Amid U.S. President Donald Trump’s imposition of tariffs on a range of imported goods this year, Chinese leader Xi Jinping and other officials in Beijing have insisted that there are no winners in trade wars. In absolute terms, they’re right: Everyone is worse off in a trade war. But in relative terms, the negative impacts of protectionism are unevenly distributed by gender, with men often coming out ahead.

After all, these policies are based not only on economic calculations but on political ones, influenced by gender norms that value work that has been traditionally performed by men over that performed by women. This political agenda is often tied to right-wing populist movements. As part of their promise to return to a vaunted past, these movements directly appeal to disillusioned male voters, promising to help them reclaim their lost sense of self—as well as their privileged position in society. Yet their policies further entrench gender inequality around the world, while limiting women’s economic opportunities and raising prices.

The Trump administration’s raft of tariffs are an apt example, as most of them are clearly aimed at protecting traditionally male-dominated industries, most prominently the 50 percent tariffs on steel, aluminum and copper imports and the 25 percent tariff on many automobiles and auto parts. These tariffs are supposed to bring back factory jobs in communities affected by deindustrialization and the shift in the U.S. toward the service economy.

This effort to “reshore” manufacturing jobs by protecting domestic firms from foreign competition is based on an overly nostalgic view of the past that misrepresents the nature of factory work. One reflection of this warped portrayal is that most people who want to see more manufacturing jobs in the U.S. would prefer that other people work those jobs. According to a 2024 survey, 80 percent of respondents believed that “America would be better off” if more Americans worked in manufacturing, yet only 1-in-4 respondents said that they personally would be better off working in a factory.

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Protecting such industries protects jobs disproportionately held by men. Women hold only 30 percent of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. and 1-in-4 managerial positions in that industry. Reflecting on the first Trump administration’s tariffs, Rachel Brewster observed, “The political promise to restore the employment status of ‘big, strong guys’ in industries such as steel rather than electronics manufacturing is, in part, about restoring a previous social order in which these men dominated.”

Republican political operative Vish Burra put it even more bluntly in a post on X earlier this year: “Men in America don’t need therapy. Men in America need tariffs and DOGE,” he wrote, referring to the so-called Department of Government Efficiency. “The fake email jobs will disappear. Competing with women like this for REAL JOBS will be over. Kitchens will be filled and sandwiches will be made. Fertility rates will go to the moon.” The political nostalgia that surrounds tariffs is tied to the belief that we can return to a simpler time when men were manly and women kept quiet about their oppression.

Protectionist policies entrench gender inequality around the world while limiting women’s economic opportunities and raising prices.

It’s not just the United States that has been gripped by populist trade policies based on antiquated gender norms. The 2019 general election in the United Kingdom—which pitted then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson, a Conservative, against the Labour Party’s Jeremy Corbyn—became a contest over what type of man it would take to run the country and what the U.K.’s place in the world would be as it exited the European Union. As Chatham House’s Thomas Raines observed at the time, Corbyn struck a cosmopolitan pose while Johnson took “a more mercantilist approach to international affairs.”

Tied to this was each man’s performance of masculinity. As Jessica Smithnoted, Johnson’s campaign stunt of demolishing a wall with a digger “emblazoned with his campaign slogan ‘Get Brexit Done’ … resonated with the ‘bolschie’ masculinity associated by some with Johnson.” In contrast, Corbyn was “known for being a ‘grandfatherly’ figure who makes jam with fruit from his allotment.” The message was clear: Johnson was committed to protecting British manufacturing industries by getting Brexit done, even if it meant relying on brute force and leaving a mess behind.

After winning in a landslide, Johnson made good on his masculine posturing by focusing on Brexit even as the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. As a part of negotiating an exit from the EU, Johnson also focused on protecting manufacturing industries by applying tariffs on imported steel. The Cato Institute’s Ryan Bourne noted the politics underlying the decision: “As ever with steel, the prime minister worries that floods of cheap imports would otherwise undermine domestic producers’ viability, with the government keen to protect a declining industry.” But it’s not just about the location of these industries—it’s also that they are dominated by men. As in the U.S., roughly 75 percent of the manufacturing work force in the U.K. is male.

As populist trade policies emerged in the U.S. and U.K., they have pushed other countries to adopt similar measures, resulting in tit-for-tat protectionist exchanges. For example, Canada has responded to Trump’s tariffs by adopting its own hefty taxes on imported American steel, aluminum and cars.

Regardless of whether tariffs were adopted to bolster the masculinity of displaced factory workers or in retaliation for other countries’ protectionism, their rising popularity threatens women’s position in the global economy and takes aim at their pocketbooks. According to the International Monetary Fund, “Trade has the potential to significantly boost women’s role in the economy, reduce inequality, and expand women’s access to skills and education.” This is in part because companies that export a higher share of their products tend to employ more women. This means freer trade—and the demand it creates for women’s labor—can chip away at the gender wage gap.

This is not to suggest that free trade is a panacea for gender equality—indeed, women are often hired by exporting firms because they are thought to be cheaper than men and less likely to unionize, hardly ideal conditions of employment. But walking away from free trade can also close off opportunities that women have used to enter the work force and improve their material well-being.

There is also some evidence that tariffs end up costing women more than they do men. Looking at Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, one study from April found they will “result in a weighted average tariff of 33 percent on women’s clothing in the U.S. market compared to just 30 percent on men’s.” Everyone’s clothes will get more expensive, but women will face an even steeper price hike.

Sensitive to Trump’s declining approval ratings as a result of continued high prices, his administration has recently been scaling back tariffs and rethinking its mercantilist ways. This provides an important opportunity to turn a critical eye to which industries are considered worthy of protection in the first place. We all pay a hefty price when we let our trade policy become a balm for fragile masculinity.

Hilary Matfess is an assistant professor at the University of Denver’s Josef Korbel School of International Studies. She is also a Council on Foreign Relations term fellow, a research fellow at the Research on International Policy Implementation Lab and a nonresident senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ (CSIS) Africa Program. Her latest book is “Putting Women in their Place.”

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