In the consulting industry where I work, we have been getting a barrage of notices lately about steel and other metal prices going up by ridiculous amounts. Steel in particular from one supplier was going up 15% per month for the next 4 months, and the supplier was not guaranteeing the price for more than 30 days. It seems the hot China and nearby Asian country boom is sucking up all the demand for world metals including scrap, and price is skyrocketing. I trust this might affect aluminum as well.

So if you are considering purchasing something for your kaa that has a lot of its price based on the cost of metal (like a roll cage, wheels, etc.) you might want to buy it sooner rather than later!

 

Just bought DOM for a couple of roll cages yesterday. The price went up 75%, that adds $150 to a cage.

 

I forgot to mention trailers. If you are planning on getting one, think fast. There is a lot of metal there. I wonder what it will do to the price of cars? Maybe it is a tempory blip, and maybe not. Price of re-bar here is up 100%, with structral steel not far behind, and many construction projects are being put on hold due to these insane price increases. If DOM tubing is up 75%, the rest will follow.

 

Ya, the price of steel is going to go up much more in the following year. My plumbing contractor can't get his suppliers to hold prices for more than 48 hrs. Kinda makes bidding jobs a little tough, eh?

 

I'm working on a project on a 1.5 million square feet of expansion of a convention center in Chicago. We are trying to get the mill order in by April 1 to avoid that steel price increase.

In a building, it does affects EVERYTHING except for carpet and paint. Well maybe even paint because the containers are metal.

An even better reason to buy my rollcage in the sig.

 

Time to build the tire rack and new trailer ramps. I'm sure glad to see that this "hobby" is getting more expensive

 

by: ronalddenis (42/M/Katy Texas) 03/11/04 02:33 pm
Msg: 54952 of 54960

In 2003, China became the world’s largest user of copper, its share of the world’s copper demand having risen from 6% on 1990, to 12% in 2002 and more than 20% presently. Its cement production and own demand is five times the size of the US cement industry! China is also a huge user of pulp and paper. No wonder, since it publishes every day 82 million newspapers compared to 55 million in the US. China has the world largest cellular phone market with 200 million subscribers and is with its 330 million smokers by far the largest consumer of tobacco.

 

Speaking of demand and China, I've heard the same thing about food prices.

Apparently China will be opening their grain markets soon, and worldwide demand will increase drastically, driving up food prices.

Scary. Pretty soon we're not going to be eating the proverbial cake.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by SpiceyRice &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">China is also a huge user of pulp and paper. No wonder, since it publishes every day 82 million newspapers compared to 55 million in the US.</TD></TR></TABLE>

US is still way ahead of everyone else in the world in terms of using/wasting paper and energy per person. on my wasteful co-workers.

 

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news....html

Scott, who thinks global commodity prices are interesting...very interesting.

 

well i work in sheet metal, and none of our prices have gone up at all for the last year and a half... stainless, aluminum, paint lock, or galvanized

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by descartesfool &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">..... and the supplier was not guaranteeing the price for more than 30 days. </TD></TR></TABLE>

Same for us. Short of Boeing, we're one of the largest steel purchasers in the NW.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by RR98ITR &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> http://www.whitehouse.gov/news....html

Scott, who thinks global commodity prices are interesting...very interesting.</TD></TR></TABLE>

That assanine attempt of Bush to appease the steel industry backfired. If the Democrats were in power, it would have been MUCH worse. To give you an idea, during the Clinton administration, it cost the American consumer $700K to save an American $50K steel worker job. Steel tariffs are bollocks, and any type of trade barrier is an economic anomoly. While I don't like Bush, you can kiss the economy goodbye if Kerry is elected.

I could spend hours pounding out words about the economy. Fact is that unions continue to plunder our economy, and the more we try to avoid the outsourcing of industry, the more we hurt ourselves. Time to wake up and smell the reality America! It's not economically efficient to produce steel here any more. We're not in the 1930s anymore... this is a new economy, a globalized one. That means we as Americans have to be more dynamic.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by RR98ITR &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> http://www.whitehouse.gov/news....html

Scott, who thinks global commodity prices are interesting...very interesting.</TD></TR></TABLE>

I read that. Must be written in some kind of political speak I didn't learn in school. Are you supposed to feel good or bad after reading that? Could be George is trying to make carbon fibre seem cheap. Now let's see, I need a carbon fibre hood, front fenders, rear hatch, a seat. How much will that be by the pound? Can it be that steel was at 20 year lows that carbon fibre could be too. If George would only write another letter. Please. Please.

For those of you who have not noticed any price increases, you could read this and think why this news does not apply to you. Some news from around the world:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/....html

http://allafrica.com/stories/200403100197.html

http://news.xinhuanet.com/engl...6.htm

Even Universal is refusing to build attractions at these prices. What is the world coming to?
http://www.themeparkinsider.co...=1540
Here is a quote (spelling is their's):
"President Buch last year dropped some tariffs on steel imports to the U.S. after the WTO ruled them illegal. Experts said at the time that the move would lead to lower steel prices, but builders have seen a double-digit percentage increase in prices instead."

No Robocoaster;-( Damn, I guess I am just going to have to keep getting my thrills in my Honda.

 

what John said

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by descartesfool &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I forgot to mention trailers. If you are planning on getting one, think fast.</TD></TR></TABLE>


yes, one of the reasons i put a deposit on one yesterday.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by John &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

If the Democrats were in power, it would have been MUCH worse. To give you an idea, during the Clinton administration, ... While I don't like Bush, you can kiss the economy goodbye if Kerry is elected. ...
</TD></TR></TABLE>

How did I know this would become a political debate?

Just like any other part of our economy, unions must adapt to present conditions. To unequivocally declare them plunderers is not reasonable.

Would you not agree that the CEOs and other executives who plunder the future of companies to improve the quarterly bottom line (and thus their bonuses) are equally guilty?

And as far as the "outsourcing of industry" is concerned, I think you're being a bit unreasonable. While it might be easy to say that sitting in the relatively non-industrial Eastern Seaboard, those of us in the Rust Belt must deal with the reality of transitions in the economic system - and those are very hard to swallow.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by John &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">and the more we try to avoid the outsourcing of industry, the more we hurt ourselves. </TD></TR></TABLE>

I would personally like to avoid the increasing outsourcing of the software engineering work. I have a really hard time convincing someone that I am worth hiring when software engineers can be hired in Bangalore for 1/4 of the salary. One of the downsides of the internet and telecommuting... Now, you can telecommute from India just as easily as you can from Haymarket. I don't know that there is a good short term solution - other than changing carreer.

 

Much more a fan of this type of outsourcing:

http://www.sacbee.com/content/....html

http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/new...5.htm

 

hell yeah!

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by phat-S &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Much more a fan of this type of outsourcing:

</TD></TR></TABLE>

Best idea I've seen yet!

 

John is right, very right. Unions increase prices for everybody. By driving up the prices of their own labor they increase the price of the goods in their industry, transferring the increase directly to the consumer. It doesn't matter where you're from, ask anybody, and you'll find that paying extra for any good doesn't help. Granted, Unions do give power to emplyees, in specialized industries this can be very necessary, but to pile legal protection for them on top of that is stupidity on stilts.

As far as outsourcing, it may not be nice in the short run, but by forcing jobs to stay within the country one is only cutting his own wrists. When the work can be done cheaper elsewhere then there is no good reason to do it in a more expensive fashion. This concept makes sense to everybody, right up until it's applied to them. When Honda came to America, and was able to do things on the cheap when compared to certain American manufacturers, consumers snatched up the opportunity to save money. Of course, something is different when it's your job, right? No, not really, it's just personal.

Make things hard now, or make them even harder later... those are your alternatives. You ask for protection now to deal with the transitions in the economy, but if you keep the industry artificially alive you reduce possible net productivity (the REAL measure of an economy), you make EVERYBODY pay more for your product, and you make everybody pay for the product two, and three times over through subsidy or tariff taxes. To be "fair" to you is to let the rest of the nation suffer at your expense. Comparative advantage is real, and it effects everybody. To deny that this is the way the economy works is to blindfold yourself before you run an obstacle course: you're asking to get hurt.

Don't believe me? Then look at recent history. As John said, OF COURSE Bush's attempt to save the steel industry backfired. It's *** backwards economics to increase the price of something to keep it alive. Want to decrease the standard of living for everybody? Make stupid arguments about why jobs should stay in the United States when money says that they need to go elsewhere. You'll soon find that everybody allowed to move jobs is reaping the benefits of efficiency while you are stuck the veritable darks ages. It HAS happened, and if you follow the same policies then it WILL happen again. Ask an economist, what I'm talking about is covered in the first two courses an economist takes: this is basic, it is simple, it is truth.

*EDIT* This isn't meant to be specifically an attack on the Steel Industry, but rather a wake up call for anyone in an industry crying about outsourcing. It is hard to swallow, I know. My own Father works in a field that's moving to India rather quickly. It's going to be hard on him, but you won't catch me trying to save his particular job by paying extra for it. You will see me trying to find ways to make him more productive where he is, or convincing him to do the same, but definitely not by erecting barriers that will hurt us all. When it's time to move, that's that. I chose economics as a profession because I realized that by letting things move freely you help people, contrary to the armchair consensus.


Modified by ASteele2 at 5:09 PM 3/12/2004

 

Oh, I am certain at a fundamental level you and John are correct. I don't argue with basic economics, and I certainly am not qualified to do so. I am an engineer in the automotive industry, two of the largest parts of our industry affected by "outsourcing." And my region of the country, the Great Lakes, is struggling to keep up with the changes. It's a painful thing to watch. And it worries me.

What I wonder is, in the long run, how are we helping ourselves by chasing technical knowledge (such as programming and engineering) offshore? Certainly Hewlett-Packard can improve its bottom line by re-sourcing to India, and maybe it makes their stakeholders a bit wealthier. But in essence, we're discouraging knowledge growth of this technology in the US - and to me, that seems short-sighted.

To me, it's similar to the Wal-Mart paradox. W-M waves the flag all over the place, and appeals largely to the blue-collar set that traditionally relies on manufacturing jobs. Yet at the same time, they drive those same manufacturing jobs overseas by forcing price reductions. So in the end, who's left to buy the cheaper goods? Right here in Wooster (where I work), Rubbermaid had to close its doors due to Wal-Mart's demands for cheap, disposable food containers as opposed to the durable, more costly ones that were being manufactured here. This offends my sensibilities on many different levels (I could go on for weeks about our "disposable" society.) I will never shop at W-M again, but then again who am I to defy such a shining example of American "efficiency."

My whole purpose for posting was the political element that was brought into it, not the economics of the issue. But I guess I do have an opinion (albeit completely unqualified) on that too.


Modified by allenp at 2:01 PM 3/12/2004

 

I'm anything but a Totalitarian sympathizer, but when I look at China I see both problems and solutions.

I don't understand global economics nor am I able to see into the future. I think I can see though that China will bid up worldwide commodity prices dramatically in coming years, and this will put inflationary pressure into many highly developed economies. How we respond to this economically and politically is unclear to me.

The only thing I think I really know is that this is a really good time for little people like me to lock in a Moderate amount of debt at a fixed low rate. And I say Moderate as a small hedge against unknown risk.

Oh, the Chinese solution I like? Take the instigators of corporate corruption out and shoot them. At this moment, people like Ken Lay should already have decomposed. These people give Capitalism a bad name.

Scott, who agrees with Ralph Nader that both major political parties are about indistinguishable - NO MATTER HOW MUCH THEY YELL TO THE CONTRARY...it's a choice of who you want to *** rape you. And I despise Ralph too - he's a twit. Thing is I'm not sure any of it matters - it's always been like this. We succeed in spite of ourselves. Hate is the great national pastime.

 

I am an opponent of the US "propping up" the economy with trade barriers to foreign competition. I am far more opposed to the US threatening foreign markets with trade barriers to back a US "named" company producing its product outside the US while potentially hurting a non-US company employing an American workforce. I think the government needs to look seriously at a policy which would not "benefit" a US company over any other company if they are using a foreign workforce (and I don't think that lobbiests should be considered part of that company's American workforce).