A June 2018 Politico article analyzed the effects consumers would face as a result of retaliatory tariffs that aim to make up for the twenty-five percent tariffs on China that the Trump administration ultimately imposed. It noted that costs for consumers are expected to increase for things like birth control and clothing, and that soybean farmers would plant fewer soybeans because China has imposed retaliatory duties on more than $12 billion worth of soybeans. Politico cited the Northeast-Midwest Institute’s Eric Heath, Senior Policy Counsel for the Mississippi River Basin Program, for his explanation that this would lead to an increase in “the amount of nitrates seeping into drinking water . . . because soybeans are planted in rotation with corn and absorb much of the nitrates left behind.”
The full article titled “Birth Control and Beer Kegs: How Trump’s Tariffs Will Hit Middle America” can be read here.