Rensselaer Journal, Volume 10, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 May 1901 — Cheap Steel for Foreigners. [ARTICLE]

Cheap Steel for Foreigners.

Mr. Schwab, president of the United States Steel company, admits that the American steel manufacturers sell their products to foreigners at a lower price. than they,do to their own countrymen. He admits and he defends the practice. His reasoning is that to produce goods at the minimum cost plants must be run to their full capacity; that when the productivity of plants run in this fashion exceeds the demands of the country surplus stacks pile up which must be disposed of abroad if disposed of at all, and that it is. for the interest of the 'manufacturers, their employes and the country generally that these surpluses should be got Hd of abroad, even if they are sold at a price below that asked of home consumers, as otherwise mills will have to be closed or run on half time and workmen thrown out of work. Mr. Schwab contends that to obtain foreign markets and sometimes to keep them when obtained it is necessary to reduce prices below the home standards.