A Chicago-area manufacturer is laying off 153 workers and moving to Mexico partly because of Trump's tariffs
- Stack-On Products, a storage manufacturing company, will lay off 153 workers at its Chicago-area plants and move those jobs to Mexico.
- Stack-On said that the move is in part due to President Donald Trump's tariffs on steel, aluminum, and some Chinese products.
- The tariffs are driving up the cost of parts used in US products, leading to layoffs and job relocations.
President Donald Trump's tariffs are forcing another manufacturer to lay off American workers as the fall out from the president's trade fights continues to grow.
Stack-On Products, a manufacturer of storage products like gun safes and metal cabinets, will lay off 153 workers in their Chicago-area plants and move those operations to its plant in Mexico, according to the Chicago Tribune. The company's two Illinois plants will close on October 12.
Al Fletcher, the human resources director at Stack-On's parent company, told the Tribune that the decision to close the plants was made two months ago. While Fletcher said the plant's unprofitability was a major piece of the reason for the layoffs, the final decision was only made following the imposition of tariffs.
"Mr. Trump is part of this," he told the Tribune.
Stack-On joins a growing group of companies that are either moving operations outside of the US due to the tariffs or laying off workers. Trump's tariffs on metals and Chinese goods hit many intermediate goods, or parts, that US firms then used to manufacture final products. The increased cost of parts forces companies to either accept lower profit margins, raise prices on consumers, or cut costs through moves like layoffs.
Here's just a few other companies that are making a similar move to Stack-On:
- Mid-Continental Nail, the largest US nail producer, laid off 130 workers after steel prices jumped. Additionally, the entire business could shut down over the next few months.
- Element Electronics, a TV manufacturer, plans to lay off 127 workers from its South Carolina factory as "a result of the new tariffs that were recently and unexpectedly imposed on many goods imported from China."
- Brinly-Hardy, an Indiana-based maker of lawn-care equipment, laid off 75 workers due to metal tariffs.
- Harley-Davidson announced that the company will shift production of motorcycles sold in Europe outside of the US. The announcement led Trump to wage an ongoing Twitter campaign against the company.