Big Take What the End of the De Minimus Trade Loophole Means for Your Shopping
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Aug 25, 2025 Laura Curtis, a Bloomberg Global Trade reporter, discusses the significant change in U.S. customs regulations with the end of the de minimis exemption, which has allowed low-cost international packages to enter tariff-free for decades. She explains how this shift could raise prices for consumers and complicate shipping for small businesses and postal services. The conversation also touches on the broader implications for global trade dynamics and how this decision might reshape shopping behaviors and economic policies in the U.S. and beyond.
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De Minimis Was Big In Aggregate
- The de minimis exemption let ~4 million low-value packages enter the U.S. duty-free, totaling about $1 billion last year.
- Removing it ends a long-standing carve-out that scaled from $1 in the 1930s to $800 by 2016.
Postal Services Halt U.S. Shipments
- Several national postal services announced they would stop taking certain packages bound for the U.S. ahead of the change.
- They said they "have never had to handle" this amount of paperwork and lack a mechanism to collect tariffs.
U.S. Threshold Grew While Others Stayed Low
- The de minimis rule evolved from $1 to $800 over decades to avoid costly low-value customs processing.
- Other countries keep much lower thresholds, showing the U.S. was an outlier that enabled cheap imports.