I don’t worry about businesses that live off imports at all. Like the previous poster, PR, Hawaii grows coffee beans! Hear that, Duncan Donuts?
Do you buy whole, unroasted beans or pre-bagged?
I just checked with my favorite source, “CO=PILOT,” which tells me Duncan gets its beans from Central and South America. They use Arabica Beans grown in Brazil, Colombia, and Guatemala. “Rainforest Alliance certified”...
Well, guess what I found? They can be grown in PR in Yauco, Adjuntas, and Lares. Areas like the song goes, “DON’T CRY FOR ME, BABY” buy American grown......
Hawaii (5m) + Puerto Rico (3m) production of coffee is ~8 million pounds. US consumes about 3.5 billion pounds. So US production is boutique, and there isn’t the land available to expand it.
It makes sense to have policies to protect jobs and industries. It makes sense to have a moderate across the board tariff rate to replace the income tax.
What’s dumb is throwing high tariffs on imports that can’t be replaced domestically.