Tariffs hit like a Mack truck

Summary

Today, Explained: Tariffs Hit Like a Mack Truck – Detailed Summary

Released April 30, 2025 | Part of the Vox Media Podcast Network

Introduction: The Economic Toll of Tariffs

In the April 30, 2025 episode of Today, Explained, hosts Noel King and Miles Bryan delve into the escalating impact of President Trump's tariff policies on the American economy. From [00:02], Noel King sets the stage by highlighting the growing concerns:

“The American economy is starting to shake under the weight of President Trump's tariff chaos.”

This sentiment is echoed by analysts John Tanazer and Miles Bryan, who discuss the negative growth figures and the onset of a potential recession:

"[The national economy] shrank in the first quarter of this year... down 3.10%... we haven't had a negative number since first quarter of '22." ([00:19])

Case Study: Mack Truck Layoffs in the Lehigh Valley

A significant portion of the episode focuses on the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania, a historically robust manufacturing hub now feeling the brunt of tariff-induced layoffs.

A. The Lehigh Valley’s Manufacturing Legacy

Noel King provides context about the region's rich manufacturing history, particularly referencing the Bethlehem Steel plant:

"The home plant here in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, operated for nearly a century and at one time employed more than 30,000 people." ([00:50])

Miles Bryan recounts the decline of manufacturing in the area:

"That plant started struggling in the late '70s and ended up bankrupt by 2001... the whole area had been really hollowed out by deindustrialization." ([03:01])

B. Union Perspectives and Personal Stories

Miles Bryan interviews Dan Hand, a District 1 committee man at the Mack Truck plant, who expresses frustration over sudden job cuts:

"Things aren't going very well. They're blaming the tariff." ([05:27])

Dan Hand reflects on the legacy and significance of Mack Truck in the community:

"Mac is a very ingrained company within the Lehigh Valley. So right now this union hall sits on Mack Boulevard... it feels very American." ([04:25])

John Tanazer, a long-time Mack Trucks employee, offers a contrasting view, supporting the tariff measures despite the layoffs:

"The only way forward is to level the field with the rest of the world and allow Americans to compete." ([10:54])

Tariffs and Their Direct Impact on Manufacturing

The episode dissects how tariffs, initially intended to bolster American manufacturing by making imports more expensive, are paradoxically leading to job losses.

Dan Hand explains the direct consequences:

"Our frame rails are made out of steel... that's going to drive up the cost that the company has to pay for those parts, which is going to, in turn, probably wind up having to be passed on to the buyer." ([08:33])

Miles Bryan highlights the complexity of the situation:

"President Trump announced Tuesday that he's watering down some tariffs for automakers who import parts. So all this is still up in the air, and we're not sure how it's going to play out." ([09:06])

Political Ramifications and Diverse Union Opinions

The episode explores the political fallout and differing perspectives within the union.

Noel King introduces local Democrat state representative Josh Siegel, who criticizes the tariffs:

"If we care about the working class, those are the jobs we should focus on improving, getting them to pay more and have more dignity and stature." ([12:10])

Conversely, John Tanazer remains supportive of the tariffs’ original intent but criticizes their implementation:

"It doesn't seem very well thought out... it doesn't seem to be targeted at all." ([08:09])

Broader Economic Trends: The Decline of Manufacturing and the Rise of the Service Economy

In the latter part of the episode, Today, Explained shifts focus to the nationwide trend of declining manufacturing jobs and the rise of the service sector.

A. Expert Analysis on Economic Shifts

Expert Tyler provides an in-depth analysis of why manufacturing jobs are decreasing:

"Productivity is going up... robotics... leads to big productivity improvements. That in turn means you can make more goods with less labor." ([18:28])

He further explains the concept of job polarization:

"There's a lot of research... the middle has been kind of hollowed out. What's left are at the bottom, sort of fairly routine jobs... and then at the other end, high-skill, high-wage jobs." ([22:37])

B. The Human Cost of Economic Transition

The narrative underscores the personal toll on workers like those at Mack Truck:

"If you're a 55-year-old working in the Mack truck plant, you get laid off. The jobs that are available to you aren't probably going to be the higher-end skilled jobs because they require an education that you didn't get." ([24:05])

Tyler emphasizes the societal implications:

"This is an example of us failing and letting down people during a big transition and we can't do that again." ([25:27])

Conclusion: Navigating the Future of American Manufacturing

Noel King wraps up the episode by juxtaposing the narrative of national progress with the localized struggles in places like the Lehigh Valley:

"We built this nation... It became the global shining castle on the hill. And then something changed, and we've been on a steady decline ever since that point." ([10:54])

The episode concludes with a call to address these economic transitions thoughtfully to prevent further community hollowing and to support displaced workers.

Production Credits

Today, Explained is produced and reported by Miles Bryan and Dylan Matthews, with editing by Jolie Myers and fact-checking by Laura Bullard. The technical aspects are handled by Andrea, Kristen's daughter, and Patrick Boyd.

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This comprehensive summary captures the essence of the episode, highlighting the multifaceted impact of tariffs on the American economy, particularly within the manufacturing sector, and the broader shift towards a service-oriented economy. By weaving in direct quotes with precise timestamps, the summary provides a clear and engaging overview for those who have not listened to the episode.

Transcript

[Noel King]

The American economy is starting to shake under the weight of President Trump's tariff chaos.

[John Tanazer]

So your answer to the concern about the tariffs is everything's going to be hunky dory.

[Miles Bryan]

Everything's going to be just fine.

[Noel King]

And it's not just the stock market anymore. The national economy, we learned today, shrank in the first quarter of this year.

[John Tanazer]

Down 3.10 of a percent. We haven't had a negative number since first quarter of 22.

[Noel King]

If it shrinks in the second, that's the dictionary definition of a recession, folks. Chinese exports to the US Are plunging. Keep your third eye open for shortages. And around the country, tariff layoffs are underway. Major layoffs for UPS. By next month, 20,000 workers will lose their job.

[Dan Hand]

And that's on top of several facilities set to close.

[Noel King]

All of this, says the Prez, to bring manufacturing back to the US except as we're going to hear the tariff layoffs are hitting manufacturing now too. Coming up on Today explained we take a trip.

[Miles Bryan]

Everything's going to be just fine.

[Tyler]

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[Noel King]

It'S today explained. Miles Bryan is a senior producer and reporter on the show. And Miles, you live in Pennsylvania.

[Miles Bryan]

I do.

[Noel King]

President Trump's tariffs were supposed to bring manufacturing back to the United States. They were supposed to create jobs. But in Pennsylvania, some people are losing jobs as a result of the tariffs. What's happening?

[Miles Bryan]

Yeah, the job cuts I'm here to talk about are at Mack Truck's production facility in a Part of the state called the Lehigh Valley. The Valley is a politically swingy part of a famously swingy state. It's also exactly the kind of place that Trump says his tariff policies will help. You know, after World War II, it was this prosperous manufacturing community anchored by the massive Bethlehem Steel plant.

[Tyler]

At the coke oven division of the steel plant, many varieties of coal arrive from different mines to be blended.

[Noel King]

The home plant here in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, operated for nearly a century and at one time employed more than 30,000 people.

[Miles Bryan]

But, you know, that plant started struggling in the late 70s and ended up bankrupt by 2001, by which point the whole area had been really hollowed out by deindustrialization. There's even a famous Billy Joel song about it. We're living here in Allergy Town and they're closing all the bacteristown.

[Noel King]

I've always loved it.

[Miles Bryan]

All this history made me do a double take when I saw a local news story out of the Valley about how Mack Truck was planning to cut around 10% of its unionized shop floor jobs there. And the company was citing tariffs specifically as the reason for the cuts. So last week I. I drove up to the area to check it out.

[Noel King]

All right, who did you get to talk to?

[Miles Bryan]

Well, I started in Allentown at the union hall. Hello.

[Dan Hand]

Forgot how to turn the alarm off because I haven't come here by myself in a long time.

[Miles Bryan]

With Dan Hand.

[Dan Hand]

My name is Dan Hand and I'm a District 1 committee man.

[Miles Bryan]

Dan's originally from the Chicago area. I can still hear it in his accent. He moved out here for his now ex wife about three decades ago and got hired on at Mac. No college degree. Mac makes the big semi trucks you see on the highway. Makes dump trucks, garbage trucks, plow trucks.

[Dan Hand]

Mac is a very ingrained company within the Lehigh Valley. So right now this union hall sits on Mack Boulevard. Mack World headquarters used to be across the street from us.

[Miles Bryan]

It's a very iconic American brand. Like, it feels very American.

[Dan Hand]

Yes, it does. You hear about it on TV all the time. There's a lot of different sayings, like built like a Mac. You also hear that when somebody gets hit by something, it feels like they're getting hit by a Mack truck.

[Noel King]

All true. This is a very well known brand. So is this a good job?

[Miles Bryan]

In Dan's telling, it was an excellent job when he started. You know, he told me this story of applying with literally thousands of other applicants back in 1998.

[Dan Hand]

And out of that, I think it was 40 people were hired.

[Miles Bryan]

Geez, that's more elite than, you know, an Ivy League school.

[Dan Hand]

Things were a lot different back then as far as, like, with our medical. We didn't have any CO pays or anything like that.

[Miles Bryan]

These days, it's not quite as competitive, but the jobs are still really good for this area. And recently, Dan said Mac seemed to be on an upswing. It was preparing for the launch of a new flagship model, and as recently as January, was hiring a lot. What happens between then and last week that led to the company announcing layoffs?

[Dan Hand]

Well, all of a sudden, we find out that the company decided to have a meeting with us and said that things aren't going very well. They're blaming the tariff.

[Noel King]

That was fast. Yeah.

[Miles Bryan]

Dan said it was a total shock. And, you know, I reached out to Max corporate spokesperson. They wouldn't do an interview, but they sent me a statement blaming possible regulatory changes and quote, unquote, market uncertainty. And those tariffs. And these layoffs are supposed to come sometime in the next couple of months.

[Noel King]

Okay, so you were at the union hall. Are Dan and the other men and women in the union, are they mad about the tariffs?

[Miles Bryan]

Well, they're uniformly pissed about the layoffs, but they have mixed feelings about the tariffs because they know that the point of the tariffs, at least in theory, is to protect them, to protect this kind of work. And these workers in the Lehigh Valley, they might need that protection.

[Dan Hand]

So last year, we got notification, notification from the company that they decided that they're going to build a plant in Mexico.

[Miles Bryan]

Uh. Oh, yeah. This is a whole other part of the story I hadn't told you about yet. Last year, Volvo, which owns Mack Truck, announced it was building a big new truck plant in Mexico. The company says it's meant to supplement American workers, not replace them. But Dan and the rest of his union chapter are really freaked out. You know, they're worried that their jobs are going to end up down in Mexico like so many other auto worker jobs have moved over the years. And last month, the local put out a press release with this sort of dramatic video that condemned Mac's decision. The policies that reflect trade have not been on the worker side for many years and argued tariffs are a good tool to fight it.

[Tyler]

Manufacturing.

[Miles Bryan]

Those are good jobs that we need to.

[Dylan Matthews]

We need to fight for.

[Noel King]

All right, so you have a union that is facing layoffs because of the tariffs, making the argument for tariffs. Why do they say tariffs are a good tool?

[Miles Bryan]

Well, they make it more expensive to import vehicles from Mexico, and that mitigates the cost savings companies get from moving Production to Mexico, where wages are way lower than they are here in the US but, you know, the union put out that press release in March before Trump's tariff, Liberation Day, before we saw how this was going to play out, and before Mack announced layoffs because of those tariffs.

[Noel King]

What do Dan and the others that you spoke to think of Trump?

[Miles Bryan]

Now, that's a complicated question. Take our union guy, Dan Hand. He's a registered Republican, big Second Amendment guy. He voted for Trump in 2016, but then soured on him because of how he treated organized labor in his first term. And, you know, he was in that video in March. He's not against tariffs in general, but. But he's not thrilled about how Trump's been rolling them out so far.

[Dan Hand]

It doesn't seem very well thought out. Okay, we're putting this tariff on. Oh, we're going to pull this back. Oh, we're taking a pause. It doesn't seem to be targeted at all. One thing I did find out that's not really widely published is the fact that for any steel coming into the United States or aluminum, that's at a 25% tariff.

[Miles Bryan]

And what's that mean for you guys?

[Dan Hand]

Well, our frame rails are made out of steel. We have a lot of different parts of our trucks that are made out of steel and aluminum. So that's going to drive up the cost that the company has to pay for those parts, which is going to, in turn, probably wind up having to be passed on to the buyer.

[Miles Bryan]

Well, I guess the counter argument would be that Matt could buy American steel. Right? American aluminum.

[Dan Hand]

Well, you would think that, but a lot of the infrastructure that we have has gone away. If you just look over in Bethlehem, Bethlehem Steel is no longer here.

[Miles Bryan]

Dan's identifying a chicken or the egg problem. That's, like, true across manufacturing right now. Lots of American companies that make stuff here rely on foreign inputs. And making that stuff more expensive hasn't immediately created new steel plants or whatever. Bethlehem Steel is still closed. It's actually a casino now. But it does immediately make it more expensive to build stuff here that relies on foreign material. And on top of all this, President Trump announced Tuesday that he's watering down some tariffs for automakers who import parts. So all this is still up in the air, and we're not sure how it's going to play out.

[Noel King]

Does everyone in the union come down on the same side as Dan in this?

[Miles Bryan]

No, absolutely not. They're really split on politics and on the tariffs. And I want you to meet one guy who really Gets at this. John Tanazer. We met in the parking lot of a grocery store across the street from Mac's plant right after he finished his shift.

[John Tanazer]

I worked for Mack Trucks for just short of 27 years.

[Miles Bryan]

It was a bit windy, so we climbed into the back of John's Cadillac to chat.

[John Tanazer]

If you don't mind moving up. So he has just a hair movement.

[Miles Bryan]

John grew up here in the Lehigh Valley. He voted for Trump, and he likes what Trump's doing with the tariffs currently here.

[John Tanazer]

We assemble trucks. We don't manufacture them. We don't make the parts that go into them.

[Miles Bryan]

We.

[John Tanazer]

We put them together, and most of those parts are made somewhere else in the world. They used to be made here.

[Miles Bryan]

It's worth noting that he has seniority. He's not as worried about losing his job, but he says his job has gotten a little bit worse every year. You know, the pay doesn't go as far, the benefits aren't as good. And he's watched manufacturing jobs in this area, his home, dry up over the years. So he told me he's willing to tolerate a fair amount of pain in service of turning things around.

[John Tanazer]

It could be a year, it could be two years. But what we're looking for is a path forward to thrive and not just sustain and exist. In this economy that we're in currently, there's no going forward. The only way forward is to level the field with the rest of the world and allow Americans to compete. I hear constantly that the jobs they're talking about, Americans don't want to do maybe garbage picking or food picking or. We did it all. We built this nation. We built this country. Right now. If we were tasked with trying to build the road system that we currently have, how did we do it? We can't even fix the roads that are already here. We built the entire country. The United States of America was nothing. And it became the global shining castle on the hill. And then something changed, and we've been on a steady decline ever since that point. We did it before, we certainly can do it again, but it's going to take change.

[Noel King]

Do you know what these guys sound like to me?

[Tyler]

What?

[Noel King]

Like people who might vote Republican or might vote Democrat based on whoever they think is doing the best job for them. You said this is a swing area. How do you hear local politicians trying to capitalize on what's going on with the tariffs?

[Miles Bryan]

Yeah, it's already resonating politically. I met up with one local politician, a Democratic state representative named Josh Siegel, who's been all over this story, he sounded like every other Democrat in that he condemned Trump's tariffs as stupid and self defeating. But he said something interesting to me, which is he pointed out that this fixation on the fate of manufacturing jobs, like at Mack Truck, it kind of misses the bigger economic picture. The biggest employers here now are hospitals and Amazon fulfillment centers. They're. They're not factories. And he was like, if we care about the working class, those are the jobs we should focus on improving, getting them to pay more and have more dignity and stature.

[Noel King]

This is the argument of the last 20 or 30 years that the American economy is moving on to other types of jobs, and we got to make sure that those jobs are good jobs and, and not spend so much political capital on people like the guys who work at Mac. What do the guys who work at Mac think about this argument?

[Miles Bryan]

Well, I ran it by a few of them and surprise, surprise, they weren't very moved. Here's what John had to say.

[John Tanazer]

We are a service economy currently, but things are still made everywhere. There may be more AI involved, there may be more robotics, but people are still a huge part of the process. It is what built the middle class in this country. And you see what happens when it leaves. We're living it right now. Look at a gear, what that used to be and Lucent and Western technology, they're all gone. All of them, all those great jobs. It built the valley. You know, you used to say a name like, you know, lucent. There are 4,000, 5,000 people working there, making good money. They are the ones who bought all these homes, who shopped at all these stores. They're not. It's not there anymore. And we want to bring it back. I want it back.

[Noel King]

John Tanazer there in the Lehigh Valley, brought to us by Miles Bryan. Thanks so much, Miles.

[Miles Bryan]

My pleasure.

[Noel King]

Coming up, we know that what replaced the manufacturing economy was the service economy. Can that ever be as good? We're going to ask.

[Josh Siegel]

Support for this show comes from another show. That show is called Democracy Works. The world certainly seems a bit alarming at the moment. Democracy Works says that might be putting it lightly. Democracy Works says, and sometimes it can feel as if no one is really doing anything to fix it. Democracy Works says now a lot of podcasts focus on that, the doom and gloom of it all and how democracy can feel like it's failing. But the people over Democracy Works podcasts take a different approach. They're turning their mics to those who are working to make democracy stronger, from scholarship to journalists to activists. They examine a different aspect of democratic life each week, from elections to the rule of law to the free press and everything in between. They interview experts who study democracy as well as people who are out there on the ground doing the hard work to keep our democracy functioning. Listen to Democracy Works wherever you Listen to podcasts and check out their website democracyworkspodcast.com to learn more. The Democracy Works podcast is a Production of the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State Foreign.

[Miles Bryan]

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[Noel King]

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[Miles Bryan]

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[Tyler]

And helping the people and communities that.

[Noel King]

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[John Tanazer]

I believe that you are the writer, director and producer of your life and if you want a better outcome then you need to make it.

[Miles Bryan]

So listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube.com YourRichBFF.

[Dylan Matthews]

The regular season is in the rearview and now it's time for the games that matter the most. This is Kenny Beachum and playoff basketball is finally here on Small Ball. We're diving deep into every series, every crunch time finish, every coaching adjustment that can make or break a championship run. Who's building for a 16 win marathon? Which superstar would submit their legacy and which role player is about to become a household name? With so many fascinating first round matchups, will the west be the bloodbath we anticipate? Will the east be as predictable as we think? Can the Celtics defend their title? Can Steph Curry, LeBron James, Kawhi Leonard push the young teams at the top? I'll be bringing the expertise, the passion, the genuine opinion you need for the most exciting time of the NBA calendar. Small Ball is your essential companion for the NBA post season. Join me, Kenny Beacham for new episodes of Small Ball throughout the playoffs. Don't miss Small Ball with Kenny Beacham. New episodes dropping through the playoffs. Available on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts.

[Miles Bryan]

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[Noel King]

Can manufacturing jobs be brought back to places like the Lehigh Valley as the people there Dylan Matthews has been trying to answer this question and we're going to start with what has been happening.

[Tyler]

The share of Americans working in manufacturing has fallen steadily for decades and decades. It's fallen steadily in every rich country and I think Even if we have plants building a lot of things, the facts on the ground suggest to me that jobs are going away and will continue going away. So I don't have great news for the folks at that plant.

[Noel King]

Why is the share of manufacturing jobs falling?

[Tyler]

So the main cause here, when you look into the data, is productivity is going up. Manufacturing is incredibly intense in equipment. You rely a lot on machinery. That machinery can get better in a lot of plants. Now it's robotics. It's literal robot arms coming and helping assembling products on the floor. That process of improving that technology and organizing it better leads to big productivity improvements. That in turn means that you can make more goods with less labor. That makes the goods that you're producing cheaper. And one thing that could happen is that it gets cheaper and then everyone buys a ton more of it because it's cheap. That's not really what happens. What happens is that as people get richer, they spend less on most manufactured goods. And so the end result of this process is the share of manufacturing in the economy falls and the number of people working in it falls as well. If you go Back to, say, 1950, there were a lot of manufactured goods that the average American didn't have. A lot of people didn't have cars yet. Most people didn't have TVs, washing machines, dryers, dishwashers. Lympht was an everyday problem to Mrs. Chester O'Donnell of Oakland, New Jersey. But not now with her new 1957 General Electric filter flow washer. Oh, here's something I want in my home. A dishwasher.

[Dan Hand]

Well, I don't blame you, lady.

[Tyler]

The US has gotten rich enough, and a lot of countries have gotten rich enough. That sort of demand for manufactured products is kind of peaking. We're nearing that saturation point.

[Miles Bryan]

Another dishwasher. We already have four, one for each member of the family.

[Tyler]

And so this combination of really fast productivity growth and people substituting what they spend away from manufactured goods because they've reached some point of saturation combines to a pretty bleak picture for the state.

[Noel King]

Of manufacturing jobs, because our spending drives the kinds of jobs that make up our economy. Okay, so what replaces manufacturing?

[Tyler]

So the standard model economist uses is three sectors. So there's agriculture, there's manufacturing, and then finally there's services and services. I find when I say that talk about services jobs, people think of, like being a greeter at Walmart, and that is a services job. But there are a lot of different services jobs. And it's, it's so heterogeneous. That it almost feels misleading. Doctors are service workers, lawyers are service workers. The most common kind of service worker is a home health aide. That's the most common job in America right now. Anything that is not like directly making a durable finished product counts as services. And that is what most rich countries are seeing spending shift into. That once people feel somewhat satisfied in the amount of stuff they have, they start to hire a housekeeper or go to a fancier gym and, and hire a personal trainer. That in turn means that employment shifts into those sectors because it's where people want to spend their money.

[Noel King]

And some of those jobs are extremely well paid. Doctor, lawyer, can make a ton of money. Some of those jobs are not as well paid. Home health aid, for example. So when people talk about manufacturing jobs as good jobs and we say service sector jobs, replace them. Is manufacturing being replaced by good jobs?

[Tyler]

So I think this is one of the things that's been really hard about the past few decades. One thing that's changed is that manufacturing as a job has changed. It used to be that the manufacturing paid above median wages. It was a place where people, predominantly men who had only a high school degree or even dropped out of high school, could get a good wage. Nearly 700,000 men and women work in the iron and steel industry and they're among the world's best paid workers, earning around $4 billion a year or an average of more than $20 a day. Steady work and steady pay constitute one.

[Dan Hand]

Of the biggest goals of the American.

[Tyler]

Worker and his employer. Manufacturing now pays slightly worse than the average job in America. So the premium that used to be there has diminished a lot. More broadly, what's happened is what a lot of researchers call job polarization, that there used to be a middle represented by sort of good manufacturing jobs that would earn you a middle class income. And the middle has been kind of hollowed out. And what's left are at the bottom, sort of fairly routine jobs that don't require a lot of education, like retail clerk, some home health aid jobs though that can be very skill intensive. Stocking Amazon factories, things like that, which tend to not be highly paid. And then at the other end, jobs like doctors and nurses, software developers, things that require a lot of education and training and command a higher wage. And so it looks like a U curve, that it's sort of feast or famine. And I think that's part of what's made this transition so vicious is if you're a 55 year old working in the Mack truck plant, you get laid off. The jobs that are available to you aren't probably going to be the higher end skilled jobs because they require an education that you didn't get and you don't have time to get before you retire. The ones that are available are the lower wage services jobs. And so that transition is genuinely incredibly hard and a lot of people have lost out on that.

[Noel King]

So the trend is it's not just in the United States. You said the trend is as a country gets richer, it moves from a manufacturing economy, a lot of manufacturing jobs, to a service economy, more service jobs. They can be great jobs or they can be less well paid jobs. There are a lot of people still in America, like John, the guy we heard from in the first half of the show, who have seen this shift and what they have seen is not progress, not getting richer. It is the community is hollowed out, people lose their jobs. How do we square this narrative of broad progress with the facts in a specific place like the Lehigh Valley?

[Tyler]

The US is a really big place and some places can be prospering at a time when other places are not as much the trajectory for a place like Boston or San Francisco or Dallas, sort of big cities that attract big industries and where wages for everyone, not just people in those industries, but service workers around them, people working retail jobs nearby, the Google offices or the biotech firm in Boston, they've really gained. So I think part of it is if you look only at where the costs are concentrated, you're going to see costs, but it's not the whole picture. That being said, it really sucks. I'm not going to try to sugarcoat what's happened from the point of view of Mack truck plant worker. Their life has gotten worse because of this transition. They have borne the brunt of this big change. And I think going forward this is going to be important because this is not going to be the last shock that the US faces. The labor market could change a lot due to AI. It could change a lot due to other policies from Trump or someone else. It could change a lot if our relationship with China changes and we need to be able to cope with big shifts like that. I think what you saw at the Maktrek plant is an example of us failing and letting down people during a big transition and we can't do that again.

[Noel King]

Vox's Dylan Matthews, Miles Bryan produced and reported today's episode. Jolie Myers edited, Laura Bullard checked the facts. Andrea, Kristen's daughter and Patrick Boyd engineered the show. I'm Noel King. It's today, explained.

[Miles Bryan]

Sarah.