TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – It’s been 24 hours since President Donald Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariff announcement.
While the president remains confident the move will benefit America in the long term, the DOW fell nearly 4% when it closed at 4 p.m. Thursday, marking the biggest drop in five years.
Tallahassee certified financial planner Bruce Hagan said that right now, he sees panic amongst some investors, businesses and everyday workers.
He said some people are seeing their 401K plummet, which can be scary for anyone on a fixed income.
Experts say it can take years to gauge the overall impacts of these changes, and Hagan said that with any change, it’s natural to see an uproar in the economy, but the scary part is uncertainty.
“I think everyone is a little confused right now because, typically, sometimes there seems to be counter changes from what was done yesterday,” Hagan said. “Determine how is that going to affect your family in the short run. If you’re a federal employee that just got laid off, it’s a serious issue.”
Hagan said it is imperative people meet with a financial advisor if possible, and more importantly, refrain from making any drastic changes to your investments or ongoing 401k contributions and have a plan tailored to your financial needs.
Hagan said it’s best to make small adjustments as time goes on and keep a close eye on your financial situation along with the status of the economy.
One local Tallahassee business owner said she has already seen a 3 to 5% increase for certain items from places like China and Malaysia.
Some imported parts that go into the making of microwaves come straight from those countries, and Meghan Munroe Lisson, co-owner of Mays-Munroe, said customers might see a slight bump in prices, which she said happens from time to time.
“It’s pretty much business as usual right now cause nothing has really come down the pipeline far enough to where we are to really affect things, but what I think is gonna be affected is our ability to get things,” she said.
She said that it’s pretty much a waiting game to see how much of an impact the new tariffs will have, but overall, for this appliance shop, Lisson said she isn’t too concerned and hopes the changes will level things out.
“I think it will be a good thing, I feel like one of two things is gonna happen, either the other countries are gonna come to the table, probably pretty quickly too, or they’re not gonna come to the table and we’ll just build more stuff here and then I don’t know about prices being better but the quality will be better,” she said.
Hagan said that large businesses tend to remain resilient to changes like this, but he said the new tariffs and other federal changes could have some “painful” impacts for smaller businesses and their families.
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