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Tariff pass-through and implications for domestic
markets: Evidence from U.S. steel imports
Mumtaz Ahmad & Imtiaz Ahmad
To cite this article: Mumtaz Ahmad & Imtiaz Ahmad (2023): Tariff pass-through and
implications for domestic markets: Evidence from U.S. steel imports, The Journal of
International Trade & Economic Development, DOI: 10.1080/09638199.2023.2187654
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/09638199.2023.2187654
Published online: 15 Mar 2023.
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THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
https://doi.org/10.1080/09638199.2023.2187654
Tariff pass-through and implications for domestic
markets: Evidence from U.S. steel imports
Mumtaz Ahmada and Imtiaz Ahmad
b
a Department of Economics, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada; b Department of Economics, School
of Social Sciences and Humanities, Nationals University of Sciences and Technology, Islamabad,
Pakistan
ABSTRACT
Recent studies report that during the U.S. trade war, the overall burden of tariffs has
entirely passed on to U.S. firms and consumers in terms of higher import prices, but
the pass-through is incomplete in the case of steel products. Using 10-digit import data
from U.S. Customs for 2018–2019, contrary to the recent literature, we find that import
tariff pass-through is complete for steel products. We also find significant and large
supply chain adjustments following the imposition of tariffs. However, despite the supply chain adjustments, the overall imports of steel products, which moved in tandem
with domestic steel consumption over the last ten years, exhibited a declining trend.
The overall steel imports declined from 34.5 in 2017 to 26.3 million metric tons in 2019.
During the same period, domestic production increased from 81.6 to 87.9 million metric
tons, almost equal to the peak production the U.S. achieved in 2012 and 2014.
KEYWORDS Tariff-passthrough; steel imports; event study
JEL CLASSIFICATIONS F10, F1, F, F41, F4
ARTICLE HISTORY Received 10 May 2022; Accepted 27 February 2023
Introduction
A recent increase in tariffs by the United States (U.S.) against its major trading partners has reinvigorated the literature on tariffs and their impact on different economic
outcomes. An increase in tariffs of a high magnitude by a large economy is unheardof in recent history. This has provided the opportunity to test the predictions of trade
theory in the context of a large economy. The standard trade theory predicts that as
the tariff-imposing country has a large share of global demand, foreign producers are
forced to decrease their prices to keep exporting. However, contrary to the predictions
of the trade theory, most recent studies have found that the U.S. tariffs have been entirely
passed on to U.S. domestic consumers and producers (Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein
2019; Fajgelbaum et al. 2020; Flaaen, Hortaçsu, and Tintelnot 2020; Amiti, Redding, and
Weinstein 2020). However, Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020) have reported that the
case of steel products, particularly steel inputs, differs from the rest of the imports. They
CONTACT Imtiaz Ahmad
imtiaz.ahmad@s3h.nust.edu.pk
© 2023 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2
M. AHMAD AND I. AHMAD
reported that 50 percent of the impact of tariffs in the case of steel inputs is borne by
exporters as they decrease their prices in the long term.
The case of steel is important, firstly, because the increase in tariffs on steel products
is considerably large relative to those imposed on other products. Secondly, the size of
the U.S. steel industry has been declining for the last three decades in terms of its share in
GDP and employment, and it is facing intense competition from China in the global market. Thirdly, steel is a crucial input for many U.S. industries, including cars, construction,
electronics, etc. These factors alone make interventions in the steel industry an attractive
case for political gains. In this context, in 2016, Trump’s Presidential campaign was based
on an anti-globalization narrative, such as safeguarding the local industry from foreign
competition and reviving the jobs for domestic labor. The theoretical and empirical literature also shows that trade policy is often a powerful electoral tool that is deployed
to benefit specific groups within the economy (Helpman 1995; Grossman and Helpman
2021).
In general, tariffs directly affect the prices of imported goods, impacting domestic
production and consumption. The extent of price changes depends on how the producers of domestic substitutes, downstream industries, and consumers respond as the effects
of tariffs permeate through the economy. Three potential channels through which tariffs affect prices are as follows: First, in the case of tariffs on steel products by the U.S.,
domestic consumers face higher prices due to increased tariffs, leading to a decrease in
demand depending on consumers’ price sensitivity. Second, a decline in the domestic
demand for relatively expensive imported goods may benefit competing U.S. producers
as they charge higher prices (Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2019). Third, U.S. producers
that use imported steel content in their production in downstream industries may lose
profits and charge higher prices because of the increased cost of production – leading to
a contraction in these industries.
Moreover, the competitiveness of exporting firms that use imported steel supplies in
the production process may decrease because of the increased cost of production, leading
to a decrease in their exports. Particularly, when there is a sizable increase in tariffs, as in
the case of the recent U.S. trade war, the downstream firms tend to relocate their supply
chains to destinations with relatively small tariffs. Although it is risky and costly to renegotiate, search, and relocate supply chains (Grossman and Helpman 2020), firms do so to
maintain their competitiveness. In addition to the direct industry-level effects of tariffs,
there are indirect effects on other industries in the local economy, owing to backward
and forward linkages with other industries. Similarly, the trade war between U.S. and
China, being large economies, can disrupt global value chains and divert investments
(Huang et al. 2019; Tam 2020; Le et al. 2022).
Most of the literature before the U.S. trade war reports incomplete tariff pass-through,
i.e. countries through the imposition of tariffs, affect the terms of trade in their favor.
This strand of literature covers large importers like the U.S. (Feenstra 1994; Hummels
and Skiba 2004; Irwin 2014), India (Mallick and Marques 2008; Marchand 2012; De
Loecker et al. 2016), and relatively small importers in New Zealand (Winkelmann and
Winkelmann 1998). The tariff pass-through in these papers range from 0.43 (Feenstra
1989) to 0.24 (Irwin 2014).
Similar to the literature on tariffs, the literature on import demand and supply elasticities also implies incomplete pass-through. For example, Broda et al. (2008) estimates that
the pass-through ranges from 0.79–0.95 in 15 non-WTO countries. A large body of literature has examined a related concept of exchange-rate pass-through as an appreciation
THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
3
of exchange rate of exporter country is also a demand determinant like increase in tariff.
A typical finding in the case of the exchange rate also suggests incomplete pass-through
(Goldberg and Knetter 1997; Burstein and Gopinath 2014).
Contrary to the literature before the U.S. trade war, several studies have reported
virtually complete tariff pass-through. Fajgelbaum et al. (2020) uses an event study
framework and HS 10-digit level data at a monthly frequency to analyze the impact of
tariff changes during the U.S. trade war. They find a complete pass-through of tariffs to
import prices, i.e. the price of tariff-targeted products did not decrease, and firms and
consumers of those products had to bear losses of $51 billion, or 27% of GDP. Using
similar data but 12-month differences instead of monthly changes, Amiti, Redding, and
Weinstein (2020) also found complete pass-through within one year after tariff changes.
In addition to the tariff pass-through literature on U.S., Chang et. al. (2021) and Ma,
Ning, and Xu (2021) analyze the case of China. They use specifications in Fajgelbaum
et al. (2020) and Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020) and find a complete tariff passthrough. This indicates that in the case of the U.S. trade war, neither country was able to
affect prices in its favor.
One of the caveats of earlier studies is that they have used disaggregated product level
import prices that compare products across different categories that may have different export supply elasticities. Also, the possibility of import diversion or supply chain
adjustments following the imposition of tariffs is ignored. This study contributes to the
literature by analyzing the short- and long-term impact of tariffs on prices within a specific industry while controlling for possible import diversion. The case of steel imports
is interesting in the sense that most of the tariff hikes were in this sector – as the tariffs
increased from 0.7% to over 10% on steel imports from February 2018 to September 2019
compared to the overall increase in tariff from 1.6 to 5.4 percent during the same period
Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020). Therefore, we confine this analysis to the direct
impact of tariffs on unit prices and the dollar value of imports of steel products only.
We use event study methodology similar to Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020), i.e.
but in our case, the control group products are also from within the steel sector. We also
control the possible import diversion that can bias our estimates of tariff elasticities. In
addition, we also analyze the domestic market for steel, including domestic production
and consumption of steel products.
More recent literature on the impact of tariffs on prices has reported that the case of
steel products is different Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2020 whereby almost half of
the burden of tariffs fell on exporters. Our findings show that when we confine control
group products within the steel sector and control for import diversion, the tariff passthrough is complete – the tariff elasticity of imports is near unity – as in other sectors
reported in literature. Also, we find that these results were driven mainly by industrial
supplies and raw materials. The insignificant effect of tariffs on import prices and values
of capital products indicates that capital decisions are not much affected by tariffs. In
long-term we found significant and large trade diversion effect of tariffs and increased
domestic production of steel industry.
Conceptual framework
When a home country imposes a tariff on product imports, the tariff will inhibit imports
simply because now the imported product costs more than before. The overall supply of
that product falls in the home country. If the products are homogeneous and the market
4
M. AHMAD AND I. AHMAD
Figure 1. Impact of a Tariff: Large Country Case. (a) Importing Country, (b) Exporting Country.
is perfectly competitive, the price of that product will increase in the home country for
both imported and domestically produced products.
The extent of tariff impact on prices hinges on how large the country is imposing tariffs. If the country is a large importer of the product, it has monopsony–like
power in trade–monopsony is the case where there is a single buyer of a product.
Just like a monopsonist that can gain by reducing demand and consequently inducing the producers to reduce price, a large importer can also cause a reduction in
prices by imposing tariffs and reducing import demand. This also has implications
for domestic production of that product because imported product becomes relatively
costly.
Figure 1 gives the supply and demand curves for the importing and exporting countries. At the free trade equilibrium price (PFT ), the excess demand by the importing
country equals excess supply by the exporter is shown as a blue line in each country’s graph – indicating the quantity of imports and exports, respectively. When a large
importing country imposes a tariff, it will increase the price in the domestic market of
importing country as the consumers will have to pay a certain amount of tariff along with
the product’s price. As shown in the figure, the price will increase from PFT to PT IM . Correspondingly, price in exporting country will decrease from PFT to PT EX . The extent of
the decline in export price depends on the elasticity of the supply curve.
For the importing country, the tariff burden falls on consumers as they have to pay
higher prices for imported products. However, the domestic producers of the product
gain because the price of their product increases, which also increases the output of
existing firms. New firms may also enter, causing an increase in employment and investment. In the exporting country, the producers (exporters) are forced to decrease prices
because of a decline in demand for their products. The price decline induces a decrease
in output, employment and investment in exporting countries. However, the magnitude
of tariff impact depends on the importing country’s monopsony power and supply chain
adjustments by the importers.
THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
5
We are particularly interested in the impact of tariffs (movement from PFT to PT IM on
import prices). There will be a one-to-one increase in import prices due to the imposition of tariffs if exporters do not reduce their prices – otherwise, tariff pass-through
will be less than perfect – and the exporters will bear some burden. Correspondingly,
we will analyze the impact of tariffs on export prices, i.e. movement from PFT to PT EX in
Exporting country (See Figure 1(b)). In addition to the impact on import prices, we are
interested in the extent of the overall decline in imports and increase in domestic supply,
i.e. decrease from DFT IM to DT IM and increase from SFT IM to ST IM in Importing country
Figure 1(a).
The case in question, where a large country applies tariffs only to specific countries,
tariffs can lead to trade diversion effects as well because importers can avoid higher tariffs by sourcing imports from elsewhere. Therefore, the impact of tariffs on prices in
importing country (Figure 1(a)) may not be complete, i.e. the increase in import prices
may not be in equal proportion to increase in tariffs. Similarly, the impact on quantity
of imports may not be as large as depicted in Figure 1(a). This in a way have favorable
impact on third countries at the expense of countries on which tariffs are imposed.
The impact of tariffs on prices and volume of imports partly depends on the extent of
trade diversion. However, particularly in case of a large country imposing tariffs, third
countries may not be able to completely capture the trade. Firstly, third countries may
not have enough supply capacity to adjust to demand. Secondly, the exporters subject
to tariffs may be able adjust prices downwards and retain their market share – that is
possible in case demand is elastic or profit margins are large. Thirdly, the trade frictions
such as high transportation cost and search cost may make it difficult to divert to other
competitive destinations. For these reasons, trade diversion should not be ignored in
answering the question of whether tariffs have affected prices and imports.
Data
The U.S. trade war started based on a particular legal rationale that imports are a threat to
national security. Initially, safeguard tariffs were imposed on solar panels and washing
machines in January 2018 based on findings of the U.S. International Trade Commission (USITC) that imports of solar panels and washing machines are hurting domestic
industries. It was followed by the imposition of tariffs on various other products based on
national security investigations by USITC, steel, and aluminum being the key products
that attracted U.S. tariffs. This resulted in three times higher average tariffs on overall
imports, increasing from 1.6 percent at the end of 2017 to 5.4 percent in September
2019 (Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2020). Although coverage of products increased
over time, much of this tariff increase was on steel products. Figure 2 shows that the trade
war resulted in import-weighted tariffs increasing from 0.7% to over 10% from February
2018 to September 2019.
The data on import values and volumes of about 16 thousand products at a 10-digit
level comes from U.S. Customs, a subset of the same data used by Amiti, Redding, and
Weinstein (2020). The data on the production and consumption of steel products comes
from U.S. Department of Commerce (2020). The unit import prices, computed based
on import values and volumes, depict foreign export prices. We compute tariff-inclusive
import prices faced by importers by using import values and volumes of steel products.
To explore heterogeneity across different categories within the steel sector. We separate
HTS 10-digit products in chapters 72–73 and categorize them by their end-use category
6
M. AHMAD AND I. AHMAD
Figure 2. Average U.S. Tariff on Steel Production During 2018–2019. Note: Dashed lines indicate the implementation of tariffs on steel products during 2018–2019. The associated import values are headline numbers from 2017,
which are a little lower. Source: Author’s calculations based on data from U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. International
Trade Commission; tariffs on HTS 10-product code by country, weighted by 2017 annual import values.
using concordance tables, i.e. consumer goods, capital goods, and industrial supplies and
materials.
Methodology
We use an event-study regression model to analyze the impact of U.S. tariffs on steel
import values and unit prices. The data comes from the U.S. Customs department, which
includes products at HTS10 digit and country-level information on monthly import values and volumes. According to the U.S. Census Bureau classification, the products are
further categorized by the end – use categories, i.e. capital, consumer, and industrial
supplies and materials. However, contrary to Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020),
the control product categories are also steel products on which tariffs were unchanged.
Moreover, we also include controls to estimate the possible impact of trade diversion on
unit prices and import values. In general, the model resembles an event study regression
proposed by Clarke and Schythe (2020) to estimate the response to a quasi-experimental
policy or event. We adopt a similar regression model to estimate the tariff pass-through
on import values and unit prices, given as follows.
IMPijt = λij +
T
s=−T
T
1 + τijs
δs (Iijs × ln
β s ( iks ) + γjt + μit + ijt
)+
1 + τij0
(1)
s=−T
where
IMPijt = the natural logarithm of import values or unit1 prices of product i, from
country j in month t
λij = product-country fixed effects
Iijs = treatment indicator variables for product i, country j, and month s in which
tariff is imposed.
iks = control indicator variables for product i for which tariff is imposed in month
s and country k,
THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
7
(i.e.
other than those on which tariff is imposed)
countries
1+τijs
= log change in tariffs between month s and the last untreated month.
ln 1+τij0
γ jt = country-time fixed effects
μit = product-time fixed effects
The final month also consists of observations for periods longer than 12 months.
Thus, the coefficient for 12th month can be interpreted as the long-term impact of tariffs. The treatment month indicator variables indicate that a particular product is a given
number of periods away from the imposition of tariff in the respective month. Each
coefficient (δ s ) is a difference-in-differences estimator. The first difference is between
the treatment and control of country-product groups based on the imposition of tariffs, and the second difference is before and after the imposition of tariffs. Like any
difference-in-differences estimator, other control variables are not required because of
highly disaggregated and high-frequency data. However, (μit ) and (γ jt ) are country-time
fixed effects and product-time fixed effects to control for country-specific time-varying
and other factors such as exchange rate affecting imports and unit prices. The country
product fixed effect controls for quality or comparative advantage across countries in
untreated months. We estimate the regression for all steel products combined and each
end-use category of steel products.
An important aspect ignored in other event study models in estimating the impact
of a particular trade policy is the possibility of supply chain adjustments (Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2020). If supply chain adjustments are ignored, the estimates of (δ s )
would be biased for unit prices and import values. The biased coefficients are highly
likely as importers divert to other destinations where the tariff is unchanged to avoid
higher costs – thus, the imports of the same products from other countries where tariffs are unchanged may be on different trends. Therefore, we have introduced dummy
variables to control potential trade diversion to countries where tariffs are not imposed.
Whether the trade diversion effect is immediate? Does it emerge slowly? Is there an initial effect that goes away after a few periods? To answer these questions, we take the log
distribution of these controls.
Results and discussions
Figure 3 shows estimates of elasticities for tariff-inclusive unit import prices for 12
months before and after impositions of tariffs. The results for overall steel goods show
that the elasticity coefficients (δ’s) are near 1 in short term, long term and beyond 12
months. For instance, in case of all steel products, immediately after imposition of tariffs, i.e. period 1 the elasticity coefficient is 1.02 indicating that for any percentage change
in tariffs there is almost equivalent percentage increase in import prices – in literature
this is also known as complete pass-through. For the subcategories of steel inputs and
industrial supplies and materials, the tariff pass-through is virtually identical to results
of overall steel products. Although insignificant, there is a disproportionate increase in
unit import prices of consumer steel products with much more volatility. The key reason
for insignificant coefficients in the case of consumer and capital goods is their considerably small share in steel imports, as Table 1 given in the Appendix shows that the share
of consumer and capital steel products is at 8–10 percent compared to 80 percent share
of industrial supplies and materials.
8
M. AHMAD AND I. AHMAD
Figure 3. Tariff pass-through: Log import prices of steel products (inclusive of tariffs). Note: Points correspond to
estimated tariff elasticity of import values (δ’s). Source: Author’s estimations based on data from U.S. Census Bureau,
U.S. International Trade Commission.
Table 1. Average Import Shares by Categories.
Consumer
Industrial Raw-materials
and Supplies
Capital
Total
2018
2019
5.7
(8.48)
55.5
(81.64)
6.7
(9.87)
67.9
(100)
5.4
(10.5)
41.7
(79.99)
5.0
(9.56)
52.1
(100)
Notes: Values are in USD Billions.
Shares are in parenthesis.
Figure 4 gives tariff elasticities of import values. For overall steel products and individual categories, the elasticity coefficients are negative and increase in magnitude over
time, except for capital products. U.S. Department of Commerce (2020) also reports that
the import volumes from the top 10 sources decreased between 56 percent from Russia
to 3 percent from Mexico.
Furthermore, the elasticity coefficients for capital goods do not show any trend
following the change in tariffs.
THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
9
Figure 4. Tariff pass-through: Log import values of steel products. Notes: Points correspond to estimated tariff elasticity of import values (δ’s). Source: Author’s estimations based on data from U.S. Census Bureau, U.S.
International Trade Commission.
Contrary to Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2020, the entire impact of tariffs on unit
prices of steel products is passed on to U.S. consumers. Figure 4 shows that the long-term
elasticities for import volumes are also considerably larger than those reported by Amiti,
Redding, and Weinstein 2020. For the specifications without controls for supply-chain
adjustments, the results for unit prices and import volumes are virtually similar to those
reported by Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein 2020 (See Appendix Figures A1–A2). This
indicates that controlling for the supply chain adjustments following the imposition of
tariffs has improved the estimates of elasticities.
Figure 5 shows that in the case of industrial supply and materials, the supply chain
adjustments or import diversion towards other countries are significant and considerably large in the long term. The supply chain adjustments begin to take effect after
seven months and become even stronger in the long term. The short-term negative
coefficients are also in line with the literature on uncertainties (Novy and Taylor 2020;
Ahmad and Mahmood 2020; Handley 2014; Handley and Limao 2015). The short-term
decline in imports even from the destinations where tariffs have not increased can be
explained in context of firms’ response to trade policy uncertainty. While optimally executing inventory policy under uncertainty, firms cut orders of foreign inputs much more
than domestic inputs mainly because of higher fixed cost involved in imports (Novy and
10
M. AHMAD AND I. AHMAD
Figure 5. Import Diversion Effect of Tariffs. Notes: Points correspond to 100 along with corresponding 95% confidence intervals based on estimated (β’s) as given in equation 1 with import values. The δ’s from the same equation
are reported in Figure 3. Source: Author’s estimations based on data from U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. International
Trade Commission.
Taylor 2020). When uncertainty subsides, firms revert to normal business and divert
their imports to destinations that are least cost options.
How did tariff pass-through to unit prices and imports affect the domestic steel industry? The answer to this question depends on whether the supply chain adjustments fully
or partially offset the decline in imports from countries on which tariffs were imposed.
Alternatively, the change in domestic production following the imposition of tariffs
would indicate how the domestic steel industry was affected.
Figure 6 shows that the overall steel production increased from 81.6 million metric tonnes (mmt) in 2017–86.6 mmt in 2018. It further increased to 87.9 in 2019. The
gap between domestic steel demand and production declined from 22.4 mmt to 19.2
mmt during 2018-2019. Import penetration (share of imports in steel demand) has
always moved in tandem with domestic consumption. However, the trend in import
penetration of steel products diverged following 2017 as it decreased from 32.6 percent in 2017 to 28.3 percent in 2018, further declining to 24.5 percent in 2019 (See
Figure 6).
In addition to the burden of higher tariffs borne by U.S. consumers and producers,
some of the burden is absorbed by exporters. Still, the decline in import value, mainly
because of declined volumes, has provided the domestic steel industry with some room
THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
11
Figure 6. U.S. Production, Consumption, and Import Penetration of Steel Products. (a) Production, Consumption
and Imports, (b) Consumption and Import Penetration. Note: Domestic consumption is domestic production plus
steel imports minus exports. Import penetration is a ratio of imports to consumption. Source: U.S. Department of
Commerce, International Trade Administration13.
to increase capacity utilization. It is also evident from the increase in domestic production from 81.6–87.9 million metric tonnes – almost equal to the peak production the
U.S. achieved in 2012 and 2014. The firms, especially those in competition with foreign
exporters, got some boost with increased demand and lesser competition but at some
cost. Further research is needed to estimate the welfare cost for domestic consumers
and producers.
12
M. AHMAD AND I. AHMAD
Conclusions
Recent studies have found that U.S. firms and consumers have to bear the entire burden of tariffs, but for steel products, as Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020) reported,
almost half of the burden of tariffs fell on exporters. In this study, we analyzed steel products – one of the main sectors that attracted U.S. tariffs, but we also control for import
diversion or supply chain adjustments – the aspect ignored by most of the earlier literature. We find that tariff pass-through to import prices is complete in the short and
longer term. Although statistically insignificant, we observe the highest impact of tariffs
in the case of consumer steel products. The price and import elasticities for consumer
steel increased substantially in the long term.
We also find significant supply chain adjustments, particularly in the long term, following the imposition of tariffs. However, these supply chain adjustments did not entirely
offset the decline in imports from countries on which tariffs were imposed. Consequently, the overall steel imports declined from 34.5 in 2017–26.3 million metric tonnes
in 2019. On the domestic side, production increased from 81.6–87.9 million metric
tonnes (7.7 percent growth) – which almost equals the peak production the U.S. achieved
in 2012 and 2014. Moreover, the imports of steel products over the last 10 years moved
in tandem with domestic steel consumption, exhibiting diverging trend after the imposition of tariffs, and import penetration declined to 24.5 percent in 2019 from 32.6 percent
in 2017. Overall, these findings show that an increase in tariffs has served the purpose
of increasing domestic production. However, U.S. manufacturing firms and consumers
have shared most of the burden of tariffs.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Note
1. The products for which units changed during the sample period were dropped from the analysis.
ORCID
Imtiaz Ahmad
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6329-5964
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Appendix
Figure A1. Tariff pass-through: Log import prices of steel products without controls. Note: Points correspond to
estimated tariff elasticity of unit prices, i.e. (δ’s) based on the model used by Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020)
that does not control trade diversion. Source: Author’s estimations based on data from U.S. Census Bureau, U.S.
International Trade Commission.
THE JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL TRADE & ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
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Figure A2. Tariff pass-through: Log import values of steel products without controls. Notes: Points correspond
to estimated tariff elasticity of import values (δ’s), i.e. (δ’s) based on model used by Amiti, Redding, and Weinstein (2020) that does not control for trade diversion. Source: Author’s estimations based on data from U.S. Census
Bureau, U.S. International Trade Commission.