Via email;
The Canadian trucking industry will be destroyed by the tariffs. Most of the industry is dependent on cross border shipments. Stopping or slowing those shipments for even a few weeks will force countless companies into bankruptcy.
The vast majority of shipments in North America are moved by small carriers with fleets of 3-30 trucks. I deal with dozens of these companies everyday. All of them rely on factoring companies for operating capital, they have no cash reserves. Many have told me in conversation they have refinanced their homes and sold vehicles to keep their companies afloat. Tariffs will drastically reduce freight volumes in an already slow market, this will drive down freight rates even further in what has been the longest soft freight market in the history of trucking. With no cash reserves these companies will fold.
The tariff issue will be resolved, but not until the government feels they have made all the political hay possible. So what comes next? Skyrocketing freight rates as shippers scramble to catch up and can’t find trucks to get products to market.
There isn’t a good end to this other than securing our border and cracking down on fentanyl production & distribution. We should be embarrassed that our neighbour had to ask.
More, from Gord Magill;
Setting trade and economic arguments aside, one of Trump’s numerous complaints about Canada has been Canada’s wide open door policy to immigration, which has caused a massive increase in illegal migrants crossing the border from Canada into the United States. These lax policies were shared by the Democrats in the US, and opposition to these policies were a major component of Trump’s mandate. Another problem Trump has with Canada is drug smuggling, as the United States has been suffering under a major opioid crisis for decades, amongst other despair inducing addictive substances.
These two issues overlap, and they also overlap with the Canadian trucking industry.
Grab a coffee.
