The importer pays directly. There are three ways the importer can deal with the burden of that. In most cases it will be a combination of all three of them.

1. Raise the price they sell the imported item for.

2. Eat it.

3. Lower the price they are willing to pay the exporter.

For the Trump tariffs it has been overall it has been about 90-96% #1 and #2 and 4-10% #3. I haven't seen a breakdown of how #1 and #2 is split.

Tariffs almost never make sense, unless it's an industry that's super important for your own survival.

Capitalism is about efficiency, and eventually there are going countries where producing certain items will always be more efficient. East asian countries have spent decades innovating and investing in their manufacturing capabilities.

Also, one thing that grinds my nerves are the narratives of trade balances that only focus on physical goods but conveniently ignore services.

US exports trillions in software, ai, music, videogames, financial services, cloud, and that's conveniently ignored.

Eventually tariffs come back biting those who issue them, because the moment your local industries don't need to compete anymore to survive, they have no incentives to innovate.

Tariffs are a cost a country incurs upon itself to protect industries that are critical, not for their profits, but for the capabilities they offer.

It's paying more for something just to keep it domestically available for purposes of national security.

It's nonsense, that's why it's hard to understand.

Next time you wonder why a Trump supporter has a bad argument, remind yourself there was a nonzero number of them who literally drank bleach and Lysol after he told them too.