I’ve been buying steel for a few years. It’s been a relatively stable market. Today I returned from the steel store with a whole new reality. What I bought one week ago was $22 per unit. Today that unit costs $45. That’s a 100 percent increase in seven days! They blamed it on the tariffs. I agree. Steel tariffs are allowing American steel producing companies to raise their prices tremendously.
Every industry uses steel tools, machinery and consumables. Nearly everything has steel in it: buildings, bridges, planes, trains, vehicles, appliances, furniture, electronics — the list is huge. The price of almost everything from paper clips to rent could well go up. This is one economic area where trickle-down and trickle-out will certainly happen. Hopefully the tariffs will be killed soon, but there will be a lot of damage in the meantime. And, sometimes even with competition, once prices go up, they don’t easily come down. We will see.
Why would Trump ignore virtually every expert’s advice and impose this new “tax” on all Americans? Who’s he listening to, and who is he working for? Let’s reclaim presidential sanity and maturity in 2020!
Brad Thompson, Murray