Analysts: Democratic midterm election sweep could shift permitting rules, but not tariffs

The U.S. midterm election sweep of the House and Senate by Democrats will doubtless have impacts on global supply chains, but worldwide tariffs are likely to remain largely intact over the next twelve months, according to an analysis by Moody’s.

That’s because most import duties are a domain of executive branches, and there have not been any significant recent changes in chief government executives across the world.

“Global supply chains have been suffering from tariffs that have brought higher costs, deterioration in supplier-customer relationships, and disrupted long-term planning. While lower tariffs would be welcomed by many companies, the private sector is more focused on an easier-to-achieve objective of maintaining the tariff status quo,” Andrei Quinn-Barabanov, a senior director and industry practice lead at research and analytics firm Moody’s, said in a statement.

“Stability in import taxes would provide a needed reprieve from two years of tariff fluctuations and would also lay groundwork for serious intergovernmental negotiations that traditionally take many months to yield trade agreements. It is reasonable to expect that the tariff picture will not change much following recent elections,” Quinn-Barabanov said.

This story was originally published by Supply Chain Quarterly. Read the full story at Supply Chain Quarterly →