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It's possible you've noticed a new charge on your bill at a restaurant or business recently.
Companies are starting to include tariff surcharges as a separate line item on people's receipts. The surcharges are a way for a company to pass some tariff costs onto the customers. They're especially being included on Chinese-made goods.
Some surcharges are a flat fee. Others could make up a quarter to half of the entire bill.
Companies are also letting people know not to blame them for the additional fee, but instead, the White House.
Lance Thrailkill, CEO of All Metals Fabricating, said one way or another, any additional costs for something that someone is selling are going to fall onto the consumer.
"Anybody that's putting it on there is doing it so that they can give you transparency in hopes that when the tariff is removed that they can go back to their original pricing which I think everybody can appreciate," Thrailkill said.
Thrailkill has seen this play out in his line of work too. A major international company requested that Thrailkill's company re-quote everything for them because material prices have gone up due to the tariffs. The line item is then written as a tariff surcharge.
Despite paying more now, Thrailkill said the level of transparency from the business putting out tariff surcharges can be appreciated.
"If they didn't have that on there and they just had a higher price, they may not of said anything and just chalked it up with no consideration," said Thrailkill.
There are plenty of factors going into the reasoning for the tariffs. Thrailkill said it's time for the U.S. to be on a level-playing field with the rest of the world, especially China, when it comes to global trade.
"There's a bigger strategy here and this needed to happen, the truing up of a trade imbalance," he said. "So, hold on and brace for the challenging season like Trump's been saying and then brace for the back end."
Arguably the biggest thing hanging over the head of the United States is the growing debt balance. Tariffs may be a long-term strategic play to alleviate some of the debt, but will also bring short-time pain for the average American.