Trump has threatened to impose tariffs on every single export from China to the Untied States, and he might do so as early as December. That would be a mistake that will backfire against the president and against the United States.

The current tariffs on $250 billion worth of goods are painful. Ask any farmer and they’ll tell you that the trade war has hurt their business, dampened their earnings and, potentially, ruined their market share for years to come. Although Trump hastily passed a bailout to protect some of his worst-hit supporters, that federal money is hardly enough to constitute a workable long-term solution. Worse, it distorts the market and fails to set American agriculture up for long-term stability.

But aside from specific sectors many Americans have largely escaped the pain of the trade war, despite current tariffs costing $1.4 billion in August. Here and there, prices are higher but overall, the basic goods that they depend on from China are still flowing uninhibited without tariffs.

That’s because so far the Trump administration, in making its lists of goods subjected to tariffs, carefully left off the items that would have the most impact among consumers in the United States.

Imposing tariffs on all goods, an additional $257 billion, would be a radical departure from that approach and would bring the tariffs home to Americans, making everyone feel the economic pain that is already apparent to some parts of society.

Although that might hasten the end of the trade war and galvanize public opposition toward trade wars going forward, the United States should not have to figuratively shoot itself in the foot with an even larger bullet than we already have to realize the costly damage of tariffs.

If talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping during the G-20 summit fail, Trump’s self-imposed condition for levying the latest round of tariffs, then that will be exactly what we’re doing. Along the way to the inevitable reckoning when consumers are asked to pay more for a president's whim, we will also further damage our relationship with Beijing, further undermine U.S. credibility as a reasonable partner on the world stage and, likely, permanently damage the willingness of overseas partners to view trade with the U.S. as a steady and welcome exchange.

Raising tariffs should be an unacceptable option for Trump as it is an unacceptable outcome from the public.