Has it ever occurred to you that if you suddenly introduce sudden tariffs that vary greatly from country to country, you will face multiple practical obstacles at the customs operational level?
Feedback from the current point of view, the actual possibility of landing almost 0, including several aspects:
Technical bottleneck: classification identification and physical limitations of origin verification
Complexity of commodity classification
The difference in duty rates between medical device parts and automotive parts may be as high as 30%, but it is difficult for the existing customs system to achieve accurate identification.For example, mixed-function electromechanical products (e.g., medical device housings containing sensors) may involve multiple tax code classifications at the same time, requiring manual intervention to determine.The current U.S. Customs AI identification system has not yet covered the intelligent classification of non-standardized goods, a large number of goods need to rely on paper documents to check, inefficient.
Origin verification of operational difficulties
For the "Mexican assembly + Chinese parts" of automobile origin determination, the U.S. Customs still follows the vague "substantial change" standard.2024 Texas Customs investigation of a car company's case shows that even if the Mexican factory completed welding, painting and other processes, but because of the engine and other core components from China, is still recognized as "China origin".Such cases require customs officers to verify the entire supply chain of original documents (such as raw material procurement vouchers from the Vietnam plant, the Mexican plant's time records), the average time spent on a single ticket from 3 days to 17 days.
Rigid constraints of human resources and budget
Professional talent gap
Tariff verification requires a combination of personnel familiar with international trade rules, commodity classification, and supply chain auditing.Currently, only 15 percent of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) personnel have tariff-specific skills, and the FY2025 budget does not increase the staffing of tariff enforcement-related positions, but instead cuts $300 million in training funding.
Structural Contradictions in Budget Allocations
Of CBP's $61.8 billion budget for the current fiscal year, 86 percent is allocated to border wall construction, immigration interdiction, and fentanyl seizures, while tariff system upgrades receive only $470 million (less than 0.8 percent of the total budget).The planned deployment of the Smart Tariff Computing Platform has been delayed until 2026 due to funding shortfalls.
Institutional flaws: operational ambiguity of rules of origin
Substantial Change Criteria Implementation Disputes
When the U.S. Customs determines origin, there is a lack of quantitative indicators for the three major criteria of "change in name, character, and use."For example, Vietnamese factories are still recognized as "Chinese origin" after dyeing Chinese cotton yarn, while the same process may be recognized as "material change" in Mexico.This subjective discretion makes it difficult for enterprises to predict the cost of compliance.
Lag in anti-circumvention investigations
Under the existing system, Customs relies on ex post facto investigations of "origin laundering" (with an average lag of 8 months).20 Of the 12,000 cases of circumvention detected in 2010, 73% of the goods cleared could not be recovered for tariff collection, exposing a loophole in the system.
Systemic risk of supply chain paralysis
Customs clearance efficiency falls off a cliff
The Port of Los Angeles' tariff declaration processing capacity has dropped from 3,000 to 700 per hour, and spoilage rates for fresh goods have soared from 2% to 19%.The average clearance time for auto parts has lengthened to 23 days (compared to 5 days before the epidemic), directly leading to three shutdowns at Ford's Kansas City plant.
The paradox of manufacturing reflux
The policy of trying to force the industry chain to return through tariffs has instead exacerbated the shortage of raw materials in U.S.-based factories.Tesla's Texas factory was forced to cut its Model Y weekly production from 5,000 to 3,200 due to stranded Chinese-made battery diaphragms at customs.Small and medium-sized enterprises have been hit even harder, with 2,300 factories across the U.S. having filed for bankruptcy protection (Q1 2025 data).
Feasibility analysis of the system optimization path
Even if the policy is forced forward, at least the following reforms need to be completed:
Technical level: invest $5 billion to establish a 3D scanning database for all categories and develop a multimodal AI classification system (3-year cycle).
Institutional level: Introduced the Operational Rules for the Determination of Origin, and clarified the quantitative standard of "35% value-added + process changes" (legislative cycle of about 2 years).
Human resources: expanding the recruitment of 3,000 tariff commissioners and implementing 18-month pre-service training (at a cost of about US$1.2 billion/year).
None of these conditions are currently in place, and the policy lacks a realistic basis for implementation.As Yale University simulations show, if a 54% tariff is imposed, there will be a backlog of $87 billion worth of goods in U.S. ports, leading to a monthly increase in the CPI topping 3.5%, with consequences far greater than those expected by the framers.
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