Word: steels
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That is not all the big steelmakers want. USX-U.S. Steel has asked Washington to waive antitrust law and let it merge with Bethlehem Steel, National Steel and other troubled companies. USX-U.S. Steel also wants the government to assume the unfunded pension and retiree-health-care obligations of its takeover targets--estimated at $13 billion over the actuarial lifetimes of retirees. At Bethlehem Steel--operating under Chapter 11 protection since October--13,000 workers now support benefits for 130,000 recipients. Much of the money, the steelmakers say, could come from revenues generated by tariffs on imported...
What's good for big steel, though, is likely to spell trouble for the larger U.S. economy--and especially for workers, managers and shareholders of American companies that use steel. The metal is a major component in thousands of industrial and consumer products, from machine tools and office buildings to cars and cookware. Most of those products face tough competition from goods made in countries where steel is already cheaper than...
...Steel producers argue that job losses from higher U.S. steel prices would be minimal. But in a study commissioned by a steel users group, economists Laura Baughman and Joseph Francois concluded that if tariffs rose to 20.7% (a weighted-average figure), the resulting higher steel prices would cost 74,500 jobs in the wider U.S. economy. The number of steel-producing jobs that would be saved: 8,900--at a cost of $451,509 for each protected steelmaking job. Independent analysts agree that the net job loss could number in the tens of thousands. "No matter what Bush decides...
...also likely that import restraints would spark a wider trade war. U.S. imports of key steel products, such as hot-rolled sheet, actually declined from the end of 1998 through 2001, and under World Trade Organization rules, America's trading partners may be authorized to retaliate immediately if the U.S. imposes hefty tariffs or quotas. In a speech in London in December, Pascal Lamy, the European Union's chief trade negotiator, vowed that the E.U. would lodge a WTO complaint if the U.S. blocked steel imports...
...European Union, 65% of the steel is now produced by just five firms, while employment in the industry dropped 33% in the 1990s. Led by giants such as Germany's ThyssenKrupp, the Dutch-Anglo venture Corus and the multinational conglomerate Arcelor, the E.U.'s mills are now among the world's least polluting and most productive. "Should restrictive trade measures be adopted, it still doesn't solve the problems of U.S. integrated producers," says Gordon Moffat of the European Confederation of Iron and Steel Industries...