Jan
27
2024

But I Was Assured…

Let me see… yup, still here:

This was the day after he imposed tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum. Coming up on six years ago.

Which makes this Reason story from yesterday relevant: Josh Hawley Thinks the White House Can Force an Aluminum Plant To Stay Open.

In response to the news that an aluminum smelting plant in southern Missouri will soon close, Sen. Josh Hawley (R–Mo.) has asked—nay, demanded—that President Joe Biden use his powers to keep the plant open.

The article goes on to point out the connection between 2018 and today:

Hawley's call for more government intervention to protect aluminum manufacturing jobs should also spur some reflection about the last major government intervention that was supposed to protect aluminum manufacturing jobs. Remember those 10 percent tariffs on imported aluminum imposed by then-President Donald Trump in 2018? That was naked protectionism, and the announced closure of this Missouri smelter seems like pretty good evidence that it failed. There's other evidence too: As Hawley points out in his letter, this is the third aluminum smelter in the U.S. to announce plans to downsize in recent months. Unfortunately, the failures of protectionism only ever seem to spur calls for more protectionism.

Just to review, the Tax Foundation did a study of the economic impact of those tariffs back in 2022: How the Section 232 Tariffs on Steel and Aluminum Harmed the Economy. The "key findings" are helpfully summarized:

  • The Section 232 tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum raised the cost of production for manufacturers, reducing employment in those industries, raising prices for consumers, and hurting exports.
  • The jobs “saved” in the steel-producing industries from the tariffs came at a high cost to consumers, at roughly $650,000 per job saved according to the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
  • According to TaxA tax is a mandatory payment or charge collected by local, state, and national governments from individuals or businesses to cover the costs of general government services, goods, and activities. Foundation estimates, repealing the Section 232 tariffs would increase long-run GDP by 0.02 percent and create more than 4,000 jobs.
  • Other estimates, such as those from economists Lydia Cox and Kadee Russ, suggest that job losses from the tariffs were as high as 75,000.

Both Trump and Biden embraced this bad policy. Another reason to hope we have better choices in November.

Also of note:

  • Maybe also hungry. And fatigued. And perhaps slightly nauseated. Evita Duffy-Alfonso has a prediction about recent green activity: Biden’s Natural Gas Shutdown Won’t Help The Environment, But It Will Make You Poor, Cold, And Miserable.

    The Biden Administration announced Friday that it’s putting a stop to the permitting process for several liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminal projects in the name of climate change.

    In a joint statement, “the White House and Department of Energy (DOE) said the pause would occur while federal officials conduct a rigorous environmental review assessing the projects’ carbon emissions, which could take more than a year to complete,” reported Fox News.

  • So I follow my favorite physics professor at the University Near Here on Twitter. And I couldn't resist responding to…

    It's a true story, folks.

    The take-home lesson here is: nobody can make you feel stupid. Not even Feynman.

    (And in this particular case, it was a pretty stupid question, even for the undergrad I was at the time.)