Is Foreign Steel Flooding the U.S. Market?

There’s been a lot of speculation that foreign steel is flooding the U.S. market with cheap steal. Which is, largely, very true and problematic. However, the numbers have been a bit skewed.

The Economic Policy Institute has claimed that over 500,000 jobs in the steel industry could be lost because of cheap foreign steel making its way into U.S. markets. However, the steel industry currently only houses about 153,000 jobs nationwide, based on a 2013 survey.

The numbers are being inflated by jobs that could potentially be affected outside the steel sector. This would include servers who would no longer serve steelworkers lunch or receptionists in steel factories.

Lately, Korea has been pointed to for most of these cheaper steel imports. However, last year only 1.8 million tons of steel were imported into the U.S. from Korean sources. As we use between 90 and 100 million tons of new steel each year, that seems a small percentage to be raising concerns at the volume that we are.

The numbers will fluctuate and we certainly do need to protect our domestic sources first. However, it seems that the U.S. steel industry is still the primary source for steel in this country and it’s here to stay.

For updates on the national and international steel industry and for all of your steel and pipe needs, contact Florida Pipe & Steel today. We’re happy to help.

Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2014/05/16/if-the-us-steel-industry-employs-150000-people-then-how-can-imports-threaten-500000-jobs/

 

Written by Katapult Marketing

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