Tariffs as a Major Revenue Source: Implications for Distribution and Growth
In the early days of our nation, tariffs, or taxes on imported goods, were a primary source of government revenue. Over time, however, as the nation’s economy and businesses matured, it became clear that it was both fairer for American households and better for businesses, many of whom increasingly imported inputs to aid their domestic production, to raise revenues through a progressive income tax rather than regressive tariffs. Tariffs remain an important and targeted tool, of course, to protect against unfair trade practices. But, as we show in this issue brief, to use them as a revenue source that would significantly or even wholly replace the income tax would increase inflation and invite deep economic distortions that benefit the wealthy and harm low- and middle-income Americans.
Tariffs have not provided a meaningful share of revenue for the US government since the early 1900s (see Figure 1a). Existing imports duties on goods raised $80 billion last year, about 2 percent of the $4.44 trillion in total Federal tax revenue (Figure 1b).[1] By comparison, the individual income tax was responsible for 49 percent of total Federal tax revenue, and an additional 36 percent was raised via social insurance (payroll) taxes, which are closely tied to individual income. In other words: more than three-quarters of federal tax revenue is linked to individual wage and non-wage income.
It is mathematically unlikely that a broad tariff could ever replace the revenue raised by the individual income tax. For example, given the value of goods imports during FY2023 ($3.12 trillion), an across-the-board 70 percent tariff would be required to replace the equivalent revenue raised by the individual income tax under the overly simplistic assumption that consumers, producers, and our trading partners would have made no changes to their behavior in response to the tariffs. There are several reasons to believe, however, that this “static” exercise is a substantial revenue overestimate.
First and foremost, an across-the-board tariff is likely to spark retaliatory tariffs that reduce U.S. exports and subsequently induce transfers of collected duties to impacted U.S. businesses. For example, U.S. farmers facing retaliatory export tariffs during the 2018-2019 trade war received Federal subsidies that totaled 92 percent of the collected duties. Thus, even in the context of targeted tariffs impacting a relatively small fraction of overall imports, the Federal government ultimately collected only 8 percent of the tariff revenue. As the scope of this tariff increases, the scale of retaliatory tariffs and cost of offsetting subsidies for affected businesses is likely to increase. Moreover, consumption and production patterns are likely to respond to avoid the expense of this tariff, further reducing expected revenue. As a result, across-the-board tariff rates would likely need to be much larger than 70 percent to raise tax revenue that is equivalent to the individual income tax.
Further, this type of across-the-board tariff is likely to negatively impact the US macroeconomy. To begin, these tariffs will raise the prices of imported consumption goods and imported inputs used to produce output that is sold both domestically and internationally. A recent study found that a broad implementation of tariffs would raise the inflation rate by about ¾ percentage point relative to the current baseline (Zandi, Le Cerda, and Begley 2024 and correspondence with author). Clausing and Obstfeld 2024 concur that the inflation impact of an across-the-board tariff would be severe.
Crucially, the increase in imported input prices adversely impacts the efficiency of domestic production. Indeed, the evidence shows that large-scale tariffs result in significant declines in domestic output and productivity, higher unemployment, more inequality and real exchange rate appreciation implying a loss of international competitiveness, while having only small effects on the trade balance. Any increases in interest rates to combat transitory inflation due to rising prices will be contractionary, additionally contributing to a decline in real investment and output. These cumulative effects are likely to further depress the revenue raised by an across-the-board tariff.
Finally, relying on a tariff as a major source of tax revenue raises serious equity concerns. As noted, across-the-board tariffs would cause substantial pressure on consumer prices, either because consumers directly purchase imported goods or because businesses that rely on imported goods as inputs to their production increase prices. Because lower-income households spend a larger share of their income on consumption of these goods, they will be disproportionately burdened by a broad tariff. For example, CEA estimates indicate that introducing a 10 percent across-the-board tariff would impose a tariff burden of 2.3 percent of income for those in the bottom quintile compared to just 0.5 percent for households in the top 1 percent, following the methodology employed by Clausing and Lovely (2024) (Figure 2).
Strategically targeted tariffs are an important tool to protect economic and international interests of the U.S. However, the potential for a broad tariff to serve as a major revenue raiser in a modern, global economy is limited. Moreover, elevating the reliance of the Federal government on tariff revenue would likely exacerbate long-running trends in income inequality by shifting more of the burden of taxation onto lower-income households. It is also highly like to generate large, negative distortions to the macroeconomy.
