Canada announced retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods on Tuesday as the two countries fall deeper into a trade battle that has gone on since late July. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Canada will match U.S. tariffs “dollar for dollar.”

The countertariffs will focus on industries including steel, dairy, paper and electronics, according to Canada’s Finance Ministry, and are expected to be on about $27 billion of annual U.S. imports. The tariffs, planned to go into effect Sept. 8, are set at 15%, 25% and 50%.

The move comes after 50% tariffs that are expected to affect $20 billion worth of Canadian exports to the U.S. went into effect on Saturday.

Carney said in a statement issued on Friday that trade conversations ended before the deadline because “last-minute changes to the U.S. proposed terms were unfair, uneconomic and called into question the reliability of any deal.”

President Donald Trump threatened higher tariffs on Canadian goods during trade talks on Friday and went on social media to accuse Canada of “Ripping Off” the U.S. and to threaten to rename Lake Ontario to “Lake America.”

“Canada’s countertariffs are designed primarily to provide protection for Canadian industry impacted by U.S. tariffs and allow them to compete against U.S. products in the Canadian market,” Canadian Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne said at a press conference with other federal officials. “It’s all about fairness. It’s all about level playing field. It’s all about supporting Canadian workers and Canadian businesses.”

White House spokesman Kush Desai told HuffPost: “Canada was offered the most generous trade deal of any of America’s trading partners despite being overwhelmingly reliant on access to the American economy, which is over 12-times larger than Canada’s economy. Canada rejected that deal to demand continued one-sided access to the American market with no reciprocity.”

The day the Canadian tariffs are expected to go into effect is also New Hampshire’s primary election day. Rhode Island will hold its primaries on Sept. 9, then Delaware on Sept. 15. As the country approaches November’s midterm elections, Republicans are speculating whether Americans’ concerns about Trump’s tariffs and the related prices of goods will affect their party’s prospects at the ballot box.

“President Trump was given a resounding Election Day mandate to put American workers, farmers and businesses first, and the administration will continue to deliver while lowering costs for everyday families,” Desai said.

There are two separate tariff actions at play. The U.S. put a 50% tax on Canadian goods entering the U.S. — such as lumber and paper — which can raise prices for American shoppers on items like toilet paper. Now Canada has taxed goods coming from the U.S., which raises prices for American products in Canada, and could hurt American companies.

Canada’s list shows that nearly 900 U.S. goods will face the tariffs in September.

One of the most affected categories would be paper products. American-made toilet paper and paper towels sold into the Canadian market will now face steeper tariffs at the border.

U.S. domestic exports that are facing retaliatory tariffs on Sept. 8, include:

Beyond the exporters directly affected, economists suggest that the broader trade war carries a cost for U.S. households.

The average American household should anticipate having to pay roughly $1,000 more annually when considering all global tariffs, John Iselin, the associate director of economic analysis at The Budget Lab at Yale, told HuffPost.

But with Canadian tariffs alone, it’s a fairly small part ― “only around $30, because while the statutory tariff rate is high those rates are impacting a very small slice of U.S. imports,” Iselin said. “This means that this specific round of tariffs should have a fairly small impact on the average U.S. consumer.”

Alex Durante, a senior economist at the Tax Foundation, described the tariffs as impacting “a small share overall” of the U.S. goods trade with Canada.

“It’s a small share overall, but it does hit a wide variety of products,” Durante told HuffPost.

Durante also pointed to a post his colleague, Erica York, made on X, showing that many of the goods were already under Canada’s existing tariffs on U.S. imports. Tariffs on vehicles and metals will be increased, while categories like wood, food and sporting goods are now added to the list.

Many of these goods were already subject to Canada's existing retaliatory tariffs on metals and autos. The new actions increase the rate on some of those previously tariffed exports, and they add more categories to the retaliation list. https://t.co/5bK3NPVHCF pic.twitter.com/drYnwd65DE

That said, both experts expressed concern about how long the conflict with Canada might continue.

“For how long this escalation persists between these two countries is uncertain,” Durante said, adding that this conflict also adds to the uncertainty around the future of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement — a free-trade deal made between the countries in 2020 — “and whether the U.S. will be viewed as a reliable trading partner going forward.”

Iselin said it could lead to more rounds of retaliatory tariffs, which would contribute risk to interconnected supply chains and raise economic uncertainty.

“None of [this] will make it any easier for U.S. consumers to afford to put food on the table, or make back-to-school purchases for their children, or any number of important purchases they may want to make,” he said.

By entering your email and clicking Sign Up, you're agreeing to let us send you customized marketing messages about us and our advertising partners. You are also agreeing to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.