Steel Tariffs; Appropriations vs. Entitlements
Remember the Bush steel tariffs? Here is the latest from
the
"http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36261-
2004Nov9.html">Washington Post.
The European Union has requested talks with the U.S.
government over antidumping duties that have hit a British
steel firm in the first step toward asking the World Trade
Organization to condemn the U.S. tariffs, EU officials said
Tuesday.
The EU maintains that the United States is breaching the
rules of global commerce through its tariffs of almost 126
percent on imports of stainless steel bars made by Firth
Rixson Special Steels Ltd.
Washington imposed the duties in March 2002, claiming the
company was unfairly dumping cheap goods on the U.S.
market….
Last year the Bush Administration removed “safeguard”
duties imposed on imported steel to protect domestic
producers after they were declared illegal by the WTO.
So we imposed extraordinary steel tariffs, waited for the
WTO to declare them against WTO rules (which they obviously
were) and then lifted them. We still, however, have some
steel tariffs, through the ordinary process of having the
U.S. International Trade Commission say that dumping
(charging unfairly low prices) is going on.
There was much complaint about Bush’s extraordinary
steel tariffs, but little against the ordinary process. This
illustrates a general point: what is most dangerous in
government is not the special favors, but the routine ones.
Special favors come and go; routine favors stay and stay.
The same thing goes on with appropriations (porkbarrel
spending on senior citizen centers, for example) and
entitlements (Medicare). Appropriations get the attention,
but entitlements are a bigger problem. Appropriations do go
down sometimes; entitlements, almost never. The only
example I can think of is the welfare reform of the 1990’s,
and I’m not sure that actually reduced spending.
This makes me more forgiving of the extraordinary steel
tariffs and the rise in appropriations spending under Bush
of which many people complain. If those payments are
necessary to get support for more important things such as
the war in Iraq or confirmation of judges who won’t violate
their oaths, they’re worth it.
On the other hand, it makes me less forgiving of the
Medicare drug benefits that Bush passed. Like the Americans
with Disabilities Act that Dole helped pass, those drug
benefits will be with us a long time, and with little
political benefit.