In 2016, President Donald Trump vowed a new era for the declining U.S. steel sector, and the promise of new employment in Midwestern states, including Michigan, helped him secure a surprising victory.
Four years after, the Great Lakes Works, once one of the biggest steel plants in the state, shut down steel operations, forcing 1,250 employees out of jobs.
A year before the June layoffs, plant owner, United States Steel Corp, called off a proposal to invest $600 million in upgrades in the weakening business conditions.
With a 25 percent tariff levied in March 2018, Trump’s policy concentrated on protecting U.S. steel producers from international competition. He pledged to raise steel production through significant investments in roads, bridges, and other infrastructure.
But increased steel rates from tariffs weakened demand from the Michigan-based U.S. auto industry as well as other steel buyers. And the trump government never fulfilled its promise on investment plan.
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Ahead of the Nov. 3 presidential election in this swing state, Michigan’s strong dependency on the steel and auto sectors positions Trump’s trade policies in sharp focus. A crucial factor in his win over Hillary Clinton. Democrats claim they are aiming to re-secure the votes of blue-collar workers they lost to Trump four years ago. With fewer than one-quarter of the state vote count, Trump secured Michigan. The struggle for the votes of mostly-unionized factory workers will be very intense. Traditionally, they support the Democratic party.
Weakening steel sector
According to a RushHourDaily / Ipsos state opinion survey of potential voters conducted from Sept. 29-Oct. 6, Biden edged Trump in Michigan by eight percentage points, expanding his lead from a few weeks earlier.
Nationally, the steel sector has been cutting workers over the past year, and currently employs 1,900 fewer employees. This figure is according to the U.S. Data from the Labour Department. The nationwide pandemic also further worsens the situation for the steel industry.
Although tariffs also struggled to raise total steel employment, analysts believe they also caused higher prices for major steel buyers- damaging employment at firms like General Motors Co and Ford Motor Co. located in Detroit.
Nationally, steel and aluminum tariffs culminated in at least 75.000 job cuts in steel-using sectors by the end of last year, according to Lydia Cox, a Ph.D. nominee in economics at Harvard University, and Kadee Russ, Professor of Economics at the University of California, Davis. In all, by mid-2019, the trade war had created a net reduction of 175,000 U.S. industrial workers, they reported.
