The waves of tariffs over the past year and a half were supposed to drive a return to domestic manufacturing, but a new study shows the biggest impact has been shifts in the country of origin for U.S. imports.
The Kearney 2026 Reshoring Index, just released, shows that roughly $300 billion in goods brought into the U.S. were sourced from a different country than previously. The report called it a “shock to the system.”
Patrick Van den Bossche, the report’s lead author and partner at Kearney’s Strategic Operations Practice, called the shift “staggering,” something he said he hasn’t seen in the report’s 13-year history.
“If anything, the immediate impact of the tariffs was a gigantic re-stacking of the cards, except the U.S. card wasn’t quite pulled just yet,” he said.
As would be expected China was the biggest loser in this new tariff era, with direct imports falling by almost one-third, accounting for $135 billion in sales gone. Thirteen other Asian countries, including Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand, gained a cumulative $194 billion in imports.
Another winner was Mexico, where exports to the U.S. were up 8 percent from 2024 to 2025, while Europe also gained, producing $62 billion in goods sent to the U.S.
The report did not say how much production returned to the U.S. but given the shifts in global sourcing it appears the reshoring results were minimal at best.