The WSJ has become a one-trick pony. Every day, it seems, they warn about the supposedly “disastrous” tariffs, even as inflation stays below 3%, and there is very little evidence that the inflation we do have is because of the tariffs. On September 16th, the WSJ ran this piece from its editorial board:
A Tariff Lesson for Coffee Drinkers
A case study in how border taxes raise the daily cost of living.
Prices were already rising toward 3% prior to the tariffs, residual effects from the Biden years, and that was over double the inflation rate that Trump handed off to Biden in January 2021, despite all the economic turmoil of COVID.
The article talks about the tariffs on Brazil raising the price of a pound of coffee from $4.50 to $6.
Maybe the WSJ should have looked at the history of coffee prices during the Biden years. Since they won’t do any research, I will do it for them; a simple 5-minute internet search will do.
In January 2021, right as Biden took over from Trump, the average pound of coffee from Brazil was just below $1.17 per pound. In January 2025, after four short years, it went to a high of over $4 per pound. It was up 241% without tariffs, because of Biden’s general inflation. Yet, I don’t recall a WSJ article at any time reporting on a “case study” about how Biden’s coffee prices raised peoples’ daily cost of living.
Since I have had 1/2 cup of coffee per day throughout my life, I was curious how many cups of coffee come from a pound of coffee. I found that there are between 32 and 45 eight-ounce cups that come from a pound. So, a $1.50 increase in a pound costs Starbucks, and all other coffee sellers, less than 5 cents a cup. Yet, here’s what the WSJ editorial board writes:
The coffee tale shows that tariffs at their essence are an income transfer from millions of individuals and businesses to the U.S. government. Like all taxes, they’re a windfall for politicians. In the case of coffee, tariffs don’t even protect a domestic constituency. They are a tax on American consumption pure and simple—a tax on Maga’s forgotten man.
An honest take would be that Trump’s tariffs on coffee raised your cost by a nickel per cup. I don’t think that is what has caused people to have cash flow problems. That was Biden and the Democrats, and their policies of big government, higher taxes, and more regulations.
Isn’t it time for the WSJ to put tariffs into perspective instead of trying to indoctrinate everyone on a Democrat agenda? Journalists are worthless and dangerous when they spend their time indoctrinating instead of informing.
Image: Free image, Pixabay license.