China's Need for Metal Keeps U.S. Scrap Dealers Scrounging

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/13/business/worldbusiness/13SCRA.html?hp

LOS ANGELES, March 12 — At a time when toys, televisions and other products made in China are flooding into the United States, helping push the trade deficit to record levels, there is at least one American product for which China has a nearly insatiable demand — industrial junk.

Sales of scrap metal to China have surged, with effects that are ricocheting across the American economy. Prices are soaring not just for scrap, but for metals in general. After years of surpluses that forced many steel makers into bankruptcy, supplies are so tight that contractors told a Congressional hearing in Washington this week that they sometimes cannot obtain supplies at any price.

,,,Both copper and steel industry trade groups are drawing up petitions that would ask the government to temporarily limit scrap exports — an authority that Washington has used only once, in the mid-1970s.

The price of scrap steel has soared to more than $300 a ton, compared with about $156 a ton at the end of 2003 and $77 at the beginning of 2001, according to the Emergency Steel Scrap Coalition, a group backed by steel users and minimills, which use scrap to make about half of the nation's steel. Many minimills have imposed surcharges to pass the higher costs onto customers like automobile and construction companies, with some of them resisting.



This reminds me of WWII= not that I'm that old, but the fact that we had to make steel pennies because of copper shortages.

This cannot be good for America's defense posture at all.

Say what you will about American militarism (I'll likely agree), but huge shortages of materials is really something that can erode America's defenses.

We are beginning to show the effects of becoming poor by becoming an empire.

By the supposed shortages of steel. Galvanized rolled steel hit $.49 per pound this week. That's outrageous.

We manufacture rolling steel doors for commercial buildings, and we are losing money big time. If we raise our prices, we lose out to the giants in the industry. If we don't we risk going under.

Steel isn't the only problem we face. Shipping costs are a huge factor. With the prices of fuel skyrocketing, the transportation industry is killing us. It sometimes costs more for shipping than the cost of the door, and let me tell you these doors aren't cheap.

I did a quote for a customer in California(we're in NY), the price for the door was $985.00, the cost to ship it was $1118.00.

Black is white, up is down. :nuke:

We are spiraling downward quickly.

America, she ain't what she used to be.

back in the 30's he use to see old buicks being loaded on boats,for scap, going to Japan. A few years later he saw them coming back at him during the war.

unlimited supplies of metal?

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Heck, their deserts are still full of stuff left over from the 91 Gulf War !

and 300 a ton ?

heck, so even an old car is worth just 300 for scrap ??

hmmmm

that might explain why up here that most junkyards won't even keep anything older than 10 years old, just crush older ones they do --

and was talking to one of the largest junkyars up here, soon, they plan to only keep stuff 5-7 years old

oh dear, my baby is 25 years old this summer !!

NOT!!!!! fuck every steel purchasing dept in american industry. don`t cry to this ex steel worker and the tens of thousands like me. in the big rush to seek cheap steel you fucked yourselves and this country. what is the phrase?..you reap what you sow?

of total domination) and the U.S. fools around, not looking past the next quarterly returns of 100 corporations. We'll pay for this folly, but the big shots don't care -- they'll just start working for the new masters, or escape to their expensive luxury homes in Bali someplace. The rest of us will end up as Chinese slaves -- but what the heck, we've been nothing but slaves to any of these people anyway.

Not one damn word about why China needs the steel-when i was a kid he plan was not to trade with a communist country-during the cold war the Soviet Union did not hold Most Favored Nation Status-please note that the joint foreign policy caused the Soviet Union to fall-I think the earlier reply is right-China is building a big fat military complex-BTW hats off to steel workers!-In the words of Bruce Springsteen's song Youngstown "you made them rich enough to forget your name" The price we paid for losing our steel industry was horrible-In Allentown, Steelton, Youngstown, fairless Hills-these communities did not recover (oh yeah Pittsburgh which is now insolvent!) we lost a whole generation of jobs-shame on corporate Benedict Arnold traitors:grr:

Yes, they sold our steel industry. Who was it who said that any country is foolish that fails to keep its native capital industry? Right now they're busy selling out our labor market to the lowest bidder. This can only be even more bad news for labor. Who was it who said that one of the right's main goals is to bust labor back to the 19th century? Yes we are slaves, but we're still slaves who are a big drag on the rate of upper management's personal enrichment.

I hope there's an economist out there who can tell us how China's voracious appetite for metal, its strict currency controls, its huge holdings in our national debt, and its vast trade surplus with us all add up (aside from the obvious military implications mentioned by other posters)--it's not like our useless news media would bother to give us the answer to such a relevant question.