Tariffs will hit consumers with the lowest incomes hardest. Here’s why.

This trade war’s going to hit everybody’s wallet. The Budget Lab at Yale University estimated fresh produce, for instance, will go up by 4% and clothing prices will rise 17%. That kind of inflation hits people with the lowest incomes hardest.

The Yale Budget Lab also estimated that Trump’s tariffs alone will slash disposable income in the poorest households by at least $1,700 a year. Simply put, the lowest-income households spend more money on necessities.

Steve Blitz, chief U.S. economist at GlobalData TS.Lombard, said the category that’ll hit them hardest is apparel.

“That’s really where they’re going to feel it the most, because they buy clothes like everybody else,” he said.

Blitz said yes, you can hold on to clothes longer and mend tears, but everybody needs new underwear and shirts sometimes.

Sheng Lu is a professor of fashion and apparel studies at the University of Delaware.

“The current reciprocal tariff structure especially leads to a price hike for products targeting the value market,” he said. That means the cheapest clothes, which come from Bangladesh, Cambodia, Sri Lanka — all countries that face some of the highest tariffs. Lu said that puts low-income buyers in a tough position.

“They already have more limited choices compared to more affluent consumers,” he said.

If you’re already buying your underwear from the most affordable brands, there’s nothing cheaper to switch to. You just have to pay the higher price.

That’s a problem people with low incomes face at the grocery store too, said Tim Richards, an agribusiness professor at Arizona State University.

“The top half of income earners, they spend about 10% of their income on food,” he said. “But if you look at the lowest 20% of income earners, they spend 30% of their income on food.”

Richards said those higher-income shoppers can also “trade down,” from, say, the organic vegetables to the cheaper ones.

“It’s one of the real harmful things about tariffs is that the people that are less able to substitute away end up paying the bigger hit,” he said.

And, Richards said, that has health consequences. Because healthier food tends to be more expensive, and if you can’t afford the cheapest vegetables, then you don’t buy any.