issue #64: tariffs, and immigration, and tech, oh my!

I have received a lot (a couple) of questions lately from friends, family, and colleagues about how our new administration’s policies might affect the fashion and apparel industry, retail, and of course, my specific company and role.

Now, I can’t predict the future, and if there is one consistent characteristic of this administration it’s uncertainty. It’s clear they’re throwing a bunch of things up against the wall to see what sticks, and therefore this post might be outdated even by when it goes live. Things are moving fast, and a lot of us are furious. But I have been working in this industry for a while now, and as a reasonably well educated person paying attention to the world around them and capable of foresight, I feel I have it on at least some authority to use my power of thought and analysis to predict a little bit about what might happen here.

First of all, if you’re reading this, you likely know where I stand on…waves hand our current situation. I think it’s bad! Very, very bad! We are in for a rocky road, and I think often about worst case scenarios and what my hard red line is that would make me leave the country (spoiler alert: it’s a federal abortion ban. I refuse to let my daughter grow up in a world where she can’t access life saving health care and have autonomy over her own body). Every day I wake up wondering what fresh hell is going to be unleashed on us, and it’s not a very fun headspace to be in but I refuse to look away because that’s what they want!!!!

Anyways. Though one of the main pillars of this Substack is motherhood, another is fashion. So today, although there are plenty of things to say about how recent events have, and will, affect families and the ability to mother/parent, I want to focus on that latter part - fashion.

Because in case anyone thought fashion and politics weren’t related, well….they are!

First, let me direct you to

Sarah Shapiro

’s recent reporting on the tariff of it all for Puck. She sums up nicely a few of the issues facing end consumers, retailers, and companies at large when thinking about tariffs, but I’d like to add a few of my predictions to her excellent analysis. To start, I think that another trickle down effect of higher tariffs will be felt not just in the cutting of costs throughout the supply chain, packaging, and manufacturing, as she mentions, but in people as well. The higher the tariffs, and the longer they last, the more employees we will see laid off or denied raises, and there will inevitably be hiring freezes across the board. Existing employees may be asked to cover more ground, and they’ll end up stretched thin with fewer opportunities for pay increases or advancement. And, because I think we are about to see incredibly high unemployment across many sectors (like seriously you guys, where are all those fired government employees going to go, I’m actually curious), there just won’t be enough open jobs for them to move into something better. And no, I don’t think I’m catastrophizing here. Often when businesses are facing tough times, people are the first to go. It’s an “easy” way to cut back on expenses and overhead, and companies - especially those beholden to shareholders - will jump on it without hesitation.

Further, a common refrain when it comes to tariffs is that the end goal is to force production back to the United States, and listen, I am actually all for working towards moving production of certain things back to the US - denim, for example! The US used to be a major denim manufacturer, but due to rising costs, advancing technology that we just couldn’t keep up with, and overall globalization, most of our denim production shifted overseas (I highly recommend reading this). But factories and facilities cannot just pop up overnight (especially if there are no workers, see below), and the cost to making things here can be outlandishly expensive compared to other places (we have labor laws, a good thing, but that can be prohibitive, no matter what you think about it morally). Further, some goods are made abroad because we just do not have the know how or the access to parts or technology to do so here.

Should we decide to seriously pursue bringing manufacturing back to US soil, it is something that would not only take a lot of time, but a lot of capitol. Capitol that businesses right now, especially apparel businesses, don’t necessarily have. It’s one thing to spend on opening a retail store in Soho, it’s entirely another to open manufacturing facilities in an area that can hold that kind of space and equipment that also has enough skilled workers that is also easily accessible to get goods flowing in and out. Now, I’m all for capitalism (although that’s what caused production to be move overseas to begin with…), but this feels like a great area in which the government should step in, if this was really their end goal. Subsidizing the moving of some apparel production back to the US, I think, is a good thing!! But it would require a major investment in infrastructure, building, training, and technology, and those folks leading the country right now just don’t seem super ready to hand out cash, unless it’s to themselves. (Hey! Maybe instead of tariffs we tax our billionaires and put that money towards companies willing to invest in developing production in the United States?? No?? We still won’t tax them? Ok.)

But moving on to the immigration side of things. According to WWD, just under 25% of apparel workers in the US are undocumented. That’s a lot!! In LA, they estimate that it’s close to a million workers working without documentation, which is an industry shifting number if they were to suddenly disappear. These people work across many categories, but are heavily concentrated in manufacturing and construction, both of which are crucial to the fashion industry.

Without people in those jobs, companies will likely start to lean into AI and technology to fill in the gaps, not unskilled Americans who aren’t interested in those jobs in the first place. It will push the technology forward, which some might argue is a good thing, but it won’t necessarily create more jobs, which we are being told is an underlying desire of those in favor of mass deportation (which it may be, but way down on the list).

Should mass deportations occur, manufacturing costs will rise significantly, not only because of tariffs (even if you sew the garment here, it’s likely you’re importing the raw materials from somewhere else), but also because without the labor of immigrants (it’s cheaper, whether we like it or not), companies will be forced to hire from a much smaller pool of candidates that require different (more expensive) protections (and probably a lot of training), and who will likely demand higher wages than the company currently pays. This will drive costs up, and those costs will get passed on to the end consumer - you. Your clothes will get more expensive. Just like your eggs. And your avocados. And your maple syrup.

That said, the adoption of any new technology doesn’t happen overnight, and it won’t happen overnight in manufacturing either. Factories will be left without anyone to make the clothes, while they also won’t have had the time to get a plan B up and running. Now, again, one could make an argument that this isn’t necessarily a bad thing because we already have enough clothes and it’s bad for the planet and all that, but that’s not how it works!! Would I love to see us all consume less and produce less and think more about how our consumption affects us globally? Yes. Do I think it’s possible to do so quickly and without planning? No. These companies rely on the production of apparel to keep the lights on, to keep food on the table of their employees. Everyone involved - from the farmers picking the cotton those producing the fabric to those designing the clothes to those marketing the line to those selling it in a retail store depend on these brands to continue to function, and any change in our production and consumption habits, just like any change in our manufacturing capabilities, needs to be a well thought out and slow burn to mitigate it’s disastrous effects. Despite what you might be hearing about Shein, most of the fashion and apparel industry still works slowly, and whatever is being produced now has been in the works for probably about a year.

So, to recap. Tariffs = higher prices for goods, lower profits for companies. Production is expensive and time consuming to reshore, and would take years, if not decades, to implement in a meaningful way (also companies will be left with less money to do this because of tariffs!). Mass deportation = fewer workers to make the things, causing a disruption in production and affecting everyone across every step of the supply chain. Americans do not get those empty jobs because they will go to technology and also they do not want them! All of this means higher prices for you, the consumer, fewer jobs for everyone, and, in all likelihood, we’ll see more businesses here in the US close not open, due to higher costs, lack of labor, and not enough cash.

But the bottom line, really, is that none of this matters. It doesn’t matter because those putting these dangerous policies in place just don’t care. They don’t care about immigrants, they don’t care about working people, they don’t care about inflation, they don’t care about you, and they don’t care about me.

What they do care about is lining their pockets and the pockets of their friends, controlling others, and retaining power.

So, vote. Speak up. Call your reps. Run for office. Make it clear that the power they are so desperate to hang on to will cease to exist when we rally together to vote them out. Make your voice heard through your wallet and spend locally, with minority owned businesses. Donate to those organizations providing help to others and working to fight back.

see you tuesday!

jen