Donald Trump’s prices put the hopes for renewal to the test

In a corner of a cavernous factory from the 1890s in southern Massachusetts, 15 people look at sewing machines, producing hospital quality neonatal equipment.

They are all that remains of what was formerly a much greater manufacturing operation, most of which the Teixeira family closed in 1990, reinventing their business as a largely stored and distribution company.

Since US President Donald Trump began deploying scanning prices, the Teixeiras have set up more requests for information from companies newly interested in their sewing services based in the United States.

But they refused these offers, dissuaded by the difficulty of hiring in the midst of a repression of immigration and doubts that the request will be maintained.

This is only one of the many indications that the realization of the revival of the manufacturing promised by the President is probably much more difficult than the White House has claimed it.

“This is simply not going to happen,” said Frank Teixeira, who joined the family business in the 1970s and supervised his dismantling and reinvention as specific services Inc.

“Prices are bad policy and will end up getting home to haunt us.”

Trump campaigned for the presidency on the promise of a better economy, designed in part by prices which, according to him, would reduce costs and inaugurate a new golden age.

The message turned out to resonate with voters, helping the campaign to make unexpected breakthroughs in workers have long considered democratic bastions.

This includes the base of Fall River des Teixeiras, a former textile manufacturing center, where Trump’s victory marked the first in the city by a republican presidential candidate in about a century.

But its plans have been widely shot by experts, who warned that prices, which are a tax on imports, would rather increase prices for American companies and consumers and slow growth – with specific risks for manufacturers, which often count on imported supplies.

Now, nine months after the president’s start to the mandate when the prices settled, the gulf between Trump’s rhetoric, which boasts of investments that pour into the country, and reality on the ground in places like Fall River, is starting to show up.

In the United States, employment growth has slowed down this year, including manufacturing. After developing after the pandemic, the payroll in manufacturing companies has shrunk this year, which allowed 12,000 jobs last month.

Trade surveys indicate that activity in the sector is in contraction.

Last month, 71% of the manufacturers questioned by the Dallas branch of the Federal Reserve said that prices – which vary from 10% to 50% on most imports – had already had a negative impact on their business, increasing the cost of resources and injuring profits.

In Matouk, a high -end bedding manufacturer on the Teixeiras route, the boss George Matouk said that between the April and August prices had already added more than $ 100,000 (£ 74,000) per month of cost, because they have struck supplies like cotton fabric in India and Portugal and down Liechtenstein.

Founded by its grandfather in 1929, the company has grown up to employ around 300 people in recent years – a pride for Mr. Matouk, who has faced opponents on his return to the third generation to join the family business after obtaining his diploma from the Columbia Business School in the late 1990s.

But sudden pricing expenses have forced the company to reduce investments on things such as new equipment and expenses in discretionary articles such as marketing.

Despite the distinction in America of many of its products, Mr. Matouk said that he did not expect any advantage of prices because higher costs pushed him to increase prices, a decision likely to weigh on sales.

“Because the materials are subject to prices like everything else, the advantages are not there,” he said.

Mr. Matouk described the current challenges encountered by his company to “demoralize a new way” because they have been deliberately inflicted, by government policy.

“We have done all the things we were supposed to do to invest in the industrial base of the United States when no one else was willing to do so and it is just really frustrating that we are now penalized,” he said.

Studies on the impact of the most limited prices imposed by Trump during his first mandate on manufacturers in the United States revealed that small employment gains in protected industries, such as steel, were more than offset by losses in other companies that depended on parts.

But Mike Van Der Sleesen, who directs Business Vanson Leathers of the motorcycle jacket company, said that he thought that the changes this year had been so disruptive that it was premature to make predictions.

Van Der Sleesen, who voted for Trump last year, is not a fan of the president’s prices, who increased his costs by around 15% this year.

However, he shared the president’s concerns that foreign companies could easily access the American market, while American companies seeking to sell abroad meet obstacles in the form of prices and other taxes.

“It was a very unequal and unfair commercial journey for a company like Vanson,” said Van Der Sleesen, whose business was founded in 1974 and employed more than 160 people as recently as 2000, before the entrance to China in the World Order reduced the workforce to around 50.

“We should not invoice them and they should not charge us in my opinion, but that will never happen,” he said.

For the moment, the demand for its jackets, which can sell thousands of dollars, has resisted. He said his suppliers in the United States reported an increase in activity.

“We have not heard overtime in the textile world for 20 years!” He said. “It is difficult to be convinced that you can predict what it will shake because the changes have been so dramatic.”

In the streets of Fall River, many Trump supporters said they had been ready to give the President time to put his strategy to the test.

“We should be able to make,” said Tom Teixeira.

The 72 -year -old retirement worker voted for Trump in 2016, 2020 and 2024, partially conquered his message on the economy.

“I know how it was and it can improve, but that will not improve overnight,” said Teixeira, who is not linked to Teixeira manufacturers, adding that he had not yet noticed a major price increase this year.

“In a year, if things are not cheaper, we will see.”