Unintended Consequences, Part 2: Easy Money = Overcapacity = Trade Wars
Turns out that it’s not. The US in particular seems to lack a sense of humor where the death of its steel industry is involved:
US hits China and others with more steep steel duties
(CNBC) – The U.S. Department of Commerce has imposed more duties on corrosion-resistant steel imports from China and elsewhere in an effort to protect its industry from a glut of steel imports from around the world.On Wednesday, the department’s International Trade Administration, which has conducted an investigation into the “dumping” of steel products into U.S. markets, said it had found the “dumping of imports of corrosive-resistant steel (CORE) products from China, India, Italy, Korea and Taiwan” by various steel producers that it named within those countries.
As a result, the department said that Chinese corrosion-resistant steel would be subject to a final anti-dumping duty of 210 percent and anti-subsidy duty of between 39 percent and up to 241 percent.
China’s low-cost metal producers have been widely cited as the main culprit for a glut in global steel production that has pushed down prices. Last week, the U.S. slapped tariffs of more than 500 percent on Chinese cold-rolled steel, which is used mainly in car production and appliances.
China has been accused by the U.S. and leading figures in the steel industry of “dumping” that cheap steel on to global markets due to a slowdown in domestic demand and a bid to gain global market share at any cost.
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