Trump weighing 25 percent lumber tariffs

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Hill

02/20/25 11:07 AM ET


President Trump is considering imposing a 25 percent tariff on international lumber and wood products, looking to add another item to an expanding list of products under duties.

“I’m going to be announcing tariffs on cars and semiconductors and chips and pharmaceuticals, drugs and pharmaceuticals and lumber, probably, and some other things over the next month or sooner,” Trump said Wednesday at a Future Investment Initiative Institute summit.

“It’s going to have a big impact on America, We are bringing our businesses back. If they don’t make their product in America then they will very simply have to pay a tariff, but if they do make their product in America, they don’t have to pay any tariff,” he added. While traveling back to Washington on Wednesday, Trump told reporters on Air Force One he was thinking about imposing the 25 percent rate in April.

Earlier this week, Trump indicated he was also looking to implement a 25 percent tariff on automobiles, semiconductors and pharmaceuticals in April, a rate that could increase over the year. “But we want to give them time to come in,” Trump told reporters at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., on Monday. “Because as you know when they come into the United States and they have their plant or factory here, there is no tariff. So we want to give them a little bit of a chance.”

Read more: https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5155132-trump-lumber-wood-tariffs/

[Maninacan]

1. Trees

Start growing trees here.

[neohippie]

4. and sweep the forest floors

We must have clean forest floors to prevent forest fires since we cut funding to fighting them

[kiri]

19. insurance rates and fire recovery costs will skyrocket

This will have huge impacts on rebuilding/reconstruction in fire-destroyed areas.
And the cost of insurance.
And plywood for hurricane season.

[FalloutShelter]

26. Good luck Americans in rebuilding

your climate devastated homes.

[BOSSHOG]

2. Herbert Hoover was fond of tariffs.

[ashredux]

3. Idiots....🤦‍♂️

[IronLionZion]

5. And if they make stuff in America out of imported lumber

they can just pass on the tariffs by raising prices.

Maybe companies will ship Canadian trees across the border to have it cut into lumber in the US. Then he'll put a tariff on trees. Trees are liberal anyway because of the green leaves.

[DENVERPOPS]

32. He and the Republicans

would like nothing more than "Clear Cutting" of ALL the pine forests in Oregon and Washington..........

And as a bonus, it would win him the favor of the massive U.S. Timber industry loggers and employers......at least until the trees run out

[CentralMass]

6. He clearly wants to destroy our economy.

Last edited Thu Feb 20, 2025, 05:40 PM - Edit history (1)

[Vinca]

7. Guess you can tack on 25% more to the cost of a new house, too.

[PhilG]

15. 25%

and don't forget a 25% increase in home repairs during hurricane & tornado season this year.

[Buddyzbuddy]

8. Koch industries must be thrilled.

[rampartd]

9. that'll bring down the price of housing!

and probably those inconvenient forests as well.

[markie]

13. yes

the idiot looks at trees and thinks we can cut them all for lumber.... he is so clueless

[Tansy_Gold]

30. We're looking at a housing market glut anyway

Too many people -- especially boomers with big equity -- looking to cash out and sell (if they can) while prices are high. Look for real estate to head into a downward spiral very, very soon.

[yorkster]

33. In some cases a house is the only equity

people have. Can't downsize until they sell for enough money to afford a condo or independent living situation. Not to say that greed never enters the picture, of course.

[Tansy_Gold]

34. In MANY cases

And I include myself in that "many."

[yorkster]

35. Moi aussi...

[AntiFascist]

10. Construction costs are likely to go up even more, then...

according to Google, the US imports up to 30% if its softwood lumber from Canada.

[OnlinePoker]

11. In August, the Biden administration nearly doubled the tariff on Canadian softwood lumber.

It went from 8.05% to 14.54%

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/canadian-softwood-lumber-us-duty-1.7294054

[surfered]

12. Guaranteed to lower housing costs

[SunSeeker]

14. A Trumper cabinet installer I know is about to experience FAFO.

Last edited Fri Feb 21, 2025, 02:37 AM - Edit history (1)

He said he couldn't vote for Harris because the price the Maple wood had gone up too much.

[Yavin4]

16. Always threatens tariffs but never follows through.

Wall Street controls him.

[BumRushDaShow]

17. The tariffs on China (10%) went through

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvg8zg7ll09o

He only delayed the Mexico/Canada tariffs.

[Bengus81]

25. LOL...not today or yesterday. TANKING damn near 800 points today on his latest edict

[ProudMNDemocrat]

18. What is the sense of Made In America...

If there is no world market for products made here, trade falls apart.

Tariffs do not work, only add more costs on American consumer.

[HarryM]

20. He really does want to kill the economy.

[DetlefK]

21. FOR FUCKS SAKE. "They" don't pay tariffs!!!

If a US real-estate company buys lumber from Canada to build a house, WHO PAYS THE FUCKING TARIFF?

[mdbl]

22. That'll really help inflation

[BumRushDaShow]

23. You betcha!

The Dow loved that idea so much that it has dropped 800 points at post time, to celebrate!!11!!!!1!!

[Bengus81]

24. Do it Trump and watch the entire building industry collapse

That orange POS has no idea of the impact that would have on the US economy. I worked in it for five decades until 2017. I'm sure all his buds at the mega corporations will let him in on the disaster it would foist on the economy.

That idiot will take us to 10% unemployment and clear cut all our forests.

CUT baby CUT!! Wheeeee

[Tansy_Gold]

31. 10% is a wildly optimistic number

It makes no difference if he understands the impact or not. Nothing he does is based on logic. ONLY on his need to retaliate against anyone who opposed him. All those people who voted for Hillary. All those people who voted for Kamala. All those people who ever voted Dem, who elected Dems in their states, ALL OF THEM. Oh, gee, will some of his supporters be hurt, too? He doesn't care. (If he even thinks about them, it will be think they support him even as their kids are dying of measles, they're living in tents because they can't afford housing, and there's no more food in the grocery store than in a soviet supermarket.)

Look for unemployment to reach 25% or more -- that's what it was in 1933 -- before this piece of shit is done. And remember that in 1933, 25% represented only about 13 million people, mostly men.

January 2025 unemployment was at approx 4% with approx 7 million out of work. Now imagine 42 million out of work, many in families that depended on two incomes to survive, and then there are all the self-employed and small businesses that will be impacted.

"The recession is coming," Rep. Jasmine Crockett told Nicolle Wallace. "I told you here first."

[doc03]

27. That will bring down the cost housing

[Norrrm]

28. Remember... as Dotard likes to say: 'Trade wars are easy to win.'

Is everyone enjoying the lower grocery prices he gave his word on?

[bucolic_frolic]

29. Trumponomics. To reduce inflation, raise the cost of the ingredients.

It's a Miracle Ear!

[jmowreader]

36. In other words..."only The Rich should own homes"

The "little bit of a chance" thing Trump is talking about is no chance at all. He's talking about tariffing semiconductors in April but giving the manufacturers until then to set up factories in the US. Problem is, even if the semiconductor foundries needed to make semiconductors in the US existed - they do not and if they broke ground on a new foundry TODAY they wouldn't be making parts in it until after Trump's term ends - it takes longer than that to make parts. If you deliver a truckload of sand to a wafer factory this morning you won't see usable parts from that sand for three to four months. And all the foundries in the US are at full capacity. It's not just a question of adding shifts; semiconductors are actually grown in huge machines, and they don't grow any faster if you put more people on the floor.

Car factories take a long time to build, and sometimes even longer to get working properly. Think of when his best friend Elon decided to build an automated production line for his smaller cars. That system took so long to make cars before they got it right, fabricators from NASCAR teams were making cars faster than Tesla was.

Now, lumber: Obviously the presence of Canadian and Swedish SPF (spruce-pine-fir) lumber in the US market is giving him butthurt. But...guess what: the US lumber is more expensive because the Canadian and Swedish governments still own their timberland. The US sold all their land off decades ago. It is a hell of a lot cheaper for a producer to farm trees on government land and just pay royalties than it is to own land and pay taxes on it.

[PufPuf23]

37. Weyerhaeuser imports from Canada are the largest source of imported lumber into the USA

by far. Weyerhaeuser is largest producer of lumber in USA and in the world.

"Our operations in Canada depend on approximately 13.9 million acres of temperate and boreal forests in four provinces: Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario, and Saskatchewan."

https://www.weyerhaeuser.com/woodproducts/canada/

For perspective, Oregon has somewhat over 6 million acres of corporate timberland.