Tariffs did not and will not bring production back to the US.
Alcoa Tariff Damage in Profile
The Wall Street Journal notes Trump’s Aluminum Tariffs Hurt Alcoa.
You’d think one company happy with President Trump’s aluminum tariffs would be Alcoa, the American aluminum producer. Well, think again, and the reason is a case study in the perverse effects of trade protectionism.
About 85% of primary aluminum in the U.S. is imported, mostly from Canada. Alcoa runs two of the four operating U.S. smelters, but three-quarters of its North American primary aluminum production is in Canada. About 70% of that supplies U.S. customers. Until February its Canadian aluminum imports were exempt from Mr. Trump’s Section 232 tariffs.
Now Alcoa’s imports must pay a 50% tariff. CEO Bill Oplinger tells us that Alcoa can pass along some of its tariff costs—an estimated $215 million per quarter—to U.S. customers with which it has long-term contracts. Contracted prices adjust with the Midwest premium charged for aluminum delivered into the U.S., which have roughly doubled since February.
Why doesn’t Alcoa expand production in the U.S. to avoid the tariff cost, as Trump trade adviser Peter Navarro urges? It takes about two years to secure permits for a new smelter and five to seven years to build one. A new smelter would cost $5 billion, which is about 80 times Alcoa’s profit last year.
Mr. Oplinger says Alcoa makes decisions on 20- to 40-year financial time-lines. Mr. Trump may or may not keep his aluminum tariffs, and he may change the rates on a whim or exempt countries as part of the broader deals he’s trying to negotiate. This is why Americans haven’t heard plans from other aluminum producers to restart smelters.
Merely restarting a production line at Alcoa’s Indiana smelter would cost $100 million and take a year or more, yet it would add only 50,000 metric tons of capacity. That’s 1.2% of U.S. imports. Even if all American smelters ran at full capacity, the U.S. would still need to import about 3.4 million metric tons of aluminum—the equivalent of five large new smelters.
The U.S. would also need much more and cheaper electricity. Alcoa says producers would need firm contractual energy-price commitments of about $30 per megawatt hour for at least 15 years to be globally competitive. Manufacturers in the U.S. typically pay from $60 to $100 per megawatt hour.
Alcoa’s Canadian smelters are economic because they run on cheap hydropower, but Mr. Oplinger says the tariffs may cause the company to stop expansion plans even in Quebec. Producing all of the aluminum that the U.S. now imports would consume about as much power as six large nuclear reactors produce in a year.
Why Tariffs Won’t Fix Manufacturing
- No one knows what the hell trump will do, what exceptions he will make, or when.
- The lead times for steel, aluminum, and copper mill expansion are too large.
- Electricity costs are rising
- Intermediate production demand is getting killed.
Intermediate Production Use
For every direct job in steel, aluminum, or copper production, there are hundreds of users of those metals.
The percentage of U.S. imports that are intermediate goods varies depending on the source and year, but a recent analysis from 2025 found that 51% of goods imported into the United States are intermediate goods, according to Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF).
Small manufacturers will be clobbered by these tariffs. And production will not return to the US for years if ever.
Related Posts
July 8, 2025: Copper Spikes to Record High After Trump’s 50 Percent Tariff Announcement
How Many Jobs Will Trump Create?
Assuming the US produces all the copper it needs, the answer is hugely negative.
Perhaps mining industry employment doubles, if and when US mines get into production.
But that is dwarfed by users of copper, all paying a higher price.
This was the subject of debate on X today.
It will take years, if ever, for Trump to make steel, aluminum, and copper production in the US great again.
The same applies to auto parts imports.
Meanwhile the costs have gone up with Ford, GM, John Deere, and even Alcoa complaining.
I suppose Trump could make iPhone production great again by having hundreds of thousands of people put in tiny screws. But what would an iPhone cost?
We are in the very beginning of a Trump-enhanced slowdown. A recession is coming.
There will be a decrease in jobs across the board. Small businesses who stockpiled de minimus imports will survive for a while. But watch for bankruptcies when those inventories run out.
Related Posts
February 11, 2025: Trump’s Steel Tariffs Now Will Work as Good as the First Time
Q: How’s that? A: Very poorly.
August 31, 2025: Petty Package Tax Starts Now, Trump Ends the De Minimis Tariff Exemption
No order is too small to escape Trump’s tariff reach.
September 4, 2025: Year-Over-Year Small Business Employment Growth Barely Above Zero
ADP reports the total YOY small business growth as +19,000.
September 5, 2025: Jobs Report Misery: Only 22,000 Gain in August, June Revised to -13,000
August was a bad month for job seekers. Here are the grim details.
September 5, 2025: Trump Will Hasten the Decline of US Manufacturing Jobs
Trump isn’t responsible for the secular decline. But he will soon speed things up.
September 6, 2025: The Bond Market Is Suddenly More Concerned About Jobs than Inflation
The long bond verdict is finally in. Jobs and growth outweigh inflation.
Can someone, anyone, explain how tariffs will work better this time?
Since they are more than double, expect more than double trouble.
Decades of giving away American jobs and wealth in return for being recognized as the hegemonic power are not going to be turned around in a few days. It will be years before the effects of tariffs and a mercantilist trade policy are truly known.
Trump is a bully and bullies get kicked in the balls!
Jobs are being lost at a quickening pace as US based manufacturers can not rely on pricing of materials and/or the availability of labor. A softening job market is a predictor of slower consumption.
There is little incentive for smaller businesses to risk investing in infrastructure or new employees with Trump trying to micro-manage an economy he does not understand. Trump wants a 50’s economy in a world that puts little value (or profit margin) in manufacturing. Trump is not intelligent enough to understand that manufacturing is a low “value added” component in the supply chain. The jobs created are not worth building the factories.
Services, technology, education, healthcare and intellectual capacity are drivers of high-margin economic growth.
The best course of action is for an agile, smaller business to either move export manufacturing off-shore to the places where the products will be consumed. OR, cease to manufacture at all because it is impossible to predict what Trump will do next.
Last time Trump was in office, he brought the economy to a near standstill with his miss-management of Covid… With the exception of ICE (Trumps private army employment), the labor market is weak
Job losses in oil and gas production are over 20,000 already. CapEx in the oil patch is falling fast as Russian oil and gas is flooding global markets. US exported LNG has fallen from 120 billion cu ft per week to 100 billion cu ft as Russian and other suppliers are taking US market share.
With Trump rolling out the Red Carpet for Putin, and Putin laughing in his face, Trumps/US sanctions on Russian oil have become worthless. India is flipping Trump off and buying Russian oil and gas while Trump tries to fart in his swollen hand (but can’t reach his fat ass) .
Even with the demand for increased energy production for AI centers, oil and gas rig counts have fallen 16 out of 17 weeks in a row ~ while Canada has dramatically increased its rig counts and announced new export capacity.
Global growth is in India or Africa, US products and commodities are being shunned given Trumps policy of unbridled arrogance and aggression.
If you want to see a shining example of the economy Trump is building? Go to Cuba… Or, Gaza…
<<<
And judging by their decades of deficit spending, the Democrats wouldnt be any better. The Republicans and Democrats have both together put America in this bad position of 37 trillion in debt, so only blaming one side of the uniparty is how this mess keeps persisting.
Tarriffs will fail in general. Latest edition; targetting countries who are currently US allies and still buying Russian crude oil. All with goal to draw Putin to the table. How well will that go? How well?
Putin is laughing in Trumps face!
This post actually proves Canada has been subsidizing American aluminum supply, but rather than accept the gift, Trump wants to rebuild an aluminum industry overnight. Trump and his foolish advisors only look at the monetary trade balance, not the whole picture where we end up with valuable products in this case feeding American industry. This shallow evaluation by the administration is killing our industry. I hope the SCOTUS rules against Trump forcing some tariff sanity into the administration.
I run a trade deficit with my grocery supplier every month and happy to be able to do it.
Always problematical when government officials claim to know better what decisions should people make than those people themselves, whose personal fortunes are existential to them.
Sometimes collective measures (traffic lights) work better than personal considerations; usually you can find broad support for such measures, if they make sense.
The solution is simple, move more US manufacturing to China where aluminum is literally free.
Problem solved! With no more manufacturing there is no more worrying about manufacturing.
It would lead to U.S. manufacturing all sorts of things that would be both competitive in the US market and the global market.
Correct!
Value is added in the final stages of product development through ingenuity and discovery of new markets or technology.
The 50’s economy Trump covets is long gone!
Samsung heavy industry, Vigor Marine and Manwha will keep USNS navy fleet ready for combat.
So we can attack what former ally or trading partner?
Build infrastructure that adds value to society, not war machines that raise costs and lower living standards for Americans!
Trump: we gave our shipbuilding industry foolishly many years ago. S Korea shipbuilder Manwha, which bought Philly shipyard for $200M two years ago, will invest $5B to build many navy and commercial ships. The $5B capex will increase capacity.
Their expertise is needed and welcome. A lot of interesting things are happening now in the shipping and the shipbuilding industry now in the US.
I setup PapaView to spill his poison for hours.
Cruel but so good.
You guys aren’t trolls like you think… you’re morons.
The US just deported hundreds of people working at a Hyundai plant, you think they are going to send their best and brightest to build ships here? Lol.
Century Aluminum to restart Mt. Holly smelter, adding 100 jobs, boosting U.S. outputFull production expected by June 2026 with $50 million investment
$50 million for 100 jobs huh. That’s $500k per employee. Is the taxpayer paying that $50 million. I want in on that action. Next year: Century files for Chapter 11.
$50M capex.
Whether it’s capex or opex is irrelevant. Those 100 employees will need to generate at least $500k each just to break even on the $50m.
Add their salary, benefits package, and taxes and it’s more like $600k per employee.
Yep. Which will add 50,000 tons of production a year from now. Which equals 1% of the 5 million tons we import each year. But hey, something is better than nothing.
This production is now worthwhile because of Trump’s 50% aluminum tariffs. This allows Century to raise their prices by close to 50%, which is enough to make this aluminum profitable.
Of course, the US buyers of this aluminum are facing much higher input costs , which will make them less competitive internationally.
As I keep saying. Tariffs may help increase steel and aluminum production a little bit, but it will hurt US manufacturing.
If you believe the US doesn’t need its own aluminum smelters then you obviously don’t believe in measures including tariffs to encourage aluminum smelting in the US. Mish and many others here are of that belief so what’s to discuss? Either you believe the US does need them or you do not.
The discussion is about POLICY and Trump’s stupid way of doing things. The US doesn’t need smelters per say, it needs refined aluminum. Why couldn’t the US partner with Canada and Iceland to provide the aluminum? If the counter-argument is ‘national security’ then where does that stop? Isn’t everything national security in some form or shape?
But if we assume the US does need/want smelters, the whole thing should have been thought through thoroughly before tariffing and pissing off every nation on earth that now views the US as a hostile actor.
As Papa has pointed out, it will take DECADES to ever get an aluminum value supply chain going so what does Trump do? Shoots himself and Americans in the foot, leg and arm to get there then lying and telling us it won’t cause inflation, hardship or bankruptcies across the board.
Sheer stupidity but that’s MAGA, 5 levels of dumb thinking by dumb hillbillies.
If it is about policy I see very little discussion on how to increase aluminum production in the US but an awful lot of people saying it can’t be done because of W, Y and Z. They are saying tariffs are stupid without proposing an alternative policy except the “invisible hand” one which will result in less production, not more. PapaDave always sees everything as impossible so for him the status quo is the most desirable policy.
I have no problem with more aluminum smelters in the US. My concern is where they will get the huge quantities of long-term contracted cheap electricity.
Without cheap electricity they are uncompetitive and unprofitable.
My second concern is the timeframe needed to accomplish the electricity generation and smelter construction. Because in the meantime, our domestic manufacturing is paying 50% tariffs for the aluminum they need to import.
Perhaps you have a magic solution?
Cheap or as cheap as the competition which I assume is Quebec? That will be hard but we don’t have to match it but be close enough for it not to matter much in the final cost of the product. Airbus uses a lot of recycled aluminum which is cheaper and perhaps we could do the same. Their costs are not exactly cheap either. It’s not magic and I wonder why so see it as such. By the way that region of Quebec is a hot bed of separatism and has been for 50 years. They would love a free-trade agreement with the US as a free Quebec. Maybe it will happen. Who knows.
But we don’t actually MAKE aluminum in the USA. Like most everything else, it is too expensive to do so.
Instead, our aluminum fabricators buy sheet aluminum from overseas and then melt them down to fabricate new products. Sounds like kind of a weird business model to me.
Scotty Basement announces U.S. will refund 1/2 of all tariffs if SCOTUS finds they are unconstitutional. Should be 100% refund plus damages. Anyway, White House playing the national humiliation day card with the court.
Bessent family name means “gold coin” in old Anglo-Saxon so his name is appropriately his occupation now.
Methinks that it means thirty silver coins actually.
Scotty Basement’s current occupation is to somehow get the Supreme Court to declare Trump’s tariffs constitutional by floating the spectre of a humiliated White House writing billions of dollars of refund checks to countries the administration falsely claimed had been ripping ripping us off for decades.
US importers get those checks… The US consumer paid at least part of those tariffs.
Off to check on the new day at the farm!
Way better and more healthy!
There is an abandoned aluminum smelter right next to John Day dam. That the just east of where US 97 crosses the Columbia River.
There is another one across the river from Rock Island which is south of Wenatchee.
The magnesium smelter at Addy Washington is also shutdown.
The US has shut down over 30 aluminum smelters since 1970. Because they are uncompetitive. Only 4 left. They are also uncompetitive because they are old, and power prices are too high.
That’s why Alcoa built new facilities in Canada and Iceland, where power is cheap.
the hydro power in northern quebec are a sight to behold. i’d recommend a trip there. valdor is a great little town to let down your hair, too. saloons and brothels with french speaking ladies…….when i was last there during the raygun administration.
Now, exalting brothels “with french speaking ladies” is acceptable? Please stop normalizing Trump type of statements and go back under a rock.
what is wrong with sex workers? you sound like a MAGA christian fundamentalist.
I have been there to see the countryside and the smelters. I didin’t see the brothels though.
my italian whore was nicer than your french whores !
Is your Italian Whore your Mom, Grandma or Auntie? Askin’ for a friend. 😉
ex CEO David please comeback.
Sounds like fun. Might we worth it to have a look.
The US will build our own oil tankers and cargo ships in the US to secure our shipping lanes. The waiting lists for F15, other planes and missiles are ten years. The breakeven cost of 737Max is high due to accidents and lawsuits, not aluminum. Capex on 787 was high bc mgt diversified globally with countries that didn’t know how build stuff, delays and the cost of shipping parts from all over the world to assembly plants. The globalists failed again and again, puked mgt, but kept doing the same. Fat cooking chefs markup is high..
Hahahaha!
“ The US will build our own oil tankers and cargo ships in the US to secure our shipping lanes.”
Well go ahead then and start up a new shipyard. It will be easy for you.
After all, there’s no domestic competition because no one is stupid enough to invest billions to build a new shipyard when we don’t have the corresponding domestic infrastructure and workforce to support it.
What’s that? Russia will lend you the money? Canada will build you the infrastructure? And China and South Korea will provide the skilled tradespeople? Well then you are all set. I say “go for it”!
And good luck to you!
S Korea will build them here, in the US. Our domestic work force, which build navy ships for years, will expand hiring highly paid union jobs. Those tankers and cargo ships will secure our shipping lanes. They are not built for export. We will build our own deep sea oil rigs. Oil co are using other countries, including China, to build stuff for them. Tariffs will
force them to build onshore, cheaper and faster.
Arithmetic violations two numerous two count.
Arithmetic violations tu numerous tu count.
Et Tu, Jch.
It’s “too” and “to.”
Anywon who duz snot no howe to spel is repricted here.
😉
My IQ is tu lo. Skip
Well that changed in a hurry. First you said the US would build the ships. Now S Korea will build the ships.
Hahaha! Sure they will. Just like S Korea was trying to build a Hyundai auto plant here for us? We begged them to build in the US. Then ICE swooped in and arrested everyone and is sending them back to Korea.
You can’t make this stuff up.
What a show!
PapaView, your sense of humor entertain most readers, who are stuck in the globalists mud.
globalist mud. you really are a moron. you sound like some acid head hippy chic cult member in charlie manson family. never change. it’s entertaining as fuck.
Please lern howe to Kapticalize.
David, ar u juwish ?
For you everything is impossible.
Not at all. Many things CAN be accomplished if you are willing to spend enough money to get them done. But if it is not economically viable, the private sector will not do it. So either the government must subsidize it, or do it itself.
Not impossible at all. Just expensive.
Sometime you need to pay for it if you want it to happen. One a country has a corner on a market they have economies of scale that you do not have or in our case in some industries no longer have. You are faced with a choice of doing nothing or acting. I prefer acting to reestablish critical industries. Others prefer to do nothing justifying their inaction with all kinds of inventive reasons. It is a choice.
I agree. If you feel is something strategic and critical, then let the government do it, or let them subsidize the private sector companies to do it.
In the case of aluminum, just provide each of a dozen new smelters with free electricity from a dozen newly constructed nuclear reactors . They are a perfect match. A new reactor will supply 1Gw of power; just what an aluminum smelter needs.
Easy peasy.
$4 billion for each smelter and $10 billion for each reactor.
The taxpayer can subsidize it all.
Next up; steel and copper. Right?
I am starting to believe our government should be subsidizing certain industries that are designated for our national security.
If its not economically viable for the private sectors, tariffs making it worse what is the alternative?
China does it. The EU to a lesser extent. CA to even a lesser to extent. Meanwhile we cannot compete with them.
I know that goes against free markets , capitalism and conservative thinking of less government but its just a different world that we live in now.
Agree. All things in life are a balance. Free enterprise is important. But so is national security. The problem is determining what is important for national security and what is important for free enterprise. Finding the right balance can be difficult.
With Trump; unfortunately everything is national security. From movies to rare earths and everything in between. It’s his go to reason for everything.
But his tariffs are the wrong tool in most cases.
If you want more aluminum production for national security reasons, then you will have to subsidize it. Do this for the next decade or two and at the end you will have enough domestic production to meet all your needs.
In the meantime, continue to import the aluminum you need at low prices so your domestic manufacturing sector that needs aluminum does not suffer and can remain competitive.
But if you use tariffs of 50% to promote more domestic aluminum production, you make your manufacturers suffer much higher input prices foe that aluminum and they become less competitive internationally.
the term globalist as a term of derision is idiotic. were you home schooled with no history books? like the ignorant hasidic jew neighbors of mine in crown heights brooklyn. that cult keeps them dumb as dirt unable to compete in modernity.
stuck in the mud, like ignorant hasidic jews in crown heights and borough park, whose rabbis make them idiots, telling them that they are protected by god and benefit from who they are. They find million of reasons, like lawyers, why they will fail if they leave crown heights and borough park. I know them them well. But when they leave, after davening for years in yeshivas, debating talmud, they are sharper than most of us. if u live near monsey u made a round trip after eighty years, or in one of the most liberal enclaves in the us.
What spinning lanes? US exports are not competitive and foreign trade partners are being taxed to the wazoo. The demand for Usonian cargo ships will tend to zero.
It’s Only a Matter of Time Until Americans Pay for Trump’s Tariffs: Whether they come in the form of higher prices, lower quality or fewer options, tariffs can’t hide forever.
Trump’s Tariffs Will Find Their Way to US Consumers in the End – Bloomberg (archive.ph)
Still waiting. How much longer do we have to wait?
If Trump is successful pushing American companies into bankruptcy, he will also be successful at undermining the tax base that funds the federal and local governments. It is obvious that the fed has chosen the inflation path of more debt via lower interest rates and potentially QE to control the long end rates and possibly mortgages and possibly some other created need, But the problem is excessive debt encouraged by those policies in the past and to think encouraging more debt to fix a debt problem is foolish stupidity.
For a very good write up on the reality of the insanity since the great recession, have a look at the link:
Prepare for New Gold Highs (Just Don’t Dance) | SchiffGold
Easy solution – make car bodies out of fiberglass! Remember the Corvette?
https://www.perplexity.ai/search/what-years-were-corvette-bodie-iMCjJNPITBmMeXbX675d7w#0
This not an easy solution.
Make them out of steel. You would save about $2,000 per car and is almost as light as aluminum if you use the proper grade. Goodbye Canada.
Steel rusts.
Like the Eastern German Trabant? Take that, Mercedes and BMW!
“I suppose Trump could make iPhone production great again by having hundreds of thousands of people put in tiny screws. But what would an iPhone cost?”
Exactly the same price. The markups at Apple are astronomical.
Please be serious
Too funny. You’re delusional.
When you rely on cheap labor you see no way to get by without cheap labor. It’s a feedback loop.
A guy with a greek statue picture being a total drooling moron? Guess water really is wet!
Sorry I post too much
But I just happened to read this
– So we need the oil and gas but we can’t get the oil and gas
“Jobs in mining also notably declined last month by 6,000. Oil and gas producers say the tariffs have increased prices for materials and caused them to pull back on drilling.”
That’s part of it. The other part is breakeven prices for drilling new oil wells is around $65 WTI. And if costs keep rising, breakevens rise. The current price is around $63. If prices for WTI stay below breakeven, expect less drilling activity. If prices head back to $70+, expect more drilling.
Can’t be true. JeffD says costs are not increasing LOL
Mish nailed this one!
I have a friend that manufactures aerospace and other products from billets of specialized aluminum alloys in two locations in the US. Two of his larger long term contracts are with De Havilland and Bombardier ~ in Canada. Last week he announced that he was closing one US location and 12 machinists would be let go along with two office staff. His building went up for sale and another friend is buying it to turn into storage. New jobs are being created ~ in Canada.
He is purchasing a larger, vacant facility in Canada and reducing staff at his other US plant and moving two jobs to the new plant. By purchasing newer ~ faster and more accurate machines, he can hire six fewer machinists, pay for the move and avoid the tariffs and hassle of cross border shipping.
As a bonus he is selling one of his US homes and buying a twin engine Canadian built aircraft as a commuter plane. All in, he is pocketing a bit into seven figures, increasing profits and improving his lifestyle.
Mish is dead on in his assessment that Americans are losing jobs because of the tariffs and high electrical costs in the US.
Who does Trump work for?
>>>
He has ample RE debt in Russia, some dots connect themselves
If Trump worked for Russia indeed, then they would have made it a crime to make such a statement. So it’s not Russia.
Pigs for EV. The EU imposed 40% tariffs on Chinese EV. China imposed 60% tariffs on Europeans pigs. What else can Shi do.
Your friend made 7 figures liquidating homes and other assets in the US, brutally cutting staff and machinists, buying new faster and accurate machines, cutting electricity, building a satellite near a Canadian hub. Bombardier and De Havilland are his biggest customers. If they cut he is out. The US aircraft industries, an essential industry, needs alumina made in the US to ensure our national interest. Same with steel for ships and tanks. Only idiots can’t get it. The wide clamp between service jobs and mfg jobs will narrow and normalized.
Yes. We can make all our own steel and aluminum domestically. But only at much higher costs than our foreign competitors. And it will take a decade or more to expand our capacity.
This is fine for building ships for our navy, because government can pay the high price of US domestic steel.
But no one else would build ships here as it is too expensive.
Same for US air force planes. The government can afford to pay exorbitant prices for US aluminum.
But high prices for domestic aluminum and copper would cripple Boeing and other aircraft manufacturers.
And high steel, copper and aluminum prices will cripple all US manufacturers that need these materials.
Just like Frosty’s friend, some will be forced to move outside the country. Some will right size to only meet domestic demand. And some will go out of business.
This is not the way to make US manufacturing great again.
u know what happened five million years ago, but u don’t know what’s going on today!
Thanks for the compliment.
And I’m glad that you are here to tell me what’s going on today. In your incredibly muddled mind.
What fantasies are you dreaming up today to entertain us with?
Oh. I like the one about shipbuilding. Good one!
Raw aluminum is only a very tiny part of the price of an airplane. It is only a couple of percent of the total cost and Canada overwhelmingly exports raw aluminum to the US so the tariffs won’t have much an effect. The cost is far from “exorbitant”.
It doesn’t matter if the cost is exorbitantly higher or not. What matters is if the cost is higher than the competitor’s.
Not if the cost difference is too small to be worth it to buy from outside. Secure and near supply lines are worth more to the bottom line than a quoted small difference in price.
Do you always pull numbers out of your ass?
In a Boeing 787, aluminum is 20% of the weight and 10% of the cost. In older planes, it is 12% of the cost.
Copper is much less of the cost. Though a 787 does have 60 miles of copper wiring.
And incidentally, Trump imposed a 25% tariff on raw aluminum imported from Canada in March 2025. This was increased to 50% in June.
These are costs that Airbus does not have to worry about.
Work?
In Canada news, one of its largest can manufacturers is moving all its operations out of the US.
Everything Trump is doing with MX & CA is squarely directed at putting pressure on the USMCA review coming up next year. If SCOTUS upholds the CIT appeal, then Trump’s leverage falls apart. If SCOTUS overturns the appeal, then CA & MX will be forced into major concessions. If SCOTUS drags its feet, then we land somewhere in between.
Over the past 15 years or so, ALCOA shutdown several coal-based smelters, significantly reducing their US capacity. My guess is that capacity moved north. It’s also reasonable to consider this was done at the behest of the environmental lobby, who wanted ALCOA to move away from dirty coal.
Unfortunately, America is every bit of 30 years behind on the much-needed nuclear power renaissance. We went astray when Carter outlawed nuclear fuel reprocessing. China, like France, reprocesses nuclear fuel. A great start would be to lift that ban.
Wind, like solar, is moderately destructive to the environment, is too intermittent & has much higher long-term costs when you consider maintenance / replacement costs plus the need for large scale batteries. Don’t get me wrong, solar is a fantastic technology and needs to continue to be built out up until the cost of nuclear is brought under control. Solar’s big benefit along with batteries is for individuals who want to go off grid. Both wind & solar are bridge technologies to nuclear. And new generation SMR’s providing baseload power are the main bridge to fusion.
You should write for Popular Mechanics.
Lol! You’ve stated dozens of times that everything Trump does is about China. Now it’s all about MX, CA, and USMCA.
I’m sorry to tell you that no matter what is negotiated in the next USMCA, it won’t help to increase electricity or aluminum production in the US.
Blaming a president from 50 years ago is funny. We have had a lot of presidents since then who could have addressed the issue.
“ Wind, like solar, is moderately destructive to the environment, is too intermittent & has much higher long-term costs when you consider maintenance / replacement costs plus the need for large scale batteries”
You always do this. You state complete bullsh*t and never provide proof. You just make it all up to suit your narrative. But it’s all garbage.
Wind, solar and natgas are the least expensive ways to generate electricity. I have shown this many times, with links. Which is why over 70% of all new electricity generation in the world last year was from wind and solar.
And as usual you provide yet more fantasy.
“ Both wind & solar are bridge technologies to nuclear. And new generation SMR’s providing baseload power are the main bridge to fusion.”
You keep saying that at some point in the future, someone will magically figure out a way to make cheap power with SMRs or fusion. Well, the world has been working on both for 50 years and nothing of significance so far. Yes, we have a few test SMRs, but they still cannot produce power cheaply. And we need the power now. We can’t sit on our butts and wait another 50 years and it will all be fine.
China has had one test SMR for years and is still building 30 conventional nuclear plants right now. Because they can’t wait 20 years for SMRs to magically deliver cheap power. Once built, those 30 new reactors will add 35 GW of generation. And China can build a conventional reactor in 7 years, while we take 15+ years,
However, China added over 300 GW of new solar and wind last year. Because it is the cheapest and fastest way to generate electricity.
While Trump is cancelling permits for wind and solar because he calls them a scam.
I have said consistently that China & MX are the real problems & that Trump is going too hard on CA. But just because that’s my opinion doesn’t do anything to diminish the fact that Trump is going after MX & CA hard to influence the USMCA negotiations. How hard is that to understand / accept as likely true? That’s what he does.
Again, like it or not, Carter banning nuclear fuel reprocessing put the US on a massively underperforming route with regards to nuclear. There are other reasons, of course, like costs & fake environmental concerns, but this is what started the path right after 3-Mile Island.
I didn’t say solar is expensive up front. I mean that, when you consider that solar farms are damaged from weather events and generally wear out sooner than nuclear, then that will drive up their long-term costs. Even batteries only last about 15 years. And, I did say that we need to continue to invest in solar & batteries. It’s my belief that in about 20 years, we won’t need to deploy anymore solar or wind. SMRs & fusion will be well on their way to dominating energy investment. In 30 years time, new solar deployments in the US will be off grid only scenarios.
I read an article that the fishermen of the NE coast are hailing Trump’s decision to reduce or eliminate federal support for wind. Why is that? They do damage to the underwater ecology, kill millions of birds, & make it harder for them to fish. I didn’t say severely environmentally damaging. I said moderately, which again is reasonable.
Right. I keep saying that SMRs are the bridge to fusion. Again, how hard is that to understand? Fusion isn’t some pipe dream, and it’s not 30 years out. No where have I said that SMRs are going to be ready start generating significant baseload power in the next few years. Within 5 years though, almost every company, of which there are about 8 just in the US, will have completed their initial deployments. There are something like 4 companies working with Texas A&M to build their initial prototypes in the next two years.
NuScale just signed their first deal that will follow through with ENTRA1 Energy for 6GW of electricity. There’s a pretty good chance all of that will be deployed in the next 10 years. The amount of money going into SMRs will make them successful long-term. Several companies are ramping up production of HALUE nuclear fuel.
I would not be surprised that NuScale & Utah re-enter their failed initial deployment. It was cancelled back in late 2023. Something tells me they’re going to restart that agreement in less than 18 months. In Nov 2023, Trump hadn’t been elected yet. Well, Chris Wright & the DOE are big & long on nuclear.
Excellent.
Other than your overly optimistic dreams, you almost agree with everything I said.
We need more electricity generation NOW and we need it quickly to grow our economy. Which means a lot of solar, wind, and natural gas. No matter what you think about wind and solar. Because nuclear just isn’t ready.
SMRs and nuclear fusion are a distant dream. Though you think it is as little as 5 years away, and I am thinking 20 years, or longer. And there is no guarantee it will ever be competitive with wind and solar.
In the meantime, we could at least start to build some conventional, though also expensive, nuclear reactors. If we start now, they can be ready in 15 years. And if electricity demand keeps growing by 60 GW per year, we need about eight hundred of them built to meet the extra demand over that 15 year period.
And of course, we need all that electricity to help produce that aluminum (and AI, EVs, crypto etc). Which is what this energy discussion is all about. This post from Mish is on aluminum.
But there is a stumbling block to more domestic aluminum.
Energy. Or more specifically, electricity.
Energy first. Aluminum, steel, and copper next. And finally, American Manufacturing last.
So while we wait for years for the SMR magic to happen; let’s ponder what Trump is doing to encourage this new electricity production.
https://time.com/7315119/trump-wind-power-free-market/#
Just one example of Trump trying to stop renewable energy. I could post many more such links from the last few months, but then my post won’t be allowed. It seems only one link per post is allowed on this site.
What is your suggestion to get 60 GW per year of new electricity generation for the next 5 years?
The most important point I can make about the data center build out is this:
THEY SHOULD HAVE TO PAY FOR THEIR OWN POWER UP FRONT BY BUILDING THE POWE PRODUCTION INTO THE DATA CENTER.
It’s that simple. AI has the potential to destroy mankind a lot sooner than people realize, and along the way it’s going to send America to the poor house in terms of meeting its energy demands.
If AI is going to gobble up the kinds of power that people say it’s going to in the next 5-10 years as it matures, then Amazon, Google, MS, OpenAI, Facebook et al need to pay for the electric energy generation. It shouldn’t be subsidized by my tax dollars. Every data center should have the latest & greatest solar panels installed. They should have batteries. Have them install windmills. Have them install microreactors that companies are already deploying to the Dept of War. But whatever the hell you do, don’t let them install natural gas turbines. I don’t want my natural gas prices going through the roof, so OpenAI can cheaply develop something that’s going to take my job.
The bottom line is that if they can afford to build a data center, then they need to figure out how to power it. Once this happens, you’ll see billions of dollars rapidly go into developing & deploying SMRs faster than you can say “TACO’s tariffs are dumb as hell”.
The benefit here also is that this will increase the costs of developing & deploying AI, which IMHO is good thing. If AGI comes to pass in as little as 2027, we’re all going to be having an “oh shit” moment. What comes next?
As for wind & solar, I don’t have a problem with Trump pulling back. Both of these are very established energy sources. At this point, the subsidies need to be redirected to SMRs & fusion. We subsidized wind & solar to get them off the ground, so the same thing needs to happen with SMRs & fusion.
And what Trump should be doing with some of the money collected from tariffs is spending a modest amount developing hydrogen-based smelters.
I agree. I don’t think we’re that far apart on energy. I’m just more optimistic about SMRs & fusion timing for commercialization.
Again. You keep missing the point and veering off in other directions because you don’t know how to answer the question. This is about aluminum and the electricity needed to produce it.
Yes. AI data centers are trying to get power directly from the utility or build out their own direct generation. Either way, they are competing for power with everyone else. So where will the power for aluminum come from?
And you miss the point yet again. It’s not about Trump stopping subsidies for renewables. It’s about Trump literally shutting down new generation facilities before they can be completed. And cancelling all future permits for planned new renewable generation.
My question again. Where are we going to get an extra 60GW of new electricity each year for the next 5 years if Trump is trying to stop renewables?
First, where did the 60GW of annual power demand come from? While it may or may not be accurate, my first question is how much of that is due to data center demands?
Whatever that is, see my last post, where I VERY CLEARLY answered that question. The amount of cash MS, Google, FB, Apple, NVidia et all have to pay for their own power is staggering.
Empire Wind was temporarily shut down & then construction resumed. Wind Revolution has been put on pause. Both will get completed. While I’m not privy to all the different environmental concerns the DOE & DNR which are, IMHO, probably real, there are good reasons for Trump to do this.
Why did he do this? It’s simple. This is his way of telling the industry that the government gravy train subsidizing wind is over. Nearly $700M is being cut. My guess this will be contested in court. Who wins, I have no idea.
FYI – renewables aren’t going to stop. Slow down, sure. They’re just going to have to do it on their own, or depend on state & local tax subsidies, etc. It’s 2025. We’ve been deploying wind & solar for decades. It’s time to stop subsidizing them. And from what I’ve read, the ROI on wind energy is 25-30 years. That’s a long time for an intermittent source of power.
The GA (2023) & TN (2016) are the only two major new nuclear reactors to have been deployed since 1993 in TX, I believe.
Trump is the president. He gets to set the priorities. That’s his job. He has decided to reset the allocation of government monies away from solar & wind towards nuclear.
How successful will he be? I don’t know. I’m not an oracle, but I strongly support the decision to reallocate government monies.
Thanks for the chat!
I don’t have specific 2024 figures for data center growth. However, total US data center demand grew to 92 GW by the end of 2024. And it is expected to double over the next 5 years to 180 GW. Which would be growth of 18 GW per year.
Manufacturing is expected to add 20 GW of demand, or 4 GW/a.
General consumer growth is expected at 20 GW. Again 4 GW/a.
If we actually manage to build one new aluminum smelter within the next 5 years; each smelter needs 1GW.
Add in everything else, like commercial, crypto, government, EV/PHEV growth etc . That is another 30 GW of demand.
On the output side: each new conventional nuclear reactor adds 1GW of supply. The largest natgas plants also add 1 GW.
If Trump wants to build lots of nuclear, then go for it. But that’s for 15 years down the road. And we need a lot of them. 100-200 conventional reactors.
I keep asking you what we do in the meantime, as Trump attempts to stop new renewable energy. Here is a timeline of his various moves to crush wind and solar.
https://boereport.com/2025/08/26/a-timeline-of-trumps-moves-to-dismantle-the-us-wind-and-solar-energy-industries/amp/
As for the data center demand, I will keep answering:
LET THEM FIGURE THAT OUT. IT’S THEIR PROBLEM TO SOLVE.
I feel extremely certain of this question you’d ask the average bottom 70% of income earners.
Would you support requiring companies deploying data centers to pay upfront for their energy needs, placing restrictions on natural gas usage, so as to ensure your monthly bill doesn’t rise due to this unprecedented demand?
Probably 90%+ would answer AFFIRMATIVE.
As for new smelters, I already answered to invest in a hydrogen moonshot but also throw everything possible that’s renewable at it, just not natural gas. I think NG should be reserved primarily for residential & light commercial demand.
I could care less about crypto. Ask the average person the same question above about crypto’s power demands, and most would say let them pay for that as well. The moment crypto has to pay its own ride is when it folds as it should.
As for manufacturing, I thought you’re on record that Trump is going to destroy that demand?
As for EV’s this is where I see solar with batteries being targeted to meet that demand along with wind. Again, I’m not saying stop investing, but it’s about time for them to fly like red bull, on their own.
I was reading that TerrePower is building a nuclear plant in Wyoming.
The intent is to provide up to 345MW of base load with a “molten salt” based storage that can support peaking up to 500MW to allow it to integrate on the grid with intermittent wind and solar power.
It appears to be a federally subsidized endeavor that gained approval under Trump’s first term. The expected completion date is 2030. We’ll see.
Yes. A Bill Gates sponsored test project. A Natrium reactor. Might be ready by 2030. The government put in $2 billion. Bill Gates put in over $1 billion. Total cost likely over $4 billion.
To produce a steady 345 MW for $4 billion is in the same ballpark as conventional nuclear. 1 GW is $6 billion, but with typical cost overruns , is often $10-12 billion.
If successful, we can start adding more of these over the next few decades. Again, to meet the 60 GW of annual demand growth would requires building around 150 of these per year.
I watched and listened to Gate’s comments at a recent White House dinner. He spoke mostly of using his accumulated wealth to improve health and food production techniques worldwide and AI. I’m encouraged that he is putting some wealth toward advancing potential energy production methods. As you keenly post and share, energy production is vital.
Yes. He is attempting many good things. Adequate energy is a requirement for everything else. Energy is life.
Here’s a fairly comprehensive list of mostly US companies working to deploy SMRs. Although not as diverse, the same thing is happening in France, UK & Germany.
Aalo Atomics – private
Antares Nuclear – private
Kairos – Google, private
Last Energy – private
Natura Resources, private
Newcleo – France, private
NNE – Nano Nuclear
Oklo – Sam Altman
Radiant Industries, private, Kaleidos
SMR – NuScale
Terrapower – Bill Gates, private
Terrestrial Energy, private
Type One Energy
X-energy – Amazon, private
Westinghouse, eVinci
Yes. Many have been trying to make this work for decades all over the world. Just like fusion, they are always “so close”, but then the projects get delayed as costs keep rising and issues arise.
Lots of test units are due to be installed “soon” all over the world. No guarantee that any of them will be successful. And no guarantee that a successful test will happen in the US. And I highly doubt any successful test will be cost efficient.
I wouldn’t invest in any company involved in this area, except for a short term trade.
Thanks for the list to research. I’ve lost touch with nuclear. In my youth I was an enlisted guy running a reactor on an SSBN. The power density still amazes me.
NuScale is the only one with a reactor that is NRC approved and is supplying the TVA with reactors. None will be installed and functioning for years from now…
I bought some SMR stock after the new year on a friends recommendation. She works for Framatome.
As PaPa Dave indicates, they are a long way from being revenue positive or generating one watt of electricity.
Bought because Trump is likely to piss away billions on this…
>>>
Don’t the phrases, “fake environmental concerns” and “3 mile island” in the same sentence contradict one another? So, maybe the concerns aren’t so fake? In truth, since 3 mile island, and because of 3 mile isl nuclear reactors have become safer but the environmental concerns were clearly not “fake” as so demonstrated by 3 mile island.
Trump is trying to do everything at once and certainly out of order. He had the ability to restart nuclear energy in his first term but didn’t. Such changes like this should have occurred BEFORE imposing tariffs; not the other way around.
Trump has no understanding of economics. As we are seeing, any economic successes he derives are from extortion and as a private citizen he helped his bottomline by not paying people.
I can’t beleive our economic vitality is dependent on such a moron.
During the Three Mile Island accident, approximately 15 curies of radiation were released. Overall, the collective dose equivalent from the radioactivity released was so low that any potential health effects were negligible.
3-Mile Island remains the only USA commercial nuclear power plant incident worth noting. And the information above clearly establishes the fact that there was an enormous environmental overreaction.
I’m not going to respond to your Trump opinions. Time will tell who’s right.
Yes, Trump should have done more to push nuclear forward in his first term. But AI still wasn’t launched then. It didn’t really arrive until early 2023 or three years after he left office. The concerns about American’s energy future is primarily seen through the lens of AI demands and, of course, trying to keep up with or ahead of China.
Trump is clueless.
Trump thinks tariffs on steel, aluminum, and copper will bring back more domestic US production of those items.
I respectfully disagree – I believe Trump knows full well that is not possible in a significant and meaningful manner – so a few jobs is more a bi-product of the tariff then the primary goal
Tariff Defined: The primary goal of a tariff is to protect domestic industries by increasing the cost of imported goods, making them less competitive compared to locally produced goods.
I do not believe that is Trumps Primary goal At All –
I do believe the primary goal a Money Grab, and if the US Consumer has to pay a portion or all of the tax, then so be it. Money Grab Brazil Coffee Money Grab India Oil.
Is it any surprise that Trumps buddy in Brazil is heading to prison?
Brazil is now booming and trade has exploded! Take a look at Florianopolis! Floripa as it is called by locals has 42 large beaches and unlike Rio, is relatively crime free.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSS94aPN-So
Gorgeous peninsula with a major new city that is referred to as the Dubai of Brazil! Brazilians are selling their Miami condos and moving assets home!
Miami is also a crime ridden place and ten times more expensive. It is sub tropical so it can get cooler, but not really cold… Strong European influence as well and pensioners can live quite well.
But the real topic here is how clueless Trump is and what en economic dinosaur he is. Trumps fantasy is a world something like 1950’s America. This is probably when something happened to him that makes him cling to that time. Perhaps he was molested? Perhaps worse? What on earth happened to make him into such a strange, stunted, rapist and malignant narcissist?
Pity the child and what he has become?
Trump still reminds many that he is a toddler running about the White House with a machine gun…
😉
In August, the first month of the Usonian tariffs, Brazilian exports stateside fell by 30%. However, Brazilian exports grew by 6% overall. Foreign trade partners will find new markets for their wares, but the US won’t be able to find new trade partners. In lay terms , the Usonian cost of living will go up and the standard of living will go down.
Trump knows nothing fully well. Not even well and much less fully.
First the executive from Alcoa didn’t mention VAT. He mentioned tariffs.
Second, even if there were smelters to restart in the United States there might not be an electricity to power the smelter. It could take many years before electricity is available to power either restarted or new smelters. Aluminum is made where electricity is cheap. When I visited Iceland several years ago there were aluminum smelters bringing in imported bauxite and producing aluminum with hydropower and/or geothermal energy. They import bauxite and export aluminum.
All the AI in the world won’t affect the cost of aluminum production much because the major cost is the raw material (bauxite) and the electricity to run the smelters. Labor is a low part of the equation. That is why it can be done in high labor cost countries like Canada and Iceland.
Yep. You can’t have it both ways.
Trump thinks tariffs on steel, aluminum, and copper will bring back more domestic US production of those items. And it might, if the producers of those items knew that tariffs would remain in place for decades in order to justify the multi-billion dollar investments that they would need to make in new production. Which is very unlikely to happen.
What the companies will do instead is take advantage of tariffs to raise their prices to domestic manufacturers (like auto companies) who use their products. This will boost profits of the metal producers. The downside is that they still won’t be able to export though, because their prices are too high compared to their foreign competitors.
The next problem is that their customers, those domestic manufacturers, are now paying higher prices for steel, aluminum and copper which raises their production costs. Which also makes them less competitive against foreign competitors. So they are also stuck selling domestically, and need to raise their prices to the consumer to offset their higher costs.
The tariffs are not going to make domestic manufacturing great again. Quite the opposite.
And as Mish pointed out, aluminum production needs a LOT of cheap electricity. Which the US does not have. Which is why Alcoa is making most of its aluminum in Quebec.
The US needs a LOT of new electricity generation for AI, crypto, EVs, and consumers. Aluminum smelters would increase that demand by a huge amount. Most of our new electricity is coming from renewables. Though Trump is doing his best to cancel renewable projects. Where the heck will we get the electricity for all these things if he cancels renewables.?
Its madness. But it’s pretty fun to watch. And its fun to see the Trump ass-kissers saying “maybe” it will all work out.
Sure it will.
This is what you have been saying all along, PapaDave.
Yes.
So glad Mish gets to this topic occasionally.
If it’s related to energy, I am interested.
I’m not much for the political discourse.
there is no difference between D and R uniparty. nobody could pass a blind test of who was in power past 65 years. the libertarians and greens only get 2% of vote totals in a good year. amerikans are vile. democrracy works perfect. hat tip republic of plato.
I am pretty agnostic in the D vs R debate. Both have squandered many of the advantages that the US has had over my lifetime. I only pay attention to what they do in order to find the opportunities they present.
Still, unlike MP, I will probably stay here. Though I can certainly leave if necessary.
I will discuss electricity in detail soon.
30% of the electricity produced in Texas comes from Wind and Solar.
Yep. Wind and solar are where most new generation is coming from all over the world because they are the cheapest, quickest and easiest to build.
Texas increased wind and solar from 18% of electricity generation in 2019 to 30% today.
We need a lot more electricity generation in the US if we want to grow our economy. Too bad Trump is doing what he can to stop this area of growth.
From AI:
The number of U.S. jobs involved in new wind and solar installations each year is substantial—and growing fast. Here’s a breakdown of the latest data and trends:
🔧 Annual Job Additions in Wind & Solar Installations
• According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, solar photovoltaic (PV) installers and wind turbine technicians are among the fastest-growing occupations in the country.
• From 2019 to 2029, the number of PV installer jobs was projected to grow by 50.5%, and wind turbine technician jobs by 60.7%.
• Despite being relatively small occupations, this growth translates to about 10,400 new jobs over that decade just for these two roles.
📈 Total Clean Energy Employment
• The broader clean energy sector—including manufacturing, construction, and maintenance—supports hundreds of thousands of jobs annually.
• The U.S. Energy & Employment Report (USEER) tracks these figures and shows that renewable energy generation (including wind and solar) employs over 500,000 workers nationwide.
• Many of these jobs are tied directly to new installations, especially as federal incentives and private investment surge.
💼 Types of Roles Involved
• Solar Installers: Mounting panels, wiring systems, testing output
• Wind Technicians: Assembling turbines, performing maintenance, troubleshooting systems
• Construction Workers: Building infrastructure for utility-scale projects
• Electrical Engineers & Technicians: Designing and integrating systems
• Project Managers & Logistics Coordinators: Overseeing timelines and supply chains
The clean energy boom isn’t just about climate—it’s a serious job engine.
And the Texas grid is not connected to rest of Usonia. It all stays in the Republic of Texas.
PapaDave, you have definitely schooled me on electricity generation and I thank you.
On wind & solar projects, my question pertains to the location of it.
I have read where farmers in Texas & Delaware are pushing back on this. Loss of farmland and potential for water contamination affecting farms & farm production.
Is the location of it and negative effects on farm land a serious issue or overblown?
Even with those complaints I do understand that Texas has increased electricity generation from wind & solar
It’s a mixed bag. I am sure that if farmers are complaining, that they probably have legitimate concerns.
There are also places where solar and wind installations have had beneficial impacts on agriculture. And there usually isn’t much impact on grazing land for cattle and sheep. Not to mention the extra income for the farmer.
But each case is different. There are many places where solar and wind can be installed other than land used for agriculture.
For comparison purposes a 1 GW nuclear reactor takes up about 1000 acres. A 1 GW solar installation takes up 5000-8000 acres. A 1 GW gas generator only takes up 100 acres; plus 1000-2000 acres of land for production of the gas it runs on.
All energy production requires some land use. So it requires some cost/benefit analysis.
Thank you for the reply. Appreciate it. For a little levity…………….
Do you guys remember in NY, at Madison Square Garden(MSG) the “No Nukes Concert” 1979. ?
You know rock & rollers thinking they are more important than they are lecturing the world about on a non-Nuclear future while at the same time plugging in their Marshall stack amplifiers and then state of the art sound systems and all plugged in to the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant?
Oh the humanity. Oh the hypocrisy.
Thanks guys. And now that plant is closed and NY is now attempting to build another one.
I’m going to propose a Pro Nukes Concert and Bruce Sprintsteen and all the other performers are not invited.
VAT TAX
Explained by Alcoa
CEO Bill Oplinger tells us that Alcoa can pass along some of its tariff costs—an estimated $215 million per quarter—to U.S. customers with which it has long-term contracts.
So Long Term Contracts are locked in / long term – and a portion of the tariffs are passed along Alcoa will eat some. And you can bet your bottom dollar on Long Term Contract expiration, New Contracts will have customers/consumers eat the lions share
I said all along it was more of a VAT tax than a tariff
I said all along it was a Money Grab not a tariff
and that we need to consider tariffs more as weapons than tariffs
[ India certainly does, it is a weapon of mass destruction for India ]
There was never possibility of expansive manufacturing being brought back to the US – and for even a chance as I said – we would need Union Free Zones, by Executive Order where states could designate regions where no Unions were permitted – of course that will never happen
and finally of note AI is consuming tremendous amounts of energy, so there is that also in the mix – AI alone will drive prices significantly ,
then you have the Climate Change Campaign to shut down nuclear coal and oil, New York for example had shut down three mile island – down they want to start it up again, wind and solar is too intermittent, so our only hope is to build out tremendouse Nuclear and Coal and Oil
Of course Russia has our nuclear ingredients – we need Russia desperately not to mention worldwide coal and oil
The entire tariff thing is an impossibility – which brings us round robin and is the proof The tariffs will be a consumer consumption tax and are a money grab by the US – these are weapon – by no means are the tariffs “tariffs” in any sense of the standard definition and purpose.
And Trump now has said the US already Already cannot survive without these “tariffs” if the US Supreme Court were to take them away.
Trump wasn’t saying a Peep about we would lose jobs if the Court took away tariffs Trump was saying we would lose the Money Grab
Economics is not a science. My license from the State of Colorado allows me to be sued for malpractice. Anyone and their weird cousin can be an economist. The Federal Reserve is made up of weird cousins that cannot be sued for being wrong.
Scotty Basement, Peter Navarro Oreo (he has a cream filling; it’s just not gray matter), and Howie the Duck? They sound like weird cousins to me. How many going concern letters were issued in auditor reports the year before the S&L crisis?
economics was in philosophy departments in universities for over a thousand years. the computer spewing data fooled economists to think it was NOT a soft science.
I’m convinced its more of an art form than a science these days
it was never as scientific as an art. it was and always is just a philosophy. art forms have real basis like science. try casting a bronze or terra cotta statue. or turn a ceramic pot on wheel. economics is flim flam nonsense like philosophy. which happens to be my favorite study in my 45 years of attending university.
Can I ask if philosopy is flim flam nonsense( I don’t disagree) why is it your favorite study?