Word: steels
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Stoking the smokestack revival even further, in 1984 the Reagan Administration negotiated voluntary restraint agreements, which limited imports to about 20% of the 100 million tons sold annually in the U.S. The justification was that the worldwide steel glut had forced many foreign governments to subsidize their mills, allowing them to charge artificially low prices in the U.S. In exchange for the VRAs, U.S. steelmakers agreed not to bring trade suits against overseas competitors and promised to plow excess cash into modernizing...
President Bush promised during the election campaign to extend the VRAs when they expire next fall, but steel buyers like Caterpillar complain that prolonging the VRAs will boost costs. According to industry analyst Peter Marcus of PaineWebber, steel prices have risen 6% since early 1988, to $509 a $ ton, although after adjustment for inflation, they remain $40 less than five years ago. Critics are also concerned that a new set of VRAs will bring back Big Steel's complacency...
...major factor in U.S. steel's improving fortunes has been the decline of the dollar, which has made imports more expensive. But foreign competitors have trimmed costs and boosted efficiency with almost the same zeal as the U.S. mills. The resurgent Japanese steel industry has cut its work force 18% in the past three years, to 228,000. Europe's steel industry, subsidized to the tune of $57 billion since 1975, is now largely self-sufficient owing to higher productivity. Because of such moves, says Walter Williams, chairman of Bethlehem Steel, "we'll never be able to go back...
...Heavy steel equipment in the North Slope oil fields turned icily brittle and snapped into pieces. Military operations were disrupted. Most of the 26,000 Army, Air Force and Coast Guard personnel taking part in Operation Brim Frost, an Arctic training mission, were told to stay in their barracks. The Kusko 300, one of the state's major dog-mushing events, had to be postponed...
Since stories are the indispensable raw material of show business, CAA has built a development department that generates ideas for its clients. Ovitz has cultivated close ties with Manhattan gliterary agent Morton Janklow, who represents such best-selling authors s Judith Krantz, Danielle Steel and Jackie Collins. That collaboration has produced some 100 hours of network mini-series. Now Ovitz hopes to work an even richer literary vein. In December Janklow announced a surprise merger with longtime ICM literary agent Lynn Nesbit, whose clients include Tom Wolfe, Ann Beattie and Michael Crichton. According to sources close to the negotiations...