Tariffs could jeopardize the president’s greatest achievement

As we all know, Donald Trump is planning to impose steep new tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum.

Another thing we all know is that the president sometimes doesn’t follow through on his stated plans. That’s a relief, in this case, because it would be a terrible idea to impose tariffs of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum. Doing so would raise the cost of consumer goods across the United States. It would needlessly alienate our allies, some of whom also are our major trading partners, and some of whom might be moved to retaliate by imposing tariffs of their own on our exports. That prospect is particularly ominous for Texas, which is America’s leading exporting state.

Long story short, Trump’s tariffs are a bad idea and I’m reluctant to insult the intelligence of my readers by further belaboring that point.

But I would like to highlight the fact that such tariffs also could backfire on the president himself by jeopardizing his greatest accomplishment to date.

Less than halfway through Trump’s first term as president, the national economy is doing quite well — better than I expected, frankly.

Trump doesn’t deserve all the credit for that. The economy was in recovery by the time he won the election, and no president deserves all the credit — or blame — for how the world’s largest economy fares during his time in office.

But I think we should give Trump credit for certain contributions he has made as president.

The tax reform act he signed in December, for example, appears to have stimulated hiring, in addition to a flurry of bonuses. In February, the U.S. economy added 313,000 jobs — well over the roughly 200,000 that