Report Finds US Consumers Pay 96% of Tariff Costs

A new report published by the German Kiel Institute for the World Economy on Monday found US importers and consumers are paying 96% of President Trump's tariffs.

The Details: After analyzing over 25 million shipment records between Jan. 2024 and Nov. 2025, the institute found foreign exporters paid only 4% of US tariffs. According to the report, the US collected $195 billion in tariff revenue in fiscal year 2025, with US consumers paying roughly $187.2 billion of that. It also showed US prices rose almost "one-for-one" with tariffs and that a 10 percentage point increase in tariffs reduced foreign export prices by only 0.39%. The report also compared exports from India and found prices charged to the US didn't fall compared to other markets, which it says suggests Indian exporters reduced their exports, not their prices.

For Context: Other research from the Yale Budget Lab, Harvard Business and the Cato Institute also showed consumers are most affected by the tariffs. The Yale Budget Lab found consumers face an average tariff rate of 16.8%, the highest since 1935. It also found tariffs slowed US real GDP growth by 0.5 percentage points in 2025. Trump recently began an affordability tour to highlight plans to reduce costs for food, housing, healthcare and energy. He's also tied tariffs to foreign policy initiatives, including pressuring US allies to agree to a US purchase of Greenland.

On the Right: AllSides found coverage from two Right-rated outlets. Breitbart (Right bias) challenged the report, emphasizing an "enormous underlying variation in the data" and flawed methodology when analyzing imports. It noted a discrepancy between cheap and expensive products, suggesting the prices are being driven up by more expensive products as cheap products leave the market due to tariffs. Conversely, John R. Puri of National Review (Right) emphasized the impact on tax payers, writing, "The purported free lunch of Trump's tariffs is a farce" and Trump "has completely ignored this data…and is now threatening to punish Americans further by raising taxes on European imports."

On the Left: Outlets on the Left also emphasized the impact on consumers. Bloomberg (Lean Left) called the tariffs a "burden" and said "consumers bear nearly all the cost." It also quoted Kiel researchers calling the tariffs a "consumption tax on Americans" and noted exporters' abilities to redirect sales to other markets so they don't "foot much of the bill." Time (Lean Left) contextualized the report within tariffs during Trump's second term and recent threats over Greenland.

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