8 ms·

> This will never succeed because the economies of scale are nonexistent without dominance in the commercial shipbuilding market. War planners should have pushe

> This will never succeed because the economies of scale are nonexistent without dominance in the commercial shipbuilding market. War planners should have pushed to repeal the Jones Act decades ago The US used to subsidize the salaries of US merchant marines on ships (US salaries are higher than Filipino ones) so that there would be a trained population, but that was stopped in the 1980s because subsidies are bad, so there are hardly any US merchant marines any more. The US government used to own transport boats and lease them to US shipping companies, but they've not bothered to build news ones in decades, and so most transport ships are foreign owned. If there's a war, and you need ship matériel to the war zone, do you think commercial ships will enter it? Perhaps the US government should eschew the Free Market™ a bit and own the means of transportation. The point of the Jones Act—or at least that one particular section that a lot of folks tend to talk about—is to have US citizens and US ships available in case of war. But given US prices relative to the prices for other countries, it costs more, and the US has not been willing to pay the premium to support that readiness. Edit: The channel What's Going on with Shipping? has a number of videos on the topic of the what people call "the Jones Act", but more specifically about Section 27, the cabotage rules. See perhaps these to get a good overview of the topic: * "The pros and cons of The Jones Act", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOIx-OAvxqQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOIx-OAvxqQ * "The Jones Act Makes Shipping More Expensive?", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95om9PGI758 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=95om9PGI758 * "Jones Act Debate | Center for Maritime Strategy & Heritage Foundation", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWKz3psejb0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWKz3psejb0 * "The Passage of the Merchant Marine Act of 1920: The Jones Act", https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1O_EhPbmr74 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1O_EhPbmr74 * Optional more: https://www.youtube.com/@wgowshipping/search?query=jones%20act https://www.youtube.com/@wgowshipping/search?query=jones%20a...

jabl 2y ago
It seems an unintended side effect of the Jones act was to insulate the US shipbuilding industry from international competition, leading to them resting on their laurels while the rest of the industry worked hard to improve productivity (see Japan, South Korea, and lately China). Which makes it even harder to repeal, since with a repeal of the Jones act the wildly noncompetitive (civilian) US shipbuilding industry would fold in an instant. So a repeal of the Jones act would need to be coupled to an extended investment program into the shipbuilding sector. Say, something like how the SEA economic miracle worked, by requiring, as a condition for various subsidies, the yards to export a certain % of the production in order to ensure prices are competitive. Even so, given US wage levels it's a fantasy to believe that US shipyards could compete with, say, China. But there are shipyards in other high-income countries e.g. in Europe that manage to survive through a combination of various subsidies and focusing on high-end specialized vessels such as cruise ships, icebreakers etc.
- FrustratedMonky 2y ago
  "insulate the US shipbuilding industry from international competition, leading to them resting on their laurels" This is what I don't get. The Jones Act is about keeping ship building at home, in the US. So protective. By locking out foreign competition. It's a 'protective' law, to isolate and protect US industry. How will opening the US to buy and operate foreign ships, somehow make the US build more US ships? Look at other Industries that have been outsourced. Once markets are open, the manufacturing "leaves" the US. So how will repealing the Jones Act somehow reverse what is seen in every other industry.
  - kangaroozach 2y ago
    If you are protected from facing competition, then you don’t need to actually compete. Therefore, you don’t develop the competitive advantages. You remain at a competitive disadvantage, but it doesn’t matter since you don’t actually have to face the competition… until someday when the protection is removed and you are left to face the more advantaged competition.
    - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
      Sure, but 'competition' by itself doesn't mean those industries would win and stay in the US. Look at all the industries where there was competition and left the US. There are industries the US should support for defense, you don't want to be buying your weapons from your enemies. See the drive to bring Chips back to the US. Allowing wonton outsourcing is finally being seen as maybe not a forgone good.
      - tolciho 2y ago
        I would imagine that the Chinese are good at wonton, though wanton outsourcing of wontons may not be in the best interests of local "pork" spending. Maybe if we had more details on how that whole Bronze Age Collapse went down we might have better ideas of what to avoid, but learning from history isn't very popular.
pbronez 2y ago
That’s the problem with resilience - you have to pay for it. That premium looks like a terrible waste right up until it looks like an incredible bargain.
Someone 2y ago
> If there's a war, and you need ship matériel to the war zone, do you think commercial ships will enter it? Yes, I think so. In wartime, a government can order them to do so. For example (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Mauretania_(1906)#First_World_War_(1914–1919) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Mauretania_(1906)#First_Wo...): “Mauretania was planned to replace the Lusitania on the Transatlantic run after the Lusitania was sunk, but she was ordered by the British government to serve as a troop ship to carry British soldiers during the Gallipoli campaign.”
- bombcar 2y ago
  People think ships for war are all warships, but the most important are transport, and those ships exist in large numbers. In case of war, those ships get commandeered and taken by whoever thinks they can get away with it. Ships are also not nearly as prevalent as they were in WW2 (as international capable jet transport didn't really exist then). Vietnam used troop transports, but I don't think Desert Storm used much beyond airplanes. Bulk goods and supplies are another matter.
  - 0xffff2 2y ago
    >Ships are also not nearly as prevalent as they were in WW2 (as international capable jet transport didn't really exist then). Vietnam used troop transports, but I don't think Desert Storm used much beyond airplanes. As someone who supported loading a whole division's worth of vehicles onto ships during the Iraq war, I would like to know what you're basing that on. Sure, the people go by plane, but the people represent an overwhelming minority of the total tonnage moved to deploy a unit.
fatnoah 2y ago
> The point of the Jones Act—or at least that one particular section that a lot of folks tend to talk about—is to have US citizens and US ships available in case of war. But given US prices relative to the prices for other countries, it costs more, and the US has not been willing to pay the premium to support that readiness. While we didn't get the ships, we did get a 100 foot railway in Canada: https://maritime-executive.com/article/judge-rules-that-canadian-rail-scheme-violated-the-jones-act https://maritime-executive.com/article/judge-rules-that-cana...
Spooky23 2y ago
US shipbuilding died because the industry died. Modern shipping is a fundamentally different industry. It wasn’t killed by foreigners, it was killed, just like the railroads, by the interstate highway system and trucks. We don’t need 150 piers and train freight/ferry terminals in NYC because we can stage trucks from a limitless number of truck terminals. Less capital cost, less labor, less wasted inventory, less chokepoints (key infrastructure, unions, etc). The guys who operate the Staten Island ferry make as much as 5-7 bus drivers. You need a smaller number of large players with multimodal integration. Containers, tankers and special purpose for oceangoing and tugs/barges for near water. The Navy is at risk because our defense procurement infrastructure is tied to the nostalgia of old admirals with dreams of fighting WW2, and struggle to identify the next thing. The main viable warships afloat are submarines and the capacity to grow that is in such a sorry state we basically keep the yard running.
- ramblenode 2y ago
  > Less capital cost, less labor, less wasted inventory, less chokepoints I don't think this is a fair comparison without considering the subsidies that go to trucking, which are substantial: the interstate highway system, manufacturer and consumer auto subsidies, municipal tax codes and development that favors single family homes (further bolstering auto and road industries). Consider that most of the damage done to roads is done by heavy trucks, but the cost is spread across everyone. That is effectively a huge subsidy.
  - Spooky23 2y ago
    I agree, but shipping is cutthroat. They care about out of pocket cost. In the case of NYC and other cities, it shows the edges/limits of your argument. The entire waterfront and west side was dedicated to rail, industry and shipping to support the city and the port. The meat packing district was… a bunch of slaughterhouses. We traded that infrastructure for highways. There’s good and bad aspects to that.

jabl 2y ago

It seems an unintended side effect of the Jones act was to insulate the US shipbuilding industry from international competition, leading to them resting on their laurels while the rest of the industry worked hard to improve productivity (see Japan, South Korea, and lately China). Which makes it even harder to repeal, since with a repeal of the Jones act the wildly noncompetitive (civilian) US shipbuilding industry would fold in an instant. So a repeal of the Jones act would need to be coupled to an extended investment program into the shipbuilding sector. Say, something like how the SEA economic miracle worked, by requiring, as a condition for various subsidies, the yards to export a certain % of the production in order to ensure prices are competitive. Even so, given US wage levels it's a fantasy to believe that US shipyards could compete with, say, China. But there are shipyards in other high-income countries e.g. in Europe that manage to survive through a combination of various subsidies and focusing on high-end specialized vessels such as cruise ships, icebreakers etc.

FrustratedMonky 2y ago
"insulate the US shipbuilding industry from international competition, leading to them resting on their laurels" This is what I don't get. The Jones Act is about keeping ship building at home, in the US. So protective. By locking out foreign competition. It's a 'protective' law, to isolate and protect US industry. How will opening the US to buy and operate foreign ships, somehow make the US build more US ships? Look at other Industries that have been outsourced. Once markets are open, the manufacturing "leaves" the US. So how will repealing the Jones Act somehow reverse what is seen in every other industry.
- kangaroozach 2y ago
  If you are protected from facing competition, then you don’t need to actually compete. Therefore, you don’t develop the competitive advantages. You remain at a competitive disadvantage, but it doesn’t matter since you don’t actually have to face the competition… until someday when the protection is removed and you are left to face the more advantaged competition.
  - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
    Sure, but 'competition' by itself doesn't mean those industries would win and stay in the US. Look at all the industries where there was competition and left the US. There are industries the US should support for defense, you don't want to be buying your weapons from your enemies. See the drive to bring Chips back to the US. Allowing wonton outsourcing is finally being seen as maybe not a forgone good.
    - tolciho 2y ago
      I would imagine that the Chinese are good at wonton, though wanton outsourcing of wontons may not be in the best interests of local "pork" spending. Maybe if we had more details on how that whole Bronze Age Collapse went down we might have better ideas of what to avoid, but learning from history isn't very popular.

pbronez 2y ago

That’s the problem with resilience - you have to pay for it. That premium looks like a terrible waste right up until it looks like an incredible bargain.

Someone 2y ago

> If there's a war, and you need ship matériel to the war zone, do you think commercial ships will enter it? Yes, I think so. In wartime, a government can order them to do so. For example (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Mauretania_(1906)#First_World_War_(1914–1919) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Mauretania_(1906)#First_Wo...): “Mauretania was planned to replace the Lusitania on the Transatlantic run after the Lusitania was sunk, but she was ordered by the British government to serve as a troop ship to carry British soldiers during the Gallipoli campaign.”

bombcar 2y ago
People think ships for war are all warships, but the most important are transport, and those ships exist in large numbers. In case of war, those ships get commandeered and taken by whoever thinks they can get away with it. Ships are also not nearly as prevalent as they were in WW2 (as international capable jet transport didn't really exist then). Vietnam used troop transports, but I don't think Desert Storm used much beyond airplanes. Bulk goods and supplies are another matter.
- 0xffff2 2y ago
  >Ships are also not nearly as prevalent as they were in WW2 (as international capable jet transport didn't really exist then). Vietnam used troop transports, but I don't think Desert Storm used much beyond airplanes. As someone who supported loading a whole division's worth of vehicles onto ships during the Iraq war, I would like to know what you're basing that on. Sure, the people go by plane, but the people represent an overwhelming minority of the total tonnage moved to deploy a unit.

fatnoah 2y ago

> The point of the Jones Act—or at least that one particular section that a lot of folks tend to talk about—is to have US citizens and US ships available in case of war. But given US prices relative to the prices for other countries, it costs more, and the US has not been willing to pay the premium to support that readiness. While we didn't get the ships, we did get a 100 foot railway in Canada: https://maritime-executive.com/article/judge-rules-that-canadian-rail-scheme-violated-the-jones-act https://maritime-executive.com/article/judge-rules-that-cana...

Spooky23 2y ago

US shipbuilding died because the industry died. Modern shipping is a fundamentally different industry. It wasn’t killed by foreigners, it was killed, just like the railroads, by the interstate highway system and trucks. We don’t need 150 piers and train freight/ferry terminals in NYC because we can stage trucks from a limitless number of truck terminals. Less capital cost, less labor, less wasted inventory, less chokepoints (key infrastructure, unions, etc). The guys who operate the Staten Island ferry make as much as 5-7 bus drivers. You need a smaller number of large players with multimodal integration. Containers, tankers and special purpose for oceangoing and tugs/barges for near water. The Navy is at risk because our defense procurement infrastructure is tied to the nostalgia of old admirals with dreams of fighting WW2, and struggle to identify the next thing. The main viable warships afloat are submarines and the capacity to grow that is in such a sorry state we basically keep the yard running.

ramblenode 2y ago
> Less capital cost, less labor, less wasted inventory, less chokepoints I don't think this is a fair comparison without considering the subsidies that go to trucking, which are substantial: the interstate highway system, manufacturer and consumer auto subsidies, municipal tax codes and development that favors single family homes (further bolstering auto and road industries). Consider that most of the damage done to roads is done by heavy trucks, but the cost is spread across everyone. That is effectively a huge subsidy.
- Spooky23 2y ago
  I agree, but shipping is cutthroat. They care about out of pocket cost. In the case of NYC and other cities, it shows the edges/limits of your argument. The entire waterfront and west side was dedicated to rail, industry and shipping to support the city and the port. The meat packing district was… a bunch of slaughterhouses. We traded that infrastructure for highways. There’s good and bad aspects to that.