The supervisor of a college guide retailer in Halifax is expressing considerations about Canada’s plan to counter-tariff extra American items on April 2nd — saying it might create a ‘disastrous’ state of affairs for guide retailers throughout the nation.
Paul MacKay, who’s labored on the King’s Co-Op Bookstore for greater than a decade, mentioned a 25 per cent tariff on books imported from the USA might put small bookshops in a troublesome place.
He says the answer isn’t so simple as “shopping for Canadian” because the Canadian guide business is reliant on manufacturing south of the border.
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“A whole lot of books which can be by Canadian authors are literally printed within the U.S., or saved within the U.S., so that you may suppose, ‘I’m going to purchase, let’s say any Canadian writer’, even Mark Carney’s guide truly is printed within the U.S., so his books could be topic to a 25 per cent tariff,” MacKay mentioned.
Because of this, he says store house owners are caught between absorbing a 25 per cent improve or passing alongside the worth hike to prospects — two choices that would negatively affect an business already working on slim margins.
Sydney Haines, a college pupil who works on the bookstore, mentioned heightened guide prices will make life extra unaffordable for college kids.
“I’ve had folks come down right here, take a look at the listing worth, balk, and stroll out of right here as a result of they merely simply can’t afford the books anymore. And if this comes into impact, that may multiply tenfold,” she mentioned.
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