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Post by John B on Mar 3, 2018 20:04:50 GMT -5
*lie*
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Post by timfarney on Mar 3, 2018 20:06:16 GMT -5
"The biggest problem here is a very simple one: There are a lot more American businesses, jobs and money in the industries that use steel and aluminum than there are in the American steel and aluminum industries. A lot." That's a problem. We need more people making steel and aluminum in this country. Sadly, not everyone can be a programmer. So, we'll just have to agree to disagree. Trump is trying to get jobs for people in this country and I support that, as long as he doesn't raise the price of Scotch. I agree that we need to replace the lost steel and aluminum jobs in this country. I disagree that Trump really cares. What leaves nothing to disagree with is what you quoted above. Increasing steel and aluminum prices is a net job loser. But bringing back steel jobs played well in the rust belt, kinda like bringing back coal. Neither are going to happen, and he’ll do far more harm than good in pretending they will. That’s why I think he doesn’t care...or doesn’t get it...or both.
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Post by brucemacneill on Mar 3, 2018 20:15:43 GMT -5
"The biggest problem here is a very simple one: There are a lot more American businesses, jobs and money in the industries that use steel and aluminum than there are in the American steel and aluminum industries. A lot." That's a problem. We need more people making steel and aluminum in this country. Sadly, not everyone can be a programmer. So, we'll just have to agree to disagree. Trump is trying to get jobs for people in this country and I support that, as long as he doesn't raise the price of Scotch. I agree that we need to replace the lost steel and aluminum jobs in this country. I disagree that Trump really cares. What leaves nothing to disagree with is what you quoted above. Increasing steel and aluminum prices is a net job loser. But bringing back steel jobs played well in the rust belt, kinda like bringing back coal. Neither are going to happen, and he’ll do far more harm than good in pretending they will. That’s why I think he doesn’t care...or doesn’t get it...or both. So, we'll just agree to disagree.
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Post by aquaduct on Mar 3, 2018 20:19:18 GMT -5
It could have been avoided. And I know it wasn't directed at me. But, it did encourage me to take a very nice nap. So, that part of it was good. Happy to help.
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Post by epaul on Mar 3, 2018 20:20:35 GMT -5
Tim, when you say we can not nor should not replace lost steel and aluminum jobs in this country, does that mean you believe we should let our steel and aluminum industries dwindle and disappear because we can buy our steel and aluminum cheaper from China than we can produce it here?
Forget about Trump and partisan politics for the moment. If our metal industries are no longer competitive with imported metal, do we stop mining ore and manufacturing steel? Do we let our plants go idle and decay?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2018 20:45:23 GMT -5
Cheaper isn't always better and, often, it turns out it's not always cheaper.
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Post by epaul on Mar 3, 2018 20:48:54 GMT -5
I don't know what Tim thinks and I won't presume.
I do know that there are those, many of them prominent, who believe that if our mining and metal industries can't compete, they should die.
It doesn't matter to them that one reason they have difficulty matching Chinese steel dollar for dollar is because our mines need to operate with some degree of environmental responsibility and subsequent environmental restoration, something that adds to the cost of domestic ore. Nor does it matter that Chinese mines operate under no such restrictions, costs, or concerns regarding air and water quality.
And it doesn't matter that American steel plants have to control their emissions, burn fuel that has an environmental surcharge, and can't freely dump shit into our rivers; factors all that add to the cost of American steel. Nor does it matter that Chinese steel plants can operate with an environmental impunity, turning their skies yellow and their waters gray, which confers a nice savings in production costs.
It doesn't matter that American miners and steel workers earn union wages and benefit from OSHA safety regulations that add to cost of American steel. Nor does it matter that Chinese workers are paid squat and are expendable to the state, which offers Chinese steel a nice competitive edge.
And apparently it doesn't matter to some that what was once considered to be a vital American industry could disappear because we didn't want to pay for the environmental and humane restrictions we placed upon it. Mines and steel plants, after all, are dirty, messy things. We don't want dirty messy things in our garden. Our land is for frolic and flowers. The Chinese can do that dirty messy stuff for us.
We will turn our mines into museums and our steel plants into monuments to error.
Oh fiddle la dee, an actor's life for me.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 3, 2018 20:53:38 GMT -5
I've been looking through the Proboards terms of service and signup screens, and I can't find where I upload my resume, work history, and list of qualifications-to-comment, which are apparently required before I can post an opinion or address an argument on a given topic. Nor is it clear how far back I need to go or whether I need to submit letters of recommendation or other supporting documents. Someone please direct me to the appropriate page(s), since I am looking forward to being allowed to take part in the vigorous discussions I see here. At least the ones in which it is judged that I have applicable expertise and skin in the game. That few or none of you have ever been under fire (an assumption) didn't stop the Trump "I woulda rushed in without a gun!" thread from growing absurdly long. Opine away, I says.
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Post by james on Mar 3, 2018 20:55:37 GMT -5
Are you feeling alright Aquaduct? Or are you going to to <lie> down or are you going to carry on with that attitude?
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Post by epaul on Mar 3, 2018 21:32:53 GMT -5
You know, if you two could just sit down and pick a little guitar and maybe tip a couple brews, well... ok, you still probably wouldn't like each other and you would probably end up shaking your beer bottles and squirting each other at ten paces. But, try cohabit a forum without keeping Marty awake past his bedtime. You both offer perspectives I value and learn from... and neither one of you is the bastard/nitwit you imagine the other to be.
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Post by aquaduct on Mar 3, 2018 22:05:55 GMT -5
Are you feeling alright Aquaduct? Or are you going to to <lie> down or are you going to carry on with that attitude? Oh, I'm fine. Just enjoying watching epaul make my arguments for me. I knew he could and probably would. Smart guy (although I still think he gets it from his wife). Carry on.
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Post by Russell Letson on Mar 3, 2018 22:10:29 GMT -5
Opine away, I says. "O-pun the door," said the jester, and died happy.
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Post by Fingerplucked on Mar 3, 2018 22:54:32 GMT -5
To start with the obvious, we don’t need steel. Consumers don’t want or need packages of steel from Walmart or the grocery store, and the military doesn’t fight wars by flinging blobs of steel at the enemy. What we want are cars, planes, tanks, guns, and all the end products that just happen to be made out of steel.
What sense does it make to impose tariffs that will raise prices of all those end products, making those products more expensive and less competitive, costing jobs and hurting those industries which happen to employ thousands of workers for every steel industry job? How does it serve our national interest to cripple the automotive and other manufacturing industries that currently rely on affordable steel?
If it’s in our national interest to bolster the capacity of our raw steel plants, then, in the interest of our nation, maybe we ought to nationalize the industry. Second choice would be to subsidize a few companies and closely regulate them, including price controls, much the same as we do with utility companies.
But imposing a tariff while blindly pretending that it will make everything better and a great return to yesteryear is just fucking stupid.
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Post by epaul on Mar 4, 2018 1:51:01 GMT -5
Jim has a point. If a 25% tariff on dumped Chinese steel raised the price of a car by $150*, I certainly would never buy another car ever, nor would, I expect, anyone else. And there goes the auto industry. So, better to let American mining and steel wither and slowly die than kill the auto industry. Then, like Jim suggested, we could nationalize the last one to drop and let the government run it. That way if China at some point should decide to leverage our economy's near total dependence on imported Chinese steel to their advantage, we can smugly say, "Oh, go ahead and try. We have a government run steel company that produces nearly 10% of what we need, so go sit on a tack.
* I don't know what figures are correct and which aren't, but three pages of googling came up with 700 lbs of steel in a mid-sized car. I then factored a corresponding 25% rise in steel prices. A new refrigerator might run you an extra $15. And a banjo an extra $3 (if you spring for a resonator). Corvettes will remain a bargain.
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Post by epaul on Mar 4, 2018 1:54:18 GMT -5
Now, it is entirely possible, maybe even likely, that a tariff on Chinese steel is a bad idea that will only hurt and not help. But, it strikes me that there should be more to this discussion of imported steel and its effect on the American steel and mining industry than "Trump is an idiot" and "Accept it, American industry, you are a dead man walking". But, that is what we are getting. "Trump is an orange-headed asshole" and "Accept the future American drones. What you did is gone and what you are doing is going. But, you can have a wonderful future working out of your rented home selling Chinese shit over the internet."
Forget about Trump. Forget about the tariff. Odds are it will be gone in the next tweet. Forget your Trump feelings, whatever they are. Bernie would have been raising this same issue (and many of you loved him). As would any good traditional Democrat; the kind that no longer exits or is in hiding having been run over by the new "Green Machine" and ridiculed by "The Deep Thinking Futurists".
Is there more to this steel issue than Trump?
Are the fucking Chinese cheating? I know, that wouldn't be at all like them, but is it possible?
Are some of America's basic industries suffering, not from the cold fingers of a future that has no place for them, but from chains we have shackled them to? Chains the Chinese don't suffer from. Or pay for?
And to that end, the environment and regulation end, could we then call a tariff on Chinese steel not a tariff at all, but rather a "Green Equivalence Measure" or an "Earth Friend Fee"? Some fancy new name with "green" in it to dress up an import tax designed to protect domestic industries that have to comply with regulations designed to protect the environment from foreign competitors that don't have to comply with shit?
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Post by jdd2 on Mar 4, 2018 6:49:16 GMT -5
epaul--you need to factor in retaliatory actions/behaviors by whoever is affected by the tariffs. You seem to have left that out of the above two posts. How about if the chinese decide to resume full trade with DPRK, even encouraging its expansion, as a reaction to the tariffs?
And trump has already called them tariffs, there's not much need to be calling them by cute new names now.
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Post by timfarney on Mar 4, 2018 8:54:37 GMT -5
Jim has a point. If a 25% tariff on dumped Chinese steel raised the price of a car by $150*, I certainly would never buy another car ever, nor would, I expect, anyone else. And there goes the auto industry. So, better to let American mining and steel wither and slowly die than kill the auto industry. Then, like Jim suggested, we could nationalize the last one to drop and let the government run it. That way if China at some point should decide to leverage our economy's near total dependence on imported Chinese steel to their advantage, we can smugly say, "Oh, go ahead and try. We have a government run steel company that produces nearly 10% of what we need, so go sit on a tack. * I don't know what figures are correct and which aren't, but three pages of googling came up with 700 lbs of steel in a mid-sized car. I then factored a corresponding 25% rise in steel prices. A new refrigerator might run you an extra $15. And a banjo an extra $3 (if you spring for a resonator). Corvettes will remain a bargain. I’m sure there’s math that can make it look insignificant, and math that can make it look important. The point is, a tariff on foreign steel won’t bring back the American steel industry, but it will negatively impact the many other industries that use steel. It’s a net loss. It’s a solution to nothing. This is political theater. This is Trump staring across the table at the Chinese and saying “You’re fired!” Except it’s not a game anymore; we didn’t cut to a commercial, the Dow dropped 600 points. The Dow will recover. He probably won’t impose the tariffs. The whole thing will probably be forgotten, swept away with his next bit. Meanwhile, there are industries that could still be saved, industries that we could be building, jobs we could be creating...and now, a message from Tidy Bowl....
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Post by Deleted on Mar 4, 2018 10:03:44 GMT -5
Opinions aren't facts. What is the first step one could take to begin to reverse a process? If any? Kill, killing regulations? Work on reversing the trade balance? Oh wait! Do we want any of this reversed? I believe too many people want the steel and coal industries dead. Jobs, national security etc. be damned. Feelings!
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Post by Fingerplucked on Mar 4, 2018 10:49:56 GMT -5
Opinions aren't facts. What is the first step one could take to begin to reverse a process? If any? Kill, killing regulations? Work on reversing the trade balance? Oh wait! Do we want any of this reversed? I believe too many people want the steel and coal industries dead. Jobs, national security etc. be damned. Feelings! Tom, this isn’t aimed at you personally, but why would anyone who favors capitalism want to reverse a process? Doesn’t the market take care of itself? Doesn’t the Invisible Hand know best? Isn’t Creative Destruction a good thing? Should we pass new legislation to bring back buggy whips? Free market advocates have no business supporting tariffs, protectionist policies, or subsidization. They don’t get to argue for government intervention when it suits their fancy. Maybe the above applies to you and maybe it doesn’t. I’ll let you decide. It sucks not to be me, though. I like capitalism. I think it is a very efficient system that also breeds abuses and evils, and thus needs oversight, restrictions and regulations. So I get to argue whatever suits my fancy. At times that will mean more freedoms for the market and at other times more regulations and interventions. In the case of steel and coal, I don’t hate either one of them. I think steel is necessary, at least for now, and that coal is an anachronism that is dying because there are better economic and environmental alternatives. I don’t want to see our steel industry decline any further, but propping it up through means that are going to cause far worse repercussions when there are currently more economically feasible alternative sources from around the world just doesn’t make good sense. And BTW, not that this was your point, and not that I remember Bernie Sanders talking about steel, I disagreed with a lot of what Bernie had to say, like his views on TPP and guns. I agreed with Bernie more than disagreed, but there was no sense of giving him blanket approval for everything he favored. Likewise, I don’t disagree with Trump on everything he says, just because he favors something.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 4, 2018 10:58:40 GMT -5
Opinions aren't facts. What is the first step one could take to begin to reverse a process? If any? Kill, killing regulations? Work on reversing the trade balance? Oh wait! Do we want any of this reversed? I believe too many people want the steel and coal industries dead. Should we pass new legislation to bring back buggy whips? That's what you got from my post? Is the steel industry "buggy whips"? One is a product, one is a process. Perhaps, when the reason they are not selling is not lack of demand but regulations that destroy the industry that produces them, we should get rid of any regulation that is preventing "buggy whips" from being produced. Not "capitalism" but a free(r) market.
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