures for that entire decade), I know all too well about the implications of trade policy on this country’s ag sector.

For one thing, the American ag industry is export dependent, with about 20% of our country’s ag  production sold to overseas buyers. In 2022, South Dakota’s ag sales totalled around $15 billion, with $1.4 billion of those sales going to buyers in China. Getting into another trade spat with China could have some seriously debilitating consequences for our state’s ag producers. 

If you need the reminder, Trump’s trade war with China caused that country to retaliate by boycotting the U.S. ag market, a retaliatory gambit that cost American farmers plenty. Only big, direct payouts from the Trump administration totalling billions of dollars kept many producers afloat.

With that debacle in recent memory, ag interests have got to be wary of Trump’s economic saber-rattling directed at China. As the Biden administration has kept many of Trump’s tariffs in effect, China has gradually ramped down its purchases of American ag products since 2020. In a piece highlighting China’s intent to become less dependent on U.S. farmers, The Peterson Institute for International Economics reports that American ag products in 2022 (couldn’t find anything more recent) represented 18 percent of Chinese ag imports, compared to 27 percent in 2009.  

In a strategically logical move, China has developed a chain of suppliers that bypasses  the United States altogether. American farmers should be wary of the fact that China can probably find much, if not all, of its overseas agricultural needs without the U.S. being a supplier.  

Trump’s supporters should know this as they decide who will best respond to U.S. agricultural interests during the next four to eight years in the White House.  

John Tsitrian is a businessman and writer from the Black Hills. He was a weekly columnist for the Rapid City Journal for 20 years. His articles and commentary have also appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The Denver Post and The Omaha World-Herald. Tsitrian served in the Marines for three years (1966-69), including a 13-month tour of duty as a radioman in Vietnam. Republish with permission.