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Harris Rips Trump as 'One of the Biggest Losers of Manufacturing in American History'
(www.commondreams.org)
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this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2024
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That's what I'm responding to. He didn't cripple the industry. It improved after the tariffs.
They localize production.
One way overseas production can out compete domestic production is by letting the foreign market eat all the externalities to keep production costs low.
Largely because American steel production is as messy as anywhere else.
The future of cheap efficient steel production is going to be centered around electric powered foundries. But set up costs for new foundries are high, and simply costing on existing infrastructure lets prices stay low.
Tariffs/subsidies give developing industries an opportunity to invest in higher efficiency infrastructure without being priced out of the market.
They're not inherently bad. And people being deluded into thinking they are undermines the quality of the industry as a whole, as businesses cling to cheap outdated machinery.
I understand that, but being pedantic doesn't make your points stronger when you handwave the negatives. You also interpret the steel industry as just steel producers but it is also the purchasers who have seen increasing costs due to tariffs.
Us steel has made a smaller portion of worldwide supply, while costing more for usa purchasers. However, even with the tariffs, some Costa are down due to less demand, from a cooling economy, which tariffs are partly to blame for.
Tariffs dont give businesses the opportunity to invest in new infrastructure. They actively make it less necessary for them to do so. They reduce the need to invest in efficiency.
https://www.barrons.com/articles/biden-trump-steel-tariffs-c44f4279
Paywalled.
Did you subscribe to Barons or are you just throwing up something you googled without reading it?
The post COVID economy has been red hot, especially in the States. Pre-COVID we just came off an explosive construction boom. Our current demand for minerals exceeds supply.
You could arguably put inflation on steel tariffs, but that would require you to ignore a deliberate loose domestic lending policy, particularly at the corporate level.
However you slice it...
Is a consequence of poor domestic administration combined with poor foreign ecological controls.
The decision to cash out of US Steel to a Japanese bidder was part of an ongoing liquidation of the industry dating back to the 1990s. That's well before the US began imposing steel tariffs.
The tariffs are a response to federal officials recognizing steel as a strategic domestic asset that has been mismanaged. They are not the cause of the mismanagement.