Yeah, that’s one of the big problems with tariffs - the big players can buy any politician they need to to get around them. The small importer just gets squashed.
If is. . . but it also leaves the native population in India with subpar equipment in many instances or in another field I know something about, paying through the nose for things they thought they had to import they actually COULD make for themselves. Our head Dentist at our office is one of the top implantologists in the the world and several years ago was the keynote speaker at the Indian Society of Dental implanvology annual conference in Mumbai where he was speaking on some implants he had developed where the jaws of edentulous patients (those with out teeth) actually regenerated and grew into the implants at the molecular level.
The dentists in India were importing their implants from the US and Europe at a very high cost, plus paying a very high tariff. . . yet no one in India was making local implants. . . which priced the implant technology out of the reach of the very patients who needed it the most in India. Our doctor pointed out to them that he was having his simple screw implants made by an Indian expatriate machinist using standard machine tools and metals that were already available in India with computerized machine tools they already have. All they have to do is properly clean the resulting implant products of all cutting oil and burrs and then sterilize them. He told them how.
Other types of implants are made using techniques that are indistinguishable from the techniques used in making high quality jewelry such as lost wax processes and India is well known as having some of the finest jewelers in the world. So, he asked, why not make the implants yourself at 5% of the cost you pay now for just the tariff? They would just have to up the materials to Titanium and Vitalism Alloys. He got a standing ovation from the over 2000 Indian implant dentists at the conference!