The Center for American Progress reports
President Trump's decision to impose tariffs on imported solar materials is already taking its toll on U.S. jobs.
After putting plans on hold last month to expand its factories in the United States, SunPower Corp., one of the nation's largest solar panel manufacturers, now intends to lay off about 10 percent of its U.S. workforce.
SunPower attributed the job cuts to the 30-percent tariffs imposed by the Trump administration on imported solar cells and panels, The Hill reported [February 28]. Company chief executive Tom Werner estimates the new tariffs will cause the company to lose $50 million in 2018 and as much as $100 million in 2019.
Werner's comments built on information that SunPower released in a filing submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) last week. The news also came only two weeks after SunPower reported a 35-percent decrease in revenue in 2017 compared to 2016.
Werner told The Hill that it has already begun laying off between 150 and 250 workers from its U.S. operations. Based in San Jose, California, SunPower imports most of its components from manufacturing facilities in the Philippines and Mexico.
Trump slapped the 30-percent tariff on imported solar cells and panels in January after the U.S. International Trade Commission ruled last year that China had harmed the domestic solar manufacturing industry with policies aimed at taking over the global market. The industry gets about 80 percent of its solar panel products from imports.
The Solar Energy Industries Association, the primary lobby group for the U.S. industry, estimates Trump's decision may cost the fast-growing industry about 23,000 jobs in 2018 and cause billions of dollars in solar investments to be canceled or delayed. The industry currently employees more than 260,000 people, primarily in the installation business.
[...] In January, SunPower said it was putting a $20 million U.S. factory expansion and hundreds of new jobs on hold until its solar panels receive an exemption from Trump's solar tariffs.
Related Stories
President Trump has signed a presidential memorandum directing the U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to draw up a list of Chinese products on which tariffs could be imposed. The list will be made public in 15 days, and tariffs will take effect after a 60-day comment period:
The US plans to impose tariffs on up to $60bn (£42.5bn) in Chinese goods and limit the country's investment in the US in retaliation for years of alleged intellectual property theft.
The White House said the actions were necessary to counter unfair competition from China's state-led economy. It said years of talks had failed to produce change. China said it was ready to retaliate with "necessary measures". Beijing also said it would "fight to the end" in any trade war with the US.
US stock markets closed lower on Thursday, as investors responded to the announcement. [...] The White House said it has a list of more than 1,000 products that could be targeted by tariffs of 25%. Businesses will have the opportunity to comment before the final list goes into effect.
Reuters portrays the action as "far removed from threats that could have ignited a global trade war". Bloomberg notes that many industry trade groups and companies are opposing the tariffs.
Related: US Government Puts Tariffs on Imported Solar Cells, Solar Modules, and Washing Machines
Major US Solar Company Blames Job Cuts On Trump's Solar Import Tariff
U.S. Steel and Aluminum Imports to Face New Tariffs
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:20PM (16 children)
So all those jobs should be going into the coal industry he's saving, right?
Coal plants now shutting down faster under Trump than Obama. [thinkprogress.org]
Guess not...
(Score: 5, Informative) by insanumingenium on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:24PM (15 children)
Worse! This was supposed to build domestic solar manufacturers, so glad that worked out.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:45PM (9 children)
Trump! Trump! Trump!
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:59PM (3 children)
Drill baby drill!!!!
All your base are belong to Glorious Smartest Trump!!
Go big oil. Down with solar!! Flat earth forever!!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:27PM (2 children)
Lock her up! Lock her up! Lock her up!
(Score: 3, Funny) by FatPhil on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:50PM (1 child)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @06:09AM
eeeeewwwwwwwww.
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:45PM (4 children)
He's like a stable genius.
Reminder: March is National Procrastination Week.
(Yes, really.)
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @12:15AM (2 children)
A true procrastinator wouldn't have alerted us until the end of March.
(Score: 2) by BK on Friday March 02 2018, @02:34AM (1 child)
You mean mid April.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 1) by redneckmother on Friday March 02 2018, @03:10AM
Next decade.
Mas cerveza por favor.
(Score: 1) by webnut77 on Friday March 02 2018, @05:11PM
Yes, I'm going to celebrate it next month.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by edIII on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:48PM (4 children)
It could have. This is one of the few things I agree with Trump on. There is ONE reason why they are laying off jobs:
Executives can never make less, they must make more, and in the worst case scenario, have a impressive Golden Parachute.
This about the greed of executives, since bringing the manufacturing back home means dealing with UNION factory workers. Instead of increasing domestic production of solar panels, they act like fucking 5-year olds and start laying off people till their profitable enough again AND the executive class still gets fed like pigs.
If there was any place I would love to see Trump double down on, it's tariffs like this that will force manufacturing back to the US. He should threaten those fuckers with subsidies towards employee owned solar companies.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:10PM
Trump is not there for the little guy, he is there for the coal/oil industry. These tariffs were a way to hurt the solar industry while pretending he was putting America First! Don't buy into the kool-aid, he is head kleptocrat right now and doesn't give two shits about US citizens without at least a cool hundred mil hiding in some bank account.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by insanumingenium on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:17PM (1 child)
If you think that there is exactly one reason for a large scale business decision you are flat wrong.
This tariff has a very short time scale, it only lasts 4 years, and falls off 5% every year. It was never going to produce domestic manufacturing, there would need to be a monstrous capital outlay to try and build a plant ASAP, then there wouldn't be a return in it before the cheaper foreign products were again available first at a drastically reduced tariff, then without tariff. What this tariff could do is significantly reduce solar demand for the next few years, good luck making a business case to push for more domestic manufacturing after that. Trump is either betting against us or is a stone blind fool.
(Score: 1) by bussdriver on Friday March 02 2018, @08:34PM
This looks more like a shakedown for the industry. The impact is short term but real - more like a mob guy breaking your leg to send a message. The industry is growing and needs to start paying bribes like everybody else in the energy sector...
Competition wants to do solar harm and delay it but this will not delay things for that long. It's not enough as the parent posted to bother investing in the USA unless you want to take the risk and this is enough to jump start beginning something.... which likely will go under if things don't come out better than they have been after the short time period is over.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:52PM
Ah, yes, "The American Dream" condensed into 5 letters. We wouldn't want anything to stand in the way of that, would we?
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:28PM
> Trump's decision may cost the fast-growing industry about 23,000 jobs in 2018
Give them a hat and a shovel, or some nurse outfits. There's plenty of Good Ol' American Coal that needs to be mined, and lots of lung-diseased people who need assistance standing up.
Getting their own black lung or back pain beats falling off roofs and getting skin cancer, right?
Just kidding. We know that most panel installers in the SW are latinos, so we'll happily deport anyone who protests, citizen or not.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:38PM
Modding everyone Trump, oh I mean Troll, for saying the truth? Quite awesome.
(Score: 5, Informative) by jelizondo on Thursday March 01 2018, @07:40PM (11 children)
With the recent decision to impose [bloomberg.com] a tariff on steel and aluminum imports, there will be more jobs cut because foreign manufacturers will have a price advantage over U.S. factories.
Think how much steel and aluminum goes into every product from appliances to cars and how cheap finished goods will be compared to domestic products.
Make China great again!
Wait, wasn't that supposed to be America?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:15PM (5 children)
Personally, I'm pretty glad that the steel mill, or aluminum refinery, or solar panel factory isn't the prime employer in any city my family lives in, both so my kids don't end up working at the (more than a little unhealthy) factory, and because they tend to pollute the surrounding area pretty heavily as well.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:21PM (3 children)
Modern factories probably pollute less. Nobody thinks of a semiconductor fab as a heavy polluter that is giving workers semiconductor lung.
However, we do need to remove 2 regs for every new reg, so maybe your kids will need to bring their own filtration mask to work.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:50PM
Wait. You mean I've been doing it wrong? I thought it was, for each existing reg, create 2 new regs, and continue until total number of regs < zero.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:19PM (1 child)
Fab labs are only "clean" because a huge portion of the cost is building the air and water scrubbers to cut down on the toxins that are a by product of the plants.
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @07:15AM
Fewer women have been allowed to work in them since the 1960s when it was found that birth defects at... I want to say Fairchild Semi. were having an above average number of birth defects, specifically in women working in the chip fabbing wings, where it was claimed the chemicals in use were safe, but for whatever reason obviously were not.
Maybe with the bunny suits and everything now that is no longer true, but I somehow doubt it, and it might explain why outside development/almost fully automated fabs they have all been moved to the 3rd world...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:49PM
You're missing the recent 30% tariffs on building products and aerospace products. Go protectionists! Go isolationists! It can only help my country in the long run as we reduce our dependency on trade with America.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:53PM (1 child)
With the recent decision to impose [bloomberg.com] a tariff on steel and aluminum imports, there will be more jobs cut because foreign manufacturers will have a price advantage over U.S. factories.
Trade wars are bad for business.
And, predictably, the DOW drops because of the announcement. [go.com]
It's almost like the President's words matter.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:21PM
Hmm, it could be because of that, but the Dow also drops every time there's rumbling about increasing interest rates. They announced we may get 4 rate increases this year, and DIJA took a dive. Very predictable.
As for why, the economy needs to crash so that the people are receptive to starting World War 3. Poor economic conditions drive the desire for war.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:07PM (2 children)
So you think the US being totally reliant on Chinese metals would be a long-term positive? China has massive internal problems that it has been offloading onto the rest of the world via currency devaluation for over a decade and Xi Jinping has just effectively become a dictator. The White House fabricate nothing when they say that reliance of Chinese metals is a national security issue; Once the US plants close, they'll not be relighting the furnaces.
(Score: 2) by arslan on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:05PM (1 child)
This. Can't mod this up enough. Not saying the tariffs are good or bad and a bit off-topic. However folks really need to understand that the new China under Xi seems to be going in a very different direction that the China in the last 2 decades. If you don't start peeling their fingers off your balls now...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @11:38PM
but why would I do that... I love the massages I am getting
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:19PM (20 children)
Please forgive my ignorance, but how does increasing the price of your foreign competitors by 30% hurt a domestic producer?
Did the US have a significant export market selling panels abroad that has been hurt by this tariff?
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:23PM (14 children)
From my read of the summary, I'm guessing the panel producer imports the cells from China, and then puts them together as complete systems in the U.S.
You would expect companies that just do installation of solar panels to also be hurt by tariffs, at least temporarily.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:27PM (7 children)
Easy fix - produce the panel 100% in the U.S. It should be better quality that way, we make the best stuff!
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:57PM (6 children)
Yeah, right.
I remember in 1977 when the Detroit auto makers redesigned everything on the road because of new clean air. Quality was already going downhill, and this accelerated it.
By the early 1980's the US auto quality problem was well known. US was the worst, except for the Moscovite. Executives thought it was a perception problem, so there were television ads like "Quality Is Job #1!". Yet quality remained poor.
I remember by the late 1980's a friend had a new van. The belts squeaked. And continued to do so. It wasn't a "new car" thing. He took it to the dealer. Told "oh, they just do that". Hey, buy a Toyota! Buy a Honda! They don't "just do that".
I could go on.
I was too young to understand whether it was workers, unions, management. But I was old enough to understand to not buy American cars, and I've had good luck by not doing so.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Sulla on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:58PM (1 child)
In the top 10 most reliable cars in the US two are produced in the US and the rest are Lexus/Audi/Mercedes or the 4runner. Not in that top 10 but generally regarded as reliable are the Camry and Corolla are made in the us (Corolla also in Canada).
Of the 19 cars Toyota makes 12 are made here in the US (or some are made here in the US).
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:32PM
So it is actually a problem with US businessmen? I'll buy that excuse, bunch of gung-ho nitwits who care more about money than the quality they produce.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @11:35PM (2 children)
Yeah. Cars of the late 1970s and the 1980s had AIR systems (Air Injector Reactor) AKA smog pumps and hoses going everywhere.
Carburetors were still common.
Remember that the computer industry were still shipping Z80-based stuff and only beginning to get into 8080-based systems.
So, even the "electronic" ignitions that existed didn't have any intelligence beyond the vacuum advance that had been industry standard for decades.
...and if that wasn't enough, cars of that era were BUTT [google.com] UGLY. [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @12:03AM
s/8080-based/8086-based
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @07:25PM
Ugly? I've always thought that 80-s era cars looked the best. Give me a caprice, a chevelle, an el dorado any day over these new smooth lines everywhere effeminate piles of shit.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @12:36AM
And not just cars either, as this old saw rather humorously points out [ambians.com]:
(Score: 1) by tftp on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:35PM (5 children)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by insanumingenium on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:46PM (4 children)
And therein lies the problem. Local manufacturing can't take over immediately, it doesn't exist at necessary scale. And who is going to build out new manufacturing capability with a tariff set to decay in just a couple of years. Building panels from foreign cells is slightly more involved than you suggest.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:11PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:39PM
This tariff decays in a few years, and in a few more the whole presidency of Trump will be gone and done with.
I'd just like to comment that I agree with your timeline here (you're implying that Trump will win his re-election bid and serve a full two terms). I predict the Dems are going to nominate yet another absolutely horrible candidate (either Hillary yet again, or maybe Oprah), and then will again lose the general election.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by insanumingenium on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:16PM
I would love increased domestic manufacturing. I don't love grandstanding which can only hurt the cause masquerading as helping the cause.
Unfortunately even permanent tariffs aren't a guaranteed fix. We still see loopholes to the chicken tax in place of genuine manufacturing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @12:53AM
Right now[,] the PCB technology in Taiwan and China exceeds the same in the USA
Hell, by now, even Bulgaria [google.com] might be outstripping the volume done by domestic USAian PCB fab houses.
Will he continue bringing factories home
[...]
Too little is made domestically
ISTM that Trump is closing the barn door after all the livestock has bolted.
(Economics professor Richard Wolff gave him a raspberry for his tariffs notion many, many months ago.)
...and it doesn't help that China engages in dumping. [wikipedia.org]
It started when the domestic components manufacturing went offshore.
(I remember having a hell of a time trying to get carbon-composition resistors.)
Lengthen the supply lines and you increase costs for domestically-produced finished goods.
(China doesn't have that problem because they have done the inverse, starting with building the small stuff.)
N.B. DoD is having to get special waivers in order to buy foreign-made components.
Manufacturers being left high and dry without lower-level components is a case of the chickens coming home to roost.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Informative) by ElizabethGreene on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:27PM (2 children)
I RTFA and answered my own question.
"SunPower, which is based in San Jose, California [...] does most of its manufacturing in the Philippines and Mexico"
My uninformed opinion on this is now "Perhaps you might consider manufacturing them in the US instead of moving the production to places with poor safety and environmental regulations?"
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:32PM
It appears Trump *does* care about the environment.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:41PM
Did they move production there, or was it set up there? If they started in the US and moved away, you might have a point, but if it was never in the US to begin with, you're just spouting populist nonsense.
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:21PM (1 child)
It's all part of the big plan to MASA (Make America Stupid Already).
Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts"- --Daniel Patrick Moynihan--
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Friday March 02 2018, @03:50PM
Plan? America is already stupid.
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by NewNic on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:55PM (12 children)
There is literally centuries of data that shows that protectionist policies don't benefit the economy as a whole.
Yet this president and his paymasters want more. Why? There is presumably some benefit for the Koch brothers and a few other ultra-wealthy. Probably the Koch brothers will benefit from increased energy use for smelting.
The rest of us, R or D voters, they don't care about.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:14PM (5 children)
Koch brothers have been firmly anti-protectionist. I'd look to the anti-immigration people and labor unions first.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:15PM (4 children)
Hahaha. You love the Kochaid. Drink up. They would never ever support policies that directly benefited them while also being so focused to hit specific places that they don’t support overall.
They are so incapable of deceit.
Chug’alug.
4-H and FFA on a field trip to the farm
Me 'n' a friend sneak off behind
This big old barn where we uncovered a covered-up moonshine still
And we thought we'd drink our fill
And I swallowed it with a smile
Bllll-bbbb, I run ten mile
Chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug
Make you want to holler hi-de-ho
Burns your tummy, don'tcha know
Chug-a-lug, chug-a-lug
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @12:21AM (2 children)
Roger Miller. [google.com]
Now, there's an American original that couldn't be replaced by some import.
Trivia: He was married to Mary Arnold, [google.com] the chick in Kenny Rogers and The First Edition. [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by redneckmother on Friday March 02 2018, @03:16AM (1 child)
I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in.
Mas cerveza por favor.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 02 2018, @06:49AM
Pappy was a pistol. I'm a son of a gun. [google.com]
Roger wrote a real pretty waltz. [google.com]
It's been covered by a bunch of folks.
..then there are the classics "You Can't Roller Skate in a Buffalo Herd" and "En-ga-land Swings" (Like a Pendulum Do).
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 02 2018, @02:45AM
Sure, I grant that could happen. I just don't see the profit they supposedly are making from this.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @09:19PM
Correct but myopic. When production (eg: food) is below requirements, a nation can be politically blackmailed and bullied. The economic cost of independence is usually preferable to the political costs of dependency.
(Score: 2) by arslan on Thursday March 01 2018, @10:12PM (1 child)
Really? The billions of Chinese would probably disagree. Of course they've implemented it differently...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @11:36PM
Plus the protectionist items they have put in place on our stuff. But we can ignore that because we have tons of data.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by NotSanguine on Friday March 02 2018, @12:47AM
Not sure why this is modded insightful.
Protectionist policies can be quite beneficial to economies that are developing. Developed economies are all about "free trade" as it gives their manufacturing and economic muscle more bang.
This was actually one of the issues that chapped colonists' asses before the US Revolutionary War. The Brits wanted raw materials and used various methods to keep the colonists from creating their own manufacturing base.
After independence, the US had very strict protectionist policies for certain products to bolster their nascent manufacturing industries.
These days, we act more like Britain in their imperial days.
That's not hype or speculation. It's history.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 1) by Captival on Friday March 02 2018, @02:44AM
Tell all the other countries who have already been doing it for decades to stop. Then maybe we can have a fair comparison.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 02 2018, @04:46PM
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 01 2018, @08:58PM
China does cheat and should be punished. However, the effects of punishment often spill over to US citizens. Perhaps put smaller tariffs on a wider variety of products from China so that no one industry takes a mass hit: many industries take a very minor hit. However, the WTO may balk at that.
(Score: 2) by ElizabethGreene on Sunday March 04 2018, @06:07AM
I have a quasi-related question.
Why does it cost less than $2 for e-packet delivery from China to the US, but over $30 to ship the same item in the opposite direction?