Not smart enough to know if tariffs are the answer or not. Consuming certainly became cheaper in a globally competitive economy though it sure seems that we dropped the ball when it came to finding new ways to re-employ people displaced by the redistribution of manufacturing overseas (still don't get how Canada got targeted as the big boogieman).
I am old enough to remember back when most industry was fairly heavily protected by trade barriers of one kind or another. Yeah, I guess America was great back then, childhood was better (at least that's how I reemeber it). Men were mostly employed in what felt at the time like secure, masculin jobs, but there were a lot of things that were "normal" back in the 70's and early 80's that I'm not sure people would go for these day's - like a family having one car, kids walking/biking to school, dad taking the bus to work days when mom had to go shopping. There'd be one TV, one phone for all to share, going out to eat would be reserved for
special occasions, fruit in the winter was a treat, you got two weeks vacation a year - a week to visit the in-laws at Christmas and maybe a week in July at lake Wassepenamee. Two cars, a tv in every room, cell phones for all, beach vacations, Disney, Hawaii, ski trips- that was all rich people stuff.
Honestly it'd probably be better for our mental health and the planet writ large to learn how to live without so much cheap crap. I just don't think most people are willing, much less capable of that kind of change without massive social and economic upheaval- but maybe that's what the powers that be have in mind.