For many Americans, owning a car is more than a convenience, it is a necessity. But with new tariffs put into place and trade becoming more difficult, consumers may feel the impacts far beyond the factory, right in their driveways.
On April 3, 2025, President Donald Trump began introducing his tariffs with the stated hope of encouraging more companies to manufacture in the United States, according to the BBC article “What tariffs has Trump announced and why?” by Jennifer Clarke. Since the announcement, many people have had theories as to what the tariffs will mean for the cost of cars. These tariffs created by the Trump administration are meant to bring jobs and boost American-made products, but the actual impact is more complicated.
Mark Naszradi, dealership manager at Hines Park Lincoln in Plymouth, Michigan, has concerns about how the tariffs will impact car sales. “I think the manufacturer would take that potential increase in tariffs because [the Lincoln Nautilus] is made in China and spread [the price hike] amongst all the models,” Naszradi said. “So you have a minimal increase across the board, instead of a substantial increase on one car.”
Car prices skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic; the market has mostly stabilized since then. Naszradi expects tariffs to have a steady increase on prices rather than another price spike, even though it is uncertain what will happen with how recently the tariffs are being implemented.
Conner Vu, a senior at Canton High School, said he has considered whether tariffs impacted the cost as he purchased his new car on April 5, 2025. “[I spent] right under 30 grand,” Vu said.
While he believed the higher price was because he was a young customer, he said he still thought the tariffs did play a part in the price of the vehicle. Vu’s advice to car buyers is to “look at used cars, and I’d wait for the market to go down, because the tariffs are definitely making everything higher.”
Chad Woodring, automotive teacher at Canton High School, has seen the impact from a different angle. Woodring said, “Car prices have, at least for new cars, remained relatively stable, even through the supply shortage.”
And as tariffs continued to roll in, Woodring has not noticed any changes in students willing to bring their cars into the shop to be fixed. “If anything, we’ve had more of a desire to get the work done here because it’s more cost effective,” Woodring said. “Because of the way we do our pricing, customers have to just cover basically the cost of parts and supplies, whereas at a shop, there would also be a significant uptick in labor and a significant upcharge on parts pricing.”
Riley Shepherd, an economics teacher at Plymouth High School, added another view of the financial troubles. “It is almost universally agreed upon by economists that increasing tariffs, it gets passed on to the consumer,” Shepherd said. “Corporations don’t just take these price increases and go, ‘Oh, guess we can’t make as much profit.’ They don’t do that.”
Shepherd also pointed out how investors responded when tariffs were announced. “When these tariffs were announced, Ford stock dropped,” because the parts used by Ford that are manufactured in other parts of the world would have tariffs imposed on them. The company would need to raise prices for consumers, leading to there being less quantity demanded. Investors are less likely to invest in a company that is not going to make as many sales, she explained.
While President Trump’s stated goal is to bring jobs and factories back to the U.S., doing so is not always that simple. “We have found different parts of the world where it makes the most sense based on their existing infrastructure, the factories that they currently have, or the resources they have naturally available to them, or even their workforce, that they have the comparative advantage to manufacture certain things,” Shepherd said.
Although it is still too early to fully measure the effects of the tariffs introduced in April 2025, economists generally agree tariffs tend to raise production costs. When costs go up for manufacturers, those costs are often passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices.
While some industries may benefit from increased domestic production, others, like auto manufacturing, could face challenges due to global supply chain dependencies. Whether car prices rise drastically or remain steady depends on how companies adjust their supply chains and how long the tariffs stay in place. The long-term impact on consumers will become clearer in the months or years ahead.
Corrected on November 19, 2025. Originally published May 28, 2025.
