Metal & Oil & Gas News – Nctv.net
The Washington Post, citing experts at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, reported that US President Trump’s steel tariffs are costing American consumers USD 900,000 for every job the tariffs have created or saved. According to the Peterson Institute for International Economics, US companies have been paying roughly 10% more for steel since Trump’s tariffs went into effect nearly a year ago, amounting to about USD 11.5 billion per year. The Alliance for American Manufacturing claims that more than 12,700 jobs have been created or saved because of Trump’s tariffs, which is how the experts came to the USD 900,000 per job figure.
According to calculations by experts at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, the cost is more than 13 times the typical salary of a steelworker. Mr Gary Hufbauer, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute who did the steel tariff cost calculation, said “It’s very high. It’s arresting. The reason it’s so high is that steel is a very capital intensive industry. There are not many workers.”
Trump has claimed that other countries are paying the tariff bill, but evidence shows the tariffs are taxes paid by Americans. U.S. companies that buy metals are either absorbing higher costs or passing them along to consumers. Mr James Knott Jr, chief executive of Riverdale Mills Corporation in Northbridge, Massachusetts, which makes wire mesh products for everything from fences to commercial fishing nets, said “The consumer pays for this in the end. They just don’t always recognize it. These 232 tariffs protect my foreign competition rather than protecting me.”
Pressure is growing on Trump to remove steel and aluminum tariffs that were put in place in March 2018, but the president continues to say the tariffs are working.
Source : THE WASHINGTON POST
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