Category: Business/Technology

Menzie Chinn, a professor of public affairs and economics at the University of Wisconsin, said, “People are maximally confused.”

To show how uncertainty plays out, Chinn gave an example of potential homebuyers: Lowering interest rates might entice them, but worries about a big drop in home prices over the next year — the kind that might arise from a recession — might scare them away.

“It’s better news, but washed out by this bad uncertainty,” Chinn said.

“Wisconsin has a lot of small companies that rely on imports,” said Chris Wojtowicz of the Small Business Development Center at the Universities of Wisconsin.

Wojtowicz spoke with WPR’s Robin Washington on “Morning Edition” about the local effects of tariffs.

Tim Carr, deputy chair of the real-estate department at the University of Wisconsin, says another option is to invest through online platforms that offer slices of ownership of large properties to investors, a process known as syndication. Two popular platforms—BiggerPockets and RealtyMogul—offer a variety of properties, deal structures and potential returns.

“By trying to protect certain industries, you can actually make other industries more vulnerable,” Lydia Cox, an assistant professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies international trade, said during a recent webinar.

Ethical implications of AI have a wide-ranging scope, Annette Zimmermann — University of Wisconsin Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Affiliate Professor of Statistics — said. One of the foremost concerns being the land and resource use, especially if the sites will be on or around native lands, she said.

“Even if this didn’t happen exactly on tribal lands, there could be a kind of cascading damaging environmental effect that affects like surrounding areas,” Zimmermann said. “And so, that would obviously be hard to contain.”

Consumer beliefs affect retail sales, said Menzie Chinn, a professor in the economics department at the University of Wisconsin. He notes that policy uncertainty can shake the economy.

“If enough people and enough companies put things off because of uncertainty, you can tip the economy into recession,” Chinn told NBC News. “It doesn’t happen overnight, but it multiplies out over time.”

“When it comes to predicting outcomes that could harm people, you have a moral obligation to share that information,” University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Andrea Lopez Lang said.

Lang — who formerly did consulting work for hedge funds and commodities traders — said she was recruited for at least one high-paying job since leaving the private sector, where she translated weather forecasts into actionable guidance ahead of cold weather outbreaks and other weather phenomena.

While these duties may “relieve” struggling U.S. industries, it comes with a cost, Lydia Cox, an assistant economics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and international trade expert, wrote in a 2022 paper. Tariffs create higher input costs for other industries, making them “vulnerable” to foreign competition, Cox wrote. These spillover effects hurt other sectors of the economy, ultimately costing jobs.

There isn’t even the slightest hint of a domestic energy crisis, especially when compared to actual crises that occurred in 1973, 1979 and 2022, Gregory Nemet, professor of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin’s Energy Institute, told ABC News.

“Prices for gasoline are mid-range over the last, say, 20 years,” Nemet said. “There’s plenty of supply. We’re not having electricity outages. We’re not having lines of gas stations.”

While tariffs’ protection may “relieve” struggling U.S. industries, it comes with a cost, Lydia Cox, an assistant economics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and international trade expert, wrote in a 2022 paper.

Tariffs create higher input costs for other industries, making them “vulnerable” to foreign competition, Cox wrote.

“In theory, you should be able to freeze and thaw something forever,” said Allison Mahvi, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. The only practical limit is the lifespan of the batteries’ pumps, valves and heat exchangers, which can last for decades.

Sources included: Email, Andrew Reschovsky, UW-Madison, Feb. 18, 2025.