The Public Interest in Metals Policy

Abstract

Government policy towards the metals industries should be based upon a careful analysis of “market failure,” those instances in which private markets fail to provide the appropriate signals to market participants. These include environmental effects, neighborhood effects, large scale economies, and national defense considerations. In most traditional metals industries, the scale economies in production are not large enough relative to the U.S. market to warrant serious policy concern. Nor are national defense considerations important in most of the “nonstrategic” metals. The principal concerns for government policy in the metals industries are therefore the environmental controls and neighborhood effects, the effects of sudden changes in metals industries upon other activity in nearby locations.