Winning! USA's largest Nail Manufacturer on the brink of closing!

Located in Poplar Bluff, Missouri! Known as the "Gateway to the Ozarks".

A small town in an area that voted 80% for Trump!

Largest US nail manufacturer 'on the brink of extinction' because of the steel tariffs

The Mid-Continent Nail plant in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, laid off 60 of its 500 workers last week because of increased steel costs. The company blames the 25% tariff on imported steel. Orders for nails plunged 50% after the company raised its prices to deal with higher steel costs.

The company is in danger of shutting production by Labor Day (September 1st) unless the Commerce Department grants it an exclusion from paying the tariffs

Mid-Continent Nail is "on the brink of extinction," he said.

Glassman said the company might relocate to Mexico, where it could buy the steel without the tariffs — and then export the finished nails back to the United States without tariffs, which only apply to raw materials.

Glassman called President Donald Trump's trade policy misguided. He noted that the company had doubled its work force since 2013, and thrived despite increased competition from China.

And this????

About 21,000 US companies have filed for tariff exclusions. In a June 20 Senate hearing, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Mid-Continent had filed a request for an exclusion only two days earlier.

"I'm not belittling their situation at all. But given the importance of it to them, it's very unfortunate that they waited all these weeks to file the request," he said.

That is Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross saying tough sh*&.

21,000 US companies have asked the Feds to exclude them from the Steel Tariffs?

So the Trump administration (Government) now has power over the free markets and what companies live or die?

And if these Steel Tariffs are such a great thing, then why do over 20,000 US companies need a special exception from the government to survive?

The US Chamber of Commerce has estimated that 2.6 million US jobs are at risk because of the Trump administration's hard-line policies on trade, although that estimate includes the impact of ending NAFTA. The tariffs that have already been proposed could cost the US economy about 700,000 jobs by next summer, according to Moody's Analytics.

"They are scared, they are worried about their families. It's not like there are tons of other manufacturing jobs," he said. "If I were a Mid-Continent worker, I would be extremely unhappy with what this administration is doing."

MORE:

Local Missouri Riverfront Times:
Trump's Tariffs Are Causing Cascading Layoffs in Missouri
At the beginning of June, the Mid Continent Nail Corporation in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, had more than 500 employees. But Donald Trump’s recent updates to tariffs on steel goods caused the company to lose 50 percent of its business in two weeks


www.riverfronttimes.com...

FOX NEWS
Largest US nail manufacturer ‘on the brink of extinction’ because of the steel tariffs
fox6now.com...

a reply to: soberbacchus

this may turn out that this was a bad strategy, but it's not done yet. I think the goal was to spark more US steel production and buying, so we would import less, and be more self sufficient, along with creating more jobs and long term stability. If it fails, then it fails, and will be a stain on Trump's blue dress.

a reply to: soberbacchus

Hopefully Trump's team will react appropriately to this.

I would recommend using some of the 800 billion that was going to China and other foreign nations to put together temporary subsidies for US steel.

The solution helps 2 fold. It would affirm the administrations desire to support US steel and actually strengthen production. While at the same time providing world class US steel to the US manufacturers in need. Exempting 20,000 companies simply puts us back to square 1 which is unacceptable.

US money staying in the US economy, moving through the ecomy. It's like a stimulation package for US manufacturering.

We currently subiside industries that no longer actually need our subsidies so it shouldn't be complicated to subside the industries that actually do need it. Maybe we could cut back some of the corporate welfare going to big oil and other large corporations and end up with zero net increase to the taxpayer.

Hopefully they are smart enough to fix the problem before it has any serious impact on the US job force.

So we gained 200000 jobs this month and lost 60. Guess those guys will be CNN's new attempt to assist Democrats in forcing out our elected president. The employees should be quite ticked with their managements failure and its delay in applying for the waiver.

Just wondering how many chapters of this "Winning" series there will be?

Do American companies NEED imported materials? Are there just not enough in the States to keep the need filled?

a reply to: soberbacchus

So is your argument that we shouldn't place tariffs on anything, yet accept that other countries do it to us at will?

ANY change in taxes or tariffs affect the viability of businesses, and yes, there are going to be some casualties and suffering because of them. I don't think that anyone would argue that tariffs are great for businesses overall or for consumers, but at some point, we have to level the field in the game of international trade or we'll keep getting taken advantage of.

I'm not saying that a massive 25% tariff was a great idea, but again, what is your solution? Go back to tariffs on the US but we don't put many on other countries?

The reality is that we need to look at this in the macro sense--as time goes on, will this have a net positive or negative effect on the US? We are not deep enough into the tariff implementations to know. Of course we can always point out the negative effects here and there on individual companies, but do you do that while ignoring the trend of joblessness in America? Exceptionally low unemployment rates that we haven't seen in decades?

When you approach this only from one side, of course you will only see a small part of the overall picture.

Tariff Winners and Losers: How Trump's Trade Spat Could Affect Shoppers

Oh man we should just keep sucking down some China....

Didn't we just see this post on monday?


honestly, if a 25% bump in material costs is enough to put you out of business, you weren't long for this world anyway... but hopefully some US steel production kicks up before the year is out. Would be nice to see the US actually producing something in my lifetime.

a reply to: soberbacchus

you say 'winning', in a 'i told you so' manner. as if when Trump looks bad on policies, you feel better? are you glad this is happening? it sounds like you were hoping for the worse?

do you think those people who may lose their jobs are Republicans or Democrats?

i know for a fact they're just citizens working an honest job.
its not 'one side' that gets affected.

originally posted by: intrepid
Do American companies NEED imported materials? Are there just not enough in the States to keep the need filled?

Depends on the material, of course. While we rank 4th in the world in steel production, we produced (in 2017) 81.6-million metric tons of steel versus China's (ranked #1) 831-million metric tons.

So, while we obviously fall far behind China's production, we do produce a decent amount and probably have the ability to produce more if necessary, and we have exempted countries that supply 53% of the U.S. steel in these tariffs, so taking that into account and understanding that we domestically produce a good amount as well, one would think that places like nail producers would be able to figure out ways to stay viable.

Trump's Steel and Aluminum Tariffs Will Now Exempt Most of US Imports

As mentioned above, this was already posted.

a reply to: odzeandennz

I know that we bicker from time to time, but very well said.

There are always more sides from which to view this issue, and cheering when some people are negatively affected by a US policy simply because one doesn't like the president is pretty...well...disgusting.

a reply to: Saiker

There's always an influx of jobs in the spring and summer tho... seasonal jobs do exist.

originally posted by: intrepid
Just wondering how many chapters of this "Winning" series there will be?

It will depend on the Trump Administration

Do American companies NEED imported materials? Are there just not enough in the States to keep the need filled?

CHINA
In 2015, China produced 803.83 million metric tons of Crude Steel accounting for 50.3% of the world’s total production.

JAPAN
Japan accounted for 105.15 million metric tons of the global production of crude steel in 2015. About 6% Worlds production.

INDIA
India produced 89.58 million metric tons of crude steel in 2015. About 5.5% Worlds Production.

UNITED STATES
Steel Companies in the US produced 78.92 million metric tons of the global production of crude steel in 2015.
About 5.5% worlds production.
The industry employs over 142,000 people

www.worldatlas.com...

DEMAND (Steel Consumption)

CHINA

China was the largest steel consumer last year, with the mainland’s ASC at 681.0 million metric tons.

UNITED STATES

The United States was ranked second at about 90 Million Metric Tons

marketrealist.com...

China has long been blamed for the United States’ and, for that matter, the global steel industry’s woes. However, we’ve seen a steep decline in Chinese steel imports this year. Furthermore, China now accounts for only about 2.0% of total steel imports.

marketrealist.com...

Note that China Consumes most of it's own Steel Production.

Also note what Trump's Trade War has done for China's Steel EXPORT Industry

After years of declining Steel Exports, Trump has China Winning again!



marketrealist.com...

Here we see Liberals rooting and cheering for failure.

Keep it up, Trump 2020!

originally posted by: odzeandennz
a reply to: soberbacchus

you say 'winning', in a 'i told you so' manner. as if when Trump looks bad on policies, you feel better?

Don't confuse sarcasm for sociopathy.

do you think those people who may lose their jobs are Republicans or Democrats?

I don't care about their political affiliation, but I think it notable that the county went Trump by 80%. He is hurting his own supporters. It is a town with few alternatives. Real people and livelihoods are impacted by Trump's nonsense and incompetence.

It is worthy of discussion.

All companies that imported cheap supplies from abroad whilst STILL increasing prices and swelling their margins are going to face a harsh reality.
Long-term that is good. If there is demand for a product then a company will spring up to make it at a price the satisfies the value equation.
I do laugh at lefties whining about greedy companies having to accept lower profits.
Drug addicts have to go through cold turkey before they no longer need their highs.

originally posted by: jjkenobi


Here we see Liberals rooting and cheering for failure.

Here we see Liberals shining a light on the plight of Trump Supporters getting hurt by Trump's incompetence.

Trump 2020!

Stick with that. Identity Politics becomes less important when you lose your job and can't pay the bills.

originally posted by: SlapMonkey
a reply to: soberbacchus

So is your argument that we shouldn't place tariffs on anything, yet accept that other countries do it to us at will?

That is not at all what I suggested, nor was that the case before Trump started the Trade War.

a reply to: soberbacchus

Dig in.
www.bls.gov...

The labour market is doing fine.
You can, and no doubt will, highlight every company that fails, but it was ever thus.
Only a complete moron judges economic direction on highlighting the losers.