I fear that President Bush’s action on the import tariffs on steel is wrong and ill-timed (“Bush moves to shelter ailing U.S. steelmakers; Tariffs will range up to 30%,” Page 1, March 6). The steel industry in America has been on the decline for many years and for many reasons, including executive incompetence with respect to not modernizing the manufacturing processes. The large steel companies have not modernized their plants the way the smaller integrated steel producers have, so they go out of business.
The path that President Bush and Congress should take is to examine why steel exporters around the world can produce and ship steel cheaper than can the U.S. steel industry. With our free-market economy, we should not erect tariffs to protect obsolete companies. Why should the American people pay more for products that contain steel just so U.S. companies can be the manufacturers of that steel?
