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This is Planet Money from NPR.

The first ships with the 145% tariffed goods from China had just started pooling into

U.S. ports last week when, just a few days later, the U.S. announced that that mind-bendingly

high tariff was now gone, paused.

The U.S. and China agreed to temporarily bring the tariff way, way, way back down

from 145% on most Chinese imports to 30%, though the tariff on things like cars and steel and

aluminum is higher, about 50%. And, you know, the deal came pretty quickly after talks in Geneva, and it was

maybe unexpected or maybe not at all unexpected because the 145% tariff on China and China's

retaliatory tariff on the U.S. was already threatening a global recession. And in all the

tit for tat back and forth, some companies caught really

unlucky, like those whose goods arrived at U.S. ports before the pause. If a medium-sized

company had a million dollars worth of goods imported, they had to pay an extra million and a half

dollars on top of that just in the tariff. And had their ships

arrived, like a day later, their bill would be punched to the gut so much less. And even though

this unprecedented tariff only lasted a month, it already inflicted its scars on the economy.

Today on the show, what a month of 145% tariffs

looked like and felt like for three people in the global economy whose lives were all affected

and still will be. We'll start at the biggest port in the Western Hemisphere. Yes, hi. Nice to meet you.

Oh, in a suit at the port on a 93-degree day.

...