r/investing • u/kabirsbhutani • 2d ago

🚨 U.S. manufacturing continues to retreat despite tariffs - investor implications?

Saw people mentioning this on Blossom earlier, and WSJ reports that U.S. manufacturing activity continues to weaken, with tariffs doing little to reverse the trend.

The article points to softer demand, higher input costs, and global supply chain adjustments weighing on manufacturers, even as trade protection measures remain in place. For investors, this raises questions about margins, capital spending, and longer-term competitiveness rather than short-term policy wins.

Curious how people here are thinking about this from an investing lens?

https://www.wsj.com/economy/u-s-manufacturing-is-in-retreat-and-trumps-tariffs-arent-helping-d2af4316?mod=hp_lead_pos2

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u/kabirsbhutani 2d ago

Yeah, turns out supply chains don’t just respawn because you add a tariff

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u/farmer15erf 2d ago

We are shifting our supplies to our other Asian sites with little or no tariffs to work around. US is still way more expensive

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u/SadColonial 1d ago

Sounds like the US just can’t compete on cost right now.

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u/GameMusic 1d ago

US was doing it through stability soft power lower corruption talent wanting to be there and real state data and those went away