I have started writing this article several times, but each time a new headline pops up that causes me to put it on hold. Since that doesn’t seem likely to change anytime soon, I’m writing it anyway based on the situation at 12:30pm Eastern Daylight Time on April 11… I have to put both the date and time since things are so fluid. Some headlines call it “A Neverending Process”; others say “U.S.-China food fight.” “Whiplash” is another. Flip flop comes to mind, and I’m not talking about shoes.

Whichever side of the fence you are on, it can be scary if you consider the increased costs the tariffs can levy on working Americans; it’s a tax on them, really.

But from another perspective, the “food fight” is going to have an interesting impact on fashion and the textiles industry. Let’s consider Fast Fashion for a moment—one of the worst contributors to fashion pollution since products from companies like Temu, Shein, and Zara are designed to take advantage of fashion fads and maybe be worn once or twice before they are no longer a fad or trend and/or they fall apart. Then what? They end up incinerated (adding to CO₂ in the atmosphere) or in landfills which have a glut of non-biodegradable textiles in them already.