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This analysis does not seem properly include wage/labor costs. "By 1958 some steelmakers in Germany and Japan were able to compete on price with US producers,

This analysis does not seem properly include wage/labor costs. "By 1958 some steelmakers in Germany and Japan were able to compete on price with US producers, and by the mid-1970s input costs for Japanese steel (ore, labor, coking coal, etc.) were nearly half those of US costs." So the input costs were half almost certainly all due to labor either directly or indirectly. Viewed in this light the fall of US Steel is no different than any other manufacturing process in the USA.

0xDEADFED5 3y ago
page 17 of http://www.sfu.ca/~kawasaki/Elbaum.pdf http://www.sfu.ca/~kawasaki/Elbaum.pdf : In Japan between 1956 and 1976 the real cost of steel fell by some 39%. Although wages increased more than 10-fold, gains in labor productivity more than compensated, so that real unit labor costs fell by 16.3%, accounting for about 5 of the 39% drop in real costs. The rest of the 39% was due to a decline in unit materials and energy costs.
- petermcneeley 3y ago
  This does not tell us what the wages were compared to Americans at that time. It is very easy to have a 10 fold increase in wages if people are making $2 a day.
  - 0xDEADFED5 3y ago
    it's a pretty interesting paper, it probably answers your questions. paragraph preceding my last quote: In the US between 1956 and 1976, while the dollar depreciated by 17.8%, the real domestic cost of producing steel grew by 37%. Although steel had historically been a materials-intensive sector, by 1956 in the US, labor and materials each accounted for about the same share of unit input costs. Each also grew in real terms by roughly the same rate from 1956 to 1976: unit labor costs by 35% and unit material costs by 38%. Each therefore made like contributions to a loss in US comparative advantage in steelmaking. The main reason for the rise in unit material costs was a 48% increase of the real price of iron ore and (with our 1976 end date falling in the aftermath of the 1973 oil price shock) a near dou- bling of the real price of coke.

0xDEADFED5 3y ago

page 17 of http://www.sfu.ca/~kawasaki/Elbaum.pdf http://www.sfu.ca/~kawasaki/Elbaum.pdf : In Japan between 1956 and 1976 the real cost of steel fell by some 39%. Although wages increased more than 10-fold, gains in labor productivity more than compensated, so that real unit labor costs fell by 16.3%, accounting for about 5 of the 39% drop in real costs. The rest of the 39% was due to a decline in unit materials and energy costs.

petermcneeley 3y ago
This does not tell us what the wages were compared to Americans at that time. It is very easy to have a 10 fold increase in wages if people are making $2 a day.
- 0xDEADFED5 3y ago
  it's a pretty interesting paper, it probably answers your questions. paragraph preceding my last quote: In the US between 1956 and 1976, while the dollar depreciated by 17.8%, the real domestic cost of producing steel grew by 37%. Although steel had historically been a materials-intensive sector, by 1956 in the US, labor and materials each accounted for about the same share of unit input costs. Each also grew in real terms by roughly the same rate from 1956 to 1976: unit labor costs by 35% and unit material costs by 38%. Each therefore made like contributions to a loss in US comparative advantage in steelmaking. The main reason for the rise in unit material costs was a 48% increase of the real price of iron ore and (with our 1976 end date falling in the aftermath of the 1973 oil price shock) a near dou- bling of the real price of coke.