Western Massachusetts small business: GSP savings “enough to pay for staff health care or a new employee”
dZi, Inc. in Easthampton, Massachusetts was founded in 1990 to provide a market for products made by the Tibetan refugee community in India. A founding member of the Fair Trade Federation, which is dedicated to helping marginalized artisan communities in developing countries, today dZi’s purchases support over 1,000 artisans in Nepal and Indi...
Continue readingAn unheralded GSP import helping Covid-19 response: cell cast acrylics
The Coalition for GSP has an open-ended survey asking companies how Covid-19 impacts their operations and GSP imports. Last night we received an interesting response from an importer of cast acrylic plastics. For those unfamiliar with plastic variations (like us), here is what they wrote: Cell cast acrylic is the raw material used to create...
Continue readingNorth Carolina company: Covid plus GSP expiration would be “double trouble”
GSP is scheduled to expire in a little over 3 months – and Congress will not be in Washington for most of that time. The Coalition for GSP is launching a new effort to collect video testimonials from companies sharing why they need Congress to renew GSP. Our first video comes from Xpres LLC in...
Continue readingGSP saved American companies $65 million in July
GSP saved American companies $65 million in July, bringing year-to-date savings in 2020 to $472 million. GSP benefits companies in every state – the map below shows the overall value of January-July 2020 GSP imports (in blue) and tax savings (in red) by state – yet is scheduled to expire on December 31. Companies and...
Continue readingMembers of Congress express support for GSP renewal at House hearing
At yesterday’s House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee hearing on Caribbean Basin preferences (i.e., CBTPA), several Members used the opportunity to support swift GSP renewal as well. CBTPA expires on September 30. In his opening statement, Ranking Member Vern Buchanan (R-FL) cited Coalition for GSP data, saying “Americans saved more th...
Continue readingCloth masks face the most new tariffs due to lost GSP for Thailand, but who needs those? (Or, how punitive tariffs punish the US)
In late April, the United States suspended duty-free treatment for about 1/3 of Thailand’s imports under GSP. Lost GSP for Thailand cost importers up to $17 million in extra taxes from May to July; another burden for American GSP importers hurt by the Covid-19 pandemic and recession. New data suggests cloth face masks are the...
Continue reading2020 swing states face some of the highest costs of GSP country suspensions
Yesterday we published new data showing state-by-state GSP tariff savings for the first half of 2020, and how savings changed from the first half of 2019. As noted, there have been widespread declines, but NOT resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic, as many might assume. Instead, declines stem primarily from GSP country suspensions, which cost Americ...
Continue readingJanuary-June 2020 GSP savings by state
GSP saved American companies over $400 million in the first half of 2020. GSP benefited companies in every state – and the map below shows the overall value of January-June 2020 GSP imports (in blue) and tax savings (in red) by state. The top states by GSP savings have been fairly consistent over the years....
Continue readingGSP saved American companies $407 million in the first half of 2020
According to new research from the Coalition for GSP, the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program saved American companies $407 million from January to June 2020. Total imports under GSP were about $7.6 billion. Though figures were down sharply from the first half of 2019, when GSP eliminated about $555 million in tariffs on $11.7...
Continue readingIf the Trump administration wants supply chains to leave China, it should restore GSP for India (and support GSP renewal)
Yesterday at a virtual conference hosted by the U.S.-India Business Council, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said India may be poised to lure American supply chains away from China because it “has earned the trust of many nations, including the United States.” Mr. Secretary, please call your colleagues at the Office of the U.S....
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