Monopolies Double Dip with Tariff “Refunds” at the Expense of Workers

So-called refunds from the Trump administration’s tariffs aren’t going back to workers or consumers—they’re going into the pockets of monopolies, despite passing the initial costs off to consumers.

In February, the Supreme Court struck down Trump’s farcically named “Liberation Day” sanctions of April 2025. The Court ordered his administration to pay back $166 billion in tariff revenue. Instead of refunding those who were forced to pay the costs of the tariffs—workers and consumers—so far $100 billion has been paid directly to businesses, per an August court filing.

According to Forbes, major retailers are among the largest recipients of tariff payouts so far. They include Walmart reporting the largest at $2.9 billion, Target receiving $994 million, Home Depot $730 million, and Amazon $600 million. Other monopolies, such as Ross, Lowe’s, and Ace Hardware received eight- and nine-figure refunds.

In earnings calls where the monopolies reported these payouts to investors, many said that they would be using the money to “reinvest” back into the company to maximize profitability.

Some monopolies, including Walmart, Best Buy, and Amazon, claimed that a portion of the refunds would be set aside to offset the costs passed on to consumers. While there is no mechanism to hold them accountable to such promises, it remains another way of investing the payout back into the monopoly to corner a larger share of the market by undercutting competition.

Walmart had its slowest US sales growth in years in Q2 2026. Cuts to SNAP by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) have hurt the retail monopoly, where over a quarter of all food stamps are spent, according to data analytics firm Numerator.

A June 2025 study by the Yale Budget Lab showed the tariffs and OBBBA would reduce the after-tax take-home pay of the bottom 80% of households while increasing the income of the top 10%. For the bottom 10% of households, it amounts to an average annual pay cut of about $2,500.

In an August 2026 update, the Budget Lab concluded that across all households, the average price of the tariffs amounts to $1,100 per year, while the average statutory tariff rate for imported commodities sits at 11.0%, with an increase to 11.8% scheduled for December.

A previous feature in The Worker noted how “tariffs serve three important functions for US monopolists today: to force concessions from rival imperialist powers, particularly Britain, the EU, and social-imperialist China; to extract greater wealth from oppressed nations in the Third World by forcing unequal treaties that lower barriers to US investment and commodities; and to depress wages in the US by raising the cost of imported goods.”

Image: Hyundai’s manufacturing plant near Montgomery, AL, 2010. Credit: Carol M. Highsmith.

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