Jerry Samet has lived in High Point, a small town in North Carolina that has styled itself as the heart of the global furniture industry, for most of his life. After taking the helm of his father’s business, he works from a sprawling warehouse on the edge of town whose showrooms are peppered with bright chairs and desks.
But in recent years the furniture industry veteran has watched the once vibrant sector of his home town decline. Over decades of global trade liberalisation measures, the US furniture industry turned to countries such as China, Mexico and Vietnam for both parts and finished pieces. North Carolina alone has lost more than 60,000 furniture-making jobs since 1990.
This is the dynamic that Donald Trump and his trade officials have said they were trying to reverse with a targeted move in their series of high duties on imported goods.