Using Import Taxes to Put People Back to Work

The current political thinking is to increase taxes to off set the huge debt left by the big bank bale out. Actually there is one tax that could be increased that would benefit American workers. The often over looked import tax could be increased to bring in more revenue for the USA and at the same time increase domestic jobs. Let me explain how that can happen.

All items that are imported into the USA go through customs and at that time customs puts a import tax on the item depending on the items value and category. The tax can range from 2% upwards to 20% of the wholesale value of the item. I have imported several items a few years ago for resale on eBay and the experience educated me on the workings of customs. The process can be expensive for importing just a few items but the larger the amount of items, the tax goes down. That is why Walmart can import so much stuff at such little layout for import taxes.

If the USA simply increased the tax scale of imported items, the government would replenish much of the debt that was incurred over the past few years. This would increase the price of the imported items dramatically. The effect of that would be that consumers would be more inclined to buy a product that was cheaper and possibly manufactured in the USA. Since products made in the USA would not have that extra tax added to their overall cost they would now be a more appealing product to the American consumer. Retail stores would now be looking for domestically made items to stock their shelves with. Larger manufacturing companies would see that domestically made items would be more cost effective to sell to the consumer and would be more inclined to bring back manufacturing to the USA from their off shore plants.

The added bonus would be a decrease of greenhouse gases because less items would travel around the world to get to your local store. Locally produced items would now be the norm.

So let's send a message to the federal government. Tell them not to add new taxes or to increase personal taxes on the American public but to increase taxes on items made outside of the USA and imported for sale to the American public..