"How dare you offer us your dirt-cheap solar panels, China! Now that's just going too far. If we let this continue, solar panels might start to become far too affordable for us Americans. That's simply unacceptable."(Reuters) - The United States hit Chinese solar companies with punitive import tariffs of 30 percent or more on Thursday, ruling they had dumped cut-price solar panels into the U.S. market.
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Other Chinese companies could now face a 250 percent tariff, although those levels could be altered before the final ruling is issued from the Commerce Department in the coming months.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/u-sets-tariffs-ch ... nance.html

Cheap solar panel imports are bad for domestic solar companies but good for people who want to buy affordable solar panels. Since the domestic solar companies have more lobbying power than the average Joe, guess who gets their way?
Protectionism is alive and well in the U.S.