What to buy before Trump makes everything more expensive

The morning after Trump’s big election win, an exodus started. Left-leaning stragglers on X, formerly Twitter, started saying goodbye and posting their new handles for Bluesky, a decentralized Twitter clone. X helped elect Trump, and who knows what will happen on the platform once Trump takes office. So people are fleeing X by the hundreds of thousands.
This is just one of many ways people are safeguarding the technology in their lives from the inevitable change that will come with the second Trump presidency. It’s still early and it’s not exactly clear what Trump’s tech policy will look like, but we do have a sense of some of his priorities based on what he’s said.
We know that Trump promises to impose strict tariffs on imported goods, which he says he’ll do on day one. This will make your next laptop, smartphone, or video game console more expensive. Trump is also expected to repeal President Biden’s executive order on AI soon after his inauguration, and whatever Trump plans to do next, it will affect how you use the technology. Trump’s pledge to rescind any unspent funds under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) could put an end to the big rebate you’d get for buying climate-friendly technology, like heat pumps or solar panels. He’s even threatened to get rid of the $7,500 tax credit you currently get for buying certain EVs.
Again, we don’t actually know what Trump will do when he takes office. The former president and current president-elect has a track record of following through on certain promises, even the most controversial ones, so it would be prudent to brace yourself. One straightforward way to do that: Buy some stuff before Trump’s incoming policies make them more expensive.
Trump has proposed a 10 to 20 percent tariff on all goods imported into the United States in an effort to lower prices and create jobs. Goods from China would face an additional 60 percent tariff. He’s also threatened to impose a 100 percent tariff on imports from Mexico, one of America’s largest trading partners, if the country doesn’t stop immigrants from crossing the border.
It almost goes without saying that this would raise prices for consumers. The Yale Budget Lab estimates that the tariffs would cost the average American household up to $7,600 a year with initial price hikes as high as about 5 percent.
But if you look specifically at goods coming from China, where many consumer electronics are manufactured, those numbers get worse. The Consumer Technology Association (CTA) estimates prices for laptops and video game consoles would rise by 46 and 40 percent, respectively, if the cost of the tariffs were passed through directly to the consumer. Smartphones would go up 26 percent. A new iPhone 16 Pro, for instance, has a sticker price of $1,000 right now, but if you want to buy the new model next year, it could cost more than $1,250 if Apple passed the cost of the tariff onto you.
While it’s not guaranteed that prices will skyrocket as much as some estimates say they will, there’s a very good chance Trump will follow through on these tariffs. After all, he did exactly that in 2016.
“Everyone’s taking the tariffs threat seriously,” said Ed Brzytwa, vice president of trade for the CTA. “He made a campaign promise to impose these tariffs, and we anticipate that he wants to follow through with it.”
There is a chance that the Supreme Court could stop him, which would save the country from a certain amount of economic pain. But even if the tariff plan fails, inflation is expected to make an unwelcome return due to Trump’s promised mass deportations.
So, if you were already thinking of getting a new laptop or upgrading your phone, you might consider doing that sooner rather than later. And hey, Black Friday is just around the corner, so you might get an extra special pre-tariff deal.
The Inflation Reduction Act is “among the most significant government investments in the US economy since President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal,” according to William Tobin at the Atlantic Council. The landmark legislation could drive $3 trillion in investment for renewable energy, and lead electric vehicle sales to surpass their gas-powered counterparts before the end of the decade.
And it’s also done a lot to make the latest climate technologies more accessible for millions of people: The IRA provides nearly $9 billion in rebates for households that install energy efficient appliances, heat pumps, solar panels, or even new windows for your home.
Trump wants to take a lot of this money away. The president-elect has said that he “will terminate the Green New Deal, which I call the Green New Scam” and “rescind all unspent funds under the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act.” The IRA and the Green New Deal are not the same thing. Nevertheless, the next Trump administration could try to dismantle Biden’s historic climate legislation, although it would not be easy to do for a number of reasons. Chief among them is that Trump would need Congress to cooperate in order to rescind the funds, and taking free money away from constituents would probably not be a popular thing for lawmakers to do.
“It would also negatively impact many people who are his supporters,” Scott Hardman, assistant director of the Electric Vehicle Research Center at the University of California Davis. “A lot of the benefits have gone to red states, so it seems like it would be a little bit of a strange decision to change it.”
Another thing Trump is hostile toward: electric vehicles. In his speech at the Republican National Convention in July, Trump said he’ll end “the electric vehicle mandate on day one” as part of his broader plan to snuff out “the Green New Scam.” That plan would include eliminating the $7,500 tax credits and other incentives the Biden administration put into place to make EVs more affordable for more Americans.
This seems to contradict the interests of Trump’s biggest supporter, Elon Musk, who was recently appointed to lead the newly created Department of Government Efficiency. Musk also runs the world’s most valuable electric vehicle company, Tesla. Tesla has benefited greatly from government subsidies over the years. Some think Musk will change Trump’s mind about EVs, but it’s also possible that Musk thinks Tesla stands to benefit. On one hand, after years of taking government subsidies to help it grow, Tesla is now a trillion dollar company making billions in profits every quarter. It doesn’t need the subsidies any more, according to Hardman.
“Another school of thought,” Hardman said regarding Musk and EV subsidies, “is that he will not support them, because that will harm the competitors to Tesla, and it will help Tesla become even more sort of dominant in the EV space.”
You may have noticed the prices of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are currently skyrocketing thanks to Trump’s win. Trump embraced the crypto community during his campaign, and many crypto investors think his second administration will streamline regulation and establish a national crypto stockpile, kicking off a crypto renaissance.
It may be tempting to buy in but don’t bet the farm. We’ve seen hot and frothy crypto markets in the past, and we’ve seen them turn into crypto winters. The crypto industry has also turned into an incredibly powerful lobbying force, helping elect pro-crypto candidates with a 100 percent success rate in this year’s cycle. That said, it’s still unclear what crypto is even for other than financial speculation.
So unless you’re an expert in the space, maybe consider buying a heat pump that will heat your home before throwing a few thousand dollars into the crypto ring. This is not financial advice — I’m just saying some technology actually does stuff, which is worth something.
One more thing I’ll say about all of this discouraging information about what Trump might do to America’s climate policy highlights one very important truth: He hasn’t done it yet. Biden’s tax credits and rebates are still in place. So if you were already thinking about getting a heat pump, making the switch to an EV, upgrading your iPhone, or frankly, buying anything imported, that means you’ve got just over two months to do it before Inauguration Day.
“As a consumer myself, I would definitely want to buy something before January 20, if it meant that I’m going to pay less for it,” Brzytwa, from the CTA, told me. And I’m planning on it. I love a deal.
A version of this story was also published in the Vox Technology newsletter. Sign up here so you don’t miss the next one!