US Trade War
Cost Calculator

About this estimate

Effective September 8, 2026, Canada applies surtaxes of 15%, 25% and 50% to 874 tariff lines of US-origin goods, matching the US Section 338 and Section 232 tariffs dollar for dollar. The measures cover $27.6 billion of imports and reach well into a household's shopping basket — dairy, seafood, clothing, cosmetics, appliances, furniture, smartphones and sporting goods are all on the list.

How the estimate is built

For each category the calculator multiplies four things: what you spend in a year, the share of that spending bought US-origin, the surtax on those goods, and the fraction of a surtax that actually reaches shelf prices. The US-origin share is itself two measured numbers — how much of the category is imported at all, and how much of those imports come from the US. Every figure in the chain is published by the Department of Finance, Statistics Canada or the Bank of Canada; none is invented. The resulting share is shown on every row so you can check the arithmetic.

Why only a quarter of the tariff shows up

A surtax is charged at the border, not at the till, and importers and retailers absorb much of it. The Bank of Canada tracked more than 110,000 products across seven major Canadian retailers through the 2025 counter-tariff round and found prices of tariffed goods rose about 6% against an untariffed control group under a 25% surtax — roughly one quarter of the statutory rate. That 25% pass-through is the figure used here. The same study found no meaningful spillover onto untariffed substitutes, and that prices reversed almost completely within three months once the surtaxes were lifted.

Where the US-origin share comes from

Two measured numbers, multiplied. The first is how much of a category Canada imports rather than makes: from the supply-use tables, that is 12% of dairy, where supply management holds imports down, up to 98% of clothing and 99% of consumer electronics. The second is how much of those imports come from the US, which ranges from 2.6% of clothing to 66% of converted paper. Both steps matter, and missing either one distorts the answer badly: the US supplies 60% of Canadian dairy imports, but because so little dairy is imported at all, that works out to about 7% of what is in your fridge. Clothing runs the other way — almost entirely imported, but hardly any of it American. The three exposure settings halve the result or raise it by half, for households that buy more or less American than average.

Where the household figures come from

The preset spending amounts are Statistics Canada's Survey of Household Spending averages for 2023, the most recent year published, broken out by household type. They are averages across the whole country, so a household in Vancouver or rural Saskatchewan will differ. Every field is editable.

What this does not capture

The figures are sourced, but the mapping between them is a judgement call: which products belong in a category, and which rate applies where a category spans several. Import shares are economy-wide, covering business as well as household purchases, and they are measured at the border rather than at the till, so retail margins are not accounted for. This also covers only the consumer goods on the September 2026 list. Canada's separate 25% counter-tariffs on US autos, steel and aluminum stay in force and are not included, nor is the indirect cost of US tariffs on Canadian exports working through wages and employment. Goods in transit when the measures took effect are exempt, and remission orders can carve out individual products at any time.