Since the industrial revolution, the textile industry, as a representative of industrial development, has followed the relevant industrial chain from Europe, to the United States, to Japan and South Korea, and then to the four Asian Tigers, and later to China, and now to Southeast Asia.
Behind the transfer of the industrial chain, there are policies to promote, but more is the impact of economic laws, labor costs and other factors, and the first barrel of blond hair accumulated by the textile industry in the late-developing countries gradually began to develop other industries.
But recent moves in the United States seem to indicate that they intend to rebuild the textile industry chain that has been basically eliminated by them.
The United States imports 97.5% of its clothing
According to CCTV finance reports, in the tariff list released by Trump on April 2, the United States will impose more than 30% "reciprocal tariffs" on Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and other countries. Vietnam's exports account for nearly 90 percent of its economy, and the United States is its largest export market, with a trade surplus of $123.5 billion in 2024.
In particular, the clothing industry, according to statistics, only 2.5% of the United States clothing and 1% of footwear for local manufacturing, Vietnam and other Asian countries are the main source of imports of American clothing, shoes and hats. In addition to Vietnam, the garment and textile industries in Cambodia and Thailand are also difficult to escape. According to relevant statistics, it is expected that the garment exports of Cambodia and Thailand will fall by 30% and 25% respectively after the implementation of tariffs.
Bringing the textile industry back to America
On April 6, 2025, local time, Peter Navarro, a senior White House trade adviser, expressed many complaints about Vietnam in an interview, including leving value-added tax, evading tariffs through transshipment, just labeling products as "made in Vietnam", using some false standards, etc. He also said that Vietnam is one of the largest dumping countries. It also pointed out that the anti-dumping investigation of the US Department of Commerce has shown that Vietnam has export subsidies.
U.S. Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer also said Trump wants to bring the textile industry back to the United States, naming all Vietnamese and Cambodian garment factories that must move back to the United States.
Although the idea of bringing the textile industry back to the United States sounds a bit absurd, it is partly the idea of the White House team.
Can the US really rebuild the textile industry chain?
So the question is, can the United States really rebuild the textile industry chain in the United States?
The first is the labor cost, as a traditional labor-intensive industry, the labor occupies the big part of the textile industry, the labor cost of the United States has increased several times more than Vietnam, superimposed nearly two years of big inflation, want to recruit workers, at least let workers do these jobs when they can support themselves, but to workers such a high wage, a piece of clothing to sell how much money enterprises can make money?
The second is the quality of workers, as a developed country, the illiteracy rate of the United States even more than 20%, even if the textile and garment industry is relatively not so high requirements for workers, but also need basic training, but also need workers to bear hardships, which is also a big problem.
The third is time, even the most basic textile industry chain, the time taken to rebuild it is also calculated in years. Can be like Wal-Mart such a large business super inventory cycle generally in 30-40 days, according to the United States today's tariffs, the world basically no country can give him large-scale supply, as we all know that the goods are not automatically grown out of the shelves, wait a month or two after the goods sold out, how should the people maintain a normal life?
The fourth is the interest rate, in the United States before a series of interest rate hikes, the risk-free interest rate of the United States Treasury bonds has been close to 5%, which is equal to a factory profit below 5% there is no living space, if you want to operate normally, the profit margin is higher, this textile people have the most say, now the textile industry where there is such a high profit?
Therefore, even if the United States really has the heart to rebuild the textile industry chain, objective conditions do not allow it. More likely to end up in a field of chicken feathers.
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