More than half of small- and midsized-business owners in the U.S. expect tariffs enacted by the Trump administration to increase their operating costs, and more than 40 percent predict sales to decline, according to a new study.
While many of these owners do not foresee major near-term changes because of the trade levies, a significant number predict rising inflation and a weakening U.S. dollar. Many owners said they would likely increase prices, cut staff and curtail business investments, according to research by Zoe Cullen and Ebehi Iyoha, assistant professors at Harvard Business School, and MIT Professor David Atkin.
For the working paper "Navigating Choppy Waters: How U.S. Trade Policy Uncertainty Affect Small Businesses," the team analyzed the responses of leaders of 4,400 small- and medium-sized enterprises in the U.S. and Canada who were surveyed on the alignable networking platform in late March. The answers, gathered just before the U.S. government announced tariffs on imports from countries worldwide, illustrate how companies from across a wide range of industries plan to cope with the duties.
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