President Donald Trump’s tariffs are expected to cost U.S. consumers an extra $1,400 in 2026, according to an analysis from the Tax Foundation.
Trump made tariffs the centerpiece of his domestic and foreign agenda at the start of his second term in the White House. The U.S. president hit all foreign nations with import taxes above 10%, with some country-specific above 40%.
Americans have paid at least part of the price this year. Those tariffs amounted to an average tax increase per U.S. household of $1,100 in 2025. Next year could be even more expensive, with the Tax Foundation estimating the same tariffs will cost about $1,400 in 2026.
Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case challenging Trump’s authority to implement tariffs without Congressional approval under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. That law, from 1977, doesn’t mention the word “tariff” and has never been used to impose tariffs.
If the high court tosses Trump’s tariffs, Americans would still pay more, in part because Trump has used multiple laws to implement tariffs, not all of which fall under the challenged 1977 law.
“If the IEEPA tariffs are permanently enjoined, the tax increases will be smaller at $300 in 2025 and $400 in 2026,” according to the nonprofit’s analysis. “Notably, these averages do not capture additional costs to U.S. households stemming from higher-priced alternative goods and loss of consumer choice.”
When the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the tariff challenge in November, even conservative justices seemed skeptical. Chief Justice John Roberts called the tariffs “taxes on Americans,” which he said had long been a “core power of Congress,” not the president.
Two lower courts had rejected Trump’s tariffs before the Supreme Court took up the case.
In August, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit affirmed a previous lower court ruling saying Trump did not have the authority. In the 7-4 decision, the majority of the Federal Circuit said that tariff authority rests with Congress.
In November, the Congressional Budget Office slashed its tariff revenue forecast to reflect new data on the highest import duties the U.S. has seen in nearly a century.
The CBO said the new projections show tariff changes will reduce deficits by $3 trillion over the next decade. That’s down from the CBO’s earlier estimate of $4 trillion in August.
The new projections assume that foreign businesses will bear a greater share of the costs than initially expected.
“We had previously projected that foreign exporters would not reduce their prices to offset increased tariff rates. We now project that foreign exporters will reduce their prices by an amount equivalent to 5% of the increase in tariff rate,” according to the CBO report.
That 5% assumption is “consistent with evidence from increases in tariff rates on China that were implemented in 2018 and 2019.”
A recent Goldman Sachs report found that U.S. consumers will pay 55% of the costs resulting from Trump’s tariffs, U.S. businesses will pay 22%, and foreign exporters will pay 18%. That report said that most tariffs will be passed on to American consumers as businesses adjust prices in the coming months.
Trump has said he wants to use tariffs to restore manufacturing jobs lost to lower-wage countries in decades past, shift the tax burden away from U.S. families and pay down the national debt.
Economists, businesses and some public companies have warned that tariffs will raise prices on a wide range of consumer products.
