Teamsters President Sean O’Brien is calling on President Donald Trump to impose tariffs on Mexican beer brewers.
O’Brien sent a letter to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Monday asking the administration to “develop a strategic plan to utilize all the tools at your disposal (including targeted tariffs where necessary) to help U.S. workers in the beer industry restore economic balance and fairness in our trading relationship with Mexico.”
The Teamsters Brewery, Bakers, and Soft Drink Conference represents over 80,000 American workers and more than 200 local unions, according to O’Brien. He raises concerns to Lutnick about U.S. workers having to compete with low-wage labor in Mexico:
The U.S. has one of the highest shares of beer imports when compared with other large countries, with beer imports even exceeding foreign imports in other high-profile categories of trade such as automobiles. As you may be aware, the vast majority of U.S. beer imports come from Mexico, where labor costs and wages are a fraction of what they are in the United States. These conditions are particularly concerning given that union representation stands at nearly 80% among large U.S. brewers.
Our nation’s trade policy should be driving a race-to-the-top in terms of labor standards across North America, not forcing U.S. workers to compete with low-road Mexican companies that pay their workers pennies on the dollar in a race-to-the-bottom.
If historical trends are allowed to continue, foreign beer imports stand to grow to nearly 40% of total US consumption, and U.S. large brewery production and utilization will continue to decline. The estimated losses to the US economy in terms of GDP may stand in the range of $23 billion, posing a risk to tens of thousands of good union jobs and the communities that these jobs sustain across our country.
Earlier this month, Trump imposed 25 percent tariffs on Canada and Mexico. However, goods that comply with the U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement (USMCA) are exempt from the 25 percent tariffs until April 2. Trump’s trade policy has been driving the onshoring of manufacturing and production to the United States, with trillions in new investments in the U.S. announced since he took office. […]
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