US tariffs on China goods would have ‘striking’ affect on women, families, JC Penney says

The Trump administration’s proposed tariffs on thousands of Chinese-made products, including apparel, footwear and home goods, unfairly targets women, according to the US retailer JC Penney.

The department store chain said that “though surely inadvertent, the disproportionate impact of the proposed List 4 tariffs on women is striking”.

Of 19 China-sourced apparel items that are of particular concern to JC Penney, 13 are for women or girls, including pullovers, trousers and underwear, the retailer said. Existing tariffs on those products “are already the highest among manufactured goods”, the company said.

“The administration’s proposed tax increase disproportionately hits women’s and girls’ apparel, but this understates the impact on women,” David M. Spooner, a lawyer for JC Penney, said in a letter filed with the US Trade Representative’s office on Tuesday.

“Women often do the shopping for their families, and so feel it acutely when the government increases taxes on basic household items,” Spooner said. “Moms every day carefully work to budget each month’s paycheck. Increasing taxes on boy’s shoes, kitchen appliances, sheets and blankets and curtains, and hundreds of other basic clothing items and home goods, will hurt all moms who don’t have inexhaustible disposable income. It will force them to make tough choices.”

US President Donald Trump has taken a hardline on tariffs this year as he tries to force Beijing to change decades of industrial and trade policy. The US has placed tariffs on nearly half of all Chinese-made goods and is threatening to add 25 per cent levies on another US$300 billion of products, many that would directly affect US consumers.