Can Tariffs End Forced Labor- Or Are They Fueling It?
The U.S. is the world’s largest importer of goods made using forced labor, purchasing over $144 billion worth every year. Despite this staggering statistic, the United States has previously passed legislation against the import of goods produced with forced labor, which the International Labor Organization (ILO) defines as “all work or service which is exacted from any person under the threat of a penalty and for which the person has not offered himself or herself voluntarily.” The Tariff Act of 1930 prohibited the import of goods made by forced labor. The act was later amended by the Trade Facilitation and Trade Enforcement Act of 2015, which eliminated the “consumptive demand” clause – a loophole that allowed imports of such goods if U.S. demand could not be met otherwise. In 2021, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act prohibited importing any goods from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China due to concerns about state-sponsored forced labor targeting Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim minorities. Even after the efforts to reduce importing goods produced by forced labor, the issue persists. According to the 2022 estimates of the ILO, approximately 27.6 million people are subjected to forced labor daily. Globally, forced labor generates $236 billion in illegal profits every year.
How Tariffs Can Be Used to Curb Forced Labor
Could increasing tariffs actually help end this injustice? The Human Trafficking Legal Center believes it can: “If used well, Section 307 of the Tariff Act has the potential to be a game-changer in the fight against forced labor.” Theoretically, limiting imports from high-risk countries like China and Vietnam would reduce U.S. consumption of goods made with forced or child labor. Nike, for example, which has been repeatedly accused of using forced labor, has announced plans to reduce manufacturing in China as a result of the new tariffs.
Sarah Reed, the director of strategic research at the Worker Rights Consortium, said in an interview that “Tariffs are not usually a tool for human rights policy.” “[Producers’] biggest cost is labor, so they want to pay less, cut benefits, and pressure factories to be faster, while disregarding adequate safety measures.” However, Reed also emphasized legislative initiatives to reduce forced labor, including the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act, which tied trade benefits to labor rights compliance, and the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, which funded prevention programs abroad, ran public awareness campaigns, and cut off U.S. funding to organizations involved in exploitation.
Kara Reynolds, chair of the economics department at American University, told me that for tariffs to effectively reduce forced labor, “we need to make it clear that the purpose of the tariffs is to address labor market conditions. A blanket tariff wouldn’t do anything; targeted sanctions are much more effective than broad-based.” She added, “To change policies overseas, we must work with the entire international community, who must be on board. Otherwise, the country can simply find another destination for their products.” Reynolds commended the Atlanta Agreement, a 1997 initiative in which sporting goods companies, the ILO, and the United Nations’ Children’s Fund (UNICEF) collaborated to eliminate child labor from Pakistan’s soccer ball industry. “It was successful in making smaller countries change labor practices,” she said. Since the Atlanta Agreement singled out soccer balls specifically, tied market access directly to verified labor reforms, and involved coordinated pressure from buyers and institutions, it led to significant improvements in labor practices, proving that targeted economic measures have the power to reform entire industries.
Ali Velazquez Carmona, a communications consultant in infrastructure finance at the World Bank and strategic advisor at Chatham Strategies, emphasized the importance of long-term planning. In an interview, he said that “in the U.S., the challenge we have is that we don't have a long-term plan, and we are prisoners of the four-year term.” While many U.S. businesses wait out their operational decisions according to the election cycle due to political uncertainty, other countries follow long-term strategies, such as China’s 30-year plan. Similarly to Dr. Reynolds, Velazquez Carmona argued that “tariffs themselves cannot be good or bad: the implementation, plan, and strategy are what will put them in the right direction.”
As the testimony of these experts indicates, using tariffs to reduce import demand doesn't guarantee better working conditions. Tariffs consistently raise consumer prices without necessarily improving labor standards. They affect entire industries rather than targeting abusive factories, often slashing workers’ incomes and prompting producers to cut corners. This downturn can lead factories to reduce overtime, lay off employees, and rely on informal outsourcing, all of which increase the risk of exploitation.
How Current Tariffs Fall Short
As tariff policies continually change under the new administration, the effects are no longer merely economic. Rising tariffs are changing labor practices and global supply chains. The new administration is placing these tariffs as a key economic strategy, aiming to reduce the trade deficit, increase U.S. leverage abroad, and make America a leading manufacturer again. However, there is no evidence that labor exploitation or human rights concerns are driving these policies. The conditions which Reynolds and Velazquez Carmona argue are essential–targeted policies, long-term plans, and coordinated pressure–appear to be absent.
Criticisms of President Trump’s policies by American producers put these flaws in stark relief. Seventy-six leading U.S. shoe makers, including Nike and Adidas America, signed a letter to President Trump that emphasized their acute need for tariff relief and suggested that the tariffs actually have the opposite of their intended effect. “It takes significant capital investment and years of planning to shift sourcing. The new tariffs, in fact, remove the business certainty that is needed to make these types of investments and erase almost all the necessary capital,” the letter said. Sudden tariffs do not give companies enough time or financial certainty to transition from supply chains tied to labor abuses.
As part of the textile and clothing industry, in which forced labor is rampant, these companies’ criticisms hold particular weight. According to Velazquez Carmona, “Even with big companies that do their due diligence, there is still suspicion that [their production] goes back to China and forced labor, and if they switched it here, they'd be out of business.” Velazquez Carmona also said that “companies' main goals are to make money and profits for themselves and their investors; if they don't have full control over competitors, they will do whatever is best for survival,” which often includes forced labor. As Velasquez Carmona predicted, American companies did not reply to high tariffs on Chinese textile imports by increasing production in the U.S.: instead, they started sourcing from other countries, particularly Vietnam. Factories in Vietnam continue to rely heavily on inputs from China, mainly cotton, meaning the risk of forced labor has not been removed. The risk was only displaced and relocated.
The United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement was signed in 2020 to create more balanced, reciprocal trade supporting high-paying jobs for Americans. Nevertheless, President Donald Trump has been increasing tariffs on a variety of goods imported from Mexico and Canada. “We are shooting ourselves in the foot,” Velazquez Carmona warned, adding that producers can seldom absorb the added cost without abusing laborers. “Only very few win,” he concluded. Passing stable policy is a challenge not only in the U.S., but around the world. In 2024, the European Union passed the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) to advance corporate accountability and reduce forced labor. The CSDDD is currently being depleted to limit due diligence to direct suppliers, remove civil liability, reduce reporting frequency, and delay enforcement until 2028. These shifts further indicate a troubling trend: although the U.S. has pledged to eliminate forced labor from supply chains, the trade policies are weakening the economic conditions needed to make it happen. Both the E.U. and the U.S. are lacking the consistent trade policy needed to end forced labor.
Conclusion
While tariffs may have the potential to be an effective mechanism to fight against labor exploitation, their haphazard application has led to inadvertent consequences, possibly even worsening conditions for workers. Real change requires targeted policies, international cooperation, and long-term plans, not tariffs alone. Ultimately, tariffs have the power to serve targeted purposes, including ending forced labor, but they require intention and enforcement.
Hannah Ferguson (BYU ‘26) is a writer from the San Francisco Bay Area studying economics and political strategy. She is interested in global trade policy, forced labor, and the relationship between business, finance, and human rights.