sponsored by
Follow The Times
Latest Local Offers
Septic Services when you need them in Northwest Indiana
With more than 35 years of experience, you can trust that Jack…
1/2 price tickets to WHAT A GLORIOUS FEELING (behind-the-scenes during the making of SINGIN' IN THE RAIN) 5/24 & 5/25.
219-836-3255 www.theatreatthecenter.com
Fast-teks will come to your home or business
Fast-teks provides on-site computer service and call-in remote…
Mention All Aspects Heating & Cooling ad and receive 10% off any parts, service or installation
Click our coupon below to print!
National Video
Most Popular
Poll
Loading…
Should Indiana require ignition interlock devices to be installed upon conviction for drunken driving?
Recent Blog Posts
- LIVE: RailCats morning game vs. Wichita9 hours ago
- LIVE: RailCats vs. Wingnuts in first early game of the seasonMay 21, 2013 10:45 am
- PREP BASEBALL: Roosevelt forfeits sectional game before postseason beginsMay 21, 2013 8:36 am
- FIRST PITCH: Opening day, Michelle FieldsMay 16, 2013 7:30 pm
Please Wait…
BH is similar as they get to use the cheap raw materials. BH has pretty good equipment, but they a heavy with employees by comparison. There is a major attitude difference between these plants.
All that said, steel is far more complex than people think. Charles Bradford is an idiot when it comes to steel. He is nothing but a stock analyst claiming to understand the metals markets. But he really has no clue. Mini-Mills are never going to have the capability of producing the really high end high quality products. They can make money, no doubt, but they can only compete in certain markets. Mini-Mills hurt the integrateds because they produced the "junk steels" cheaper. Therefore the integrateds were forced to stay focused on the high quality, high end products with little profit available in their mistakes because the Minis captured those markets.
All that said, the region steel mills have become far more efficient than they ever hoped to be a couple decades ago. Our mills out produce virtually all foreign competitors when it comes to tons per manhour and generally produce far better quality on the products that are critical. The trouble is that you have to look at the whole market. Depending on the product, a ton of finished steel on the high end can be worth 4 times as much as a ton on the low end. People think that "steel is steel", but nothing could be farther from the truth.
Mittal does have an advantage in that he is the largest producer. He looks at every cost issue, but deals with 5 times larger workforces in places like Kazakstan to produce the same amount of tons. He has plants where a pension amounts to a one time payment of 100 Pesos for every year worked to far more elaborate contracts. His European mills have some of the best pay and benefits of any producers in the world. They also have some of the strictest environmental requirements and even government restrictions that keep him from closing inefficient mills.
What Mittal has realized is that steel is best supplied as locally as possible. It is very heavy and costs a great deal to ship. That also means that from the time an order is placed to the time it gets delivered, can vary greatly. He has first hand experience in by far the most different technologies and can easily take ideas from one plant and use them in another. But in the end, Mittal is driven by the markets he serves. He is not about to give someone a free ride even if they are the worlds best at what they do. He is always looking at how to become more efficient at the least cost possible.
It will be interesting to see if Mittal wins the bid for the Thyssen Krupp plant in Alabama. That venture was a total disaster with TK having built the finishing plant in Alabama and an integrated supply mill in Brazil. Mittal doesn't want the Brazilian plant but a joint bid with Nippon and Sumitoma, who do want it may be the best deal. TK had a dumb idea from the beginning. (Bradford was big on TK for a while until it turned into the predictable disaster that it was.) The plant in Alabama is pretty decent equipment, but they need material to run it. Mittal produces slabs in Mexico and also has excess integrated steel capacity in the region and elsewher in the US. The whole purpose of that mill in Alabama was to supply BMW USA. Mittal will need integrated slabs to do it which could be good for the region although it might impact some of the Region's finishing mills.
Today, we can produce steel here in the US better and more efficiently and when you consider the time and cost involved in shipping, it is unlikely that imports regain the position they once had. We are in a decent position in regards to steel, but it will never be a gravy train again. Those days are long gone. You can not let up and must contiuously improve and evolve.
UPS has a big facility in Rockford but if you ever looked at Fed Ex tracking, there is no telling where it will come from. They are underserved in this part of the country. Even UPS could benefit too for some routes by avoiding Chicago.
If they got one of these big players at the airport, it could be the basis for a lot of business. There is probably enough Gary owned land near the airport that they could gift it to them as an incentive. Could bring some jobs to the area too. With the runway expansion, just about anything that flies can get in and out with far less hassle than flying into Ohare.
Unfortuantely, the runway expansion project was dragged out far too long and that is an important part of attracting big players. So now we will have that by the end of the year but no control tower. A day late and many dollars short. Pretty sad really.
The Tea Party movement is the quickest collapsing political movement of all time in this country and it is because you guys are not about America. People everywhere are seeing it.
The numbers I stated are accurate. But even with your less than 25% of the Republican Party, the Republicans are still only controlling about 45% of the country's votes. Does that win you elections anywhere but in your little gerrymandered dynasties? No, it doesn't. The rest of the Republican Party doesn't want to destroy government, they only want to shape it.
You guys want to become a third party? Go for it! The Republicans will gradually shift back toward the middle and after having dumped the Tea Party, and they will quickly see growth. It won't take two years to recoup the numbers they lose by dumping you. And the timing is right as some of the Democrats are paying too much attention to their far left wing. There are people in the middle, ripe for the taking.
Yes be proud that you have Republicans by the short hairs and can push them around. Keep deluding yourselves as you slowly enter the dustbin of political history. You can make a lot of noise and you may stop a few things, but you will never drive any change. You will not take America, back or otherwise. You may cripple her for awhile, but she's far bigger than you are. The best you can hope for is being an irritating smashed bug on the windshield. You will block vison for awhile, but eventually you will be scraped away.
Destroying government is not the way to fix what some perceive is wrong. I have no doubt that there is room for some reduction of spending, but the reality is that both parties authorized the spending. The trouble is they authorized spending but didn't authorize paying for it. We don't have as big of a spending problem as we do a revenue problem. But we aren't going to fix either overnight. It will take decades and must include increased revenues primarily and smart spending reductions as well.
We are still in a postition that deficit spending isn't the end of the world. We are still the worlds biggest market place and that is why other countries are willing to invest in us. We can today borrow money for less than the cost of inflation. That doesn't mean we should disregard debt, but it does say we are in a position where we can use it to our benefit.
Over the long run, contary to what some would believe, growth in government always leads to growth in the economy. The use of some debt to help fund limited duration government spending on things like infrastructure development and research, is a wise use of money that will absolutely spur immediate economic growth. It is economic growth that will keep us as the number one market place.
Cutting spending and cutting taxes does put more money in the hands of the people. Most will just spend their few dollars gained as fast as they get it. The upper sector will take those extra dollars and find ways to invest it. The problem with that is that in a global economy, there is no assurance that the money invested, gets invested in the US economy. In reality, much of it will get invested in foreign economies because the returns look better. But when the US government directs that money into US investment, it stays here and contributes to our growth.
In a global economy, the role government plays must be a larger one or we will sacrifice any advantages that we currently possess. If you have no loyalties but greed, the only place to invest is in China. It is a no-brainer. You will profit short term from cheap labor and other low production costs, while still selling to the US market at higher profit levels. In the long run, the US market will decline, but you will be right there in the biggest growth market in the world. If greed is the driver, China wins and the US loses. Everybody with a lot of money knows this. It really comes down to how much loyalty you have for your homeland. If you aren't loyal enough to accept moderate increases in taxes to invest in your own country, you probably could care less about loyalty for your personal investments.
Some private groups get by on donations and fee for their involvement, but again, there is substantial costs associated with putting on the shows. Admission fees can hardly make up for the costs involved and many tens of thousands enjoy the show for free. Somebody has to pay for it. When the checkbook gets closed, so do the shows.
You are free to want what you want, but you are not free to over ride the majority. You TeaPublicans are holding the Republican Party hostage and you barely make up 25% of it, but without you, they know they are dead. So you are proud about how your little band of radicals are sabotaging the United States government?
I won't argue that you folks are achieveing some "victories", but at what cost? You are defying and destroying the very principles the government was founded on. Obstructionism is not good government. Our representative style of government was designed around the idea of compromise that best suits everyone. You don't buy into that but instead take the approach of what ever it takes to get your way. You can't get much more un-American than that. You have nothing to be proud of but being thugs who will force your will upon others using any method you can think of.
You may think you are taking America, but you are not taking it back, because you never had it. What you folks are actually trying to do is over throw the government and take it away from the people.
We do have health care issues in this country and people do die needlessly because of a lack of adequate care. I think you point out too that to a large degree, many could care less about someone else particularly if caring might somehow cost them something. And even when it doesn't cost them anything, it then becomes an issue about people not be deserving of something you worked for. Nobody bothers to even attempt to put themselves in the shoes of people who need help. Regardless of the reasons for it, there are people who can't help themselves. It is easy to say that it is because they lack some moral character and could help themselves if they really tried. But no one really knows that unless you live their lives. But even so, does it make their lives somehow worth less? Apparently that is the belief of many who refuse to offer any help.
Personally, I believe the core problem with health care is the profit driven nature of it that we have in this country. But that isn't about to change overnight. I don't think the AHCA is a fix all by any means and it has plenty of room for improvement. In truth, the position that Pence is taking is mainly about politics and refusing to play. He will put many Hoosiers at risk that could be prevented simply to make a point. That is the definition of selfishness. Pence and the Republican legislature are not about representing all of Indiana, but only the group who believe in their ideas. That is not what governing is supposed to be about.
As for mega-churches, many of these are really nothing more than political action groups. If people don't attend mainly because of political beliefs, they attend for the entertainment value and the feeling that they belong to something big. Mega-churches follow a "corporate" model but enjoy tax exempt status. Many are associated with scandal and abuses of all types and often have cultish underpinnings. Big on "morality", but low on social justice issues. Mega-churches tend to draw from a wide area and by this nature tend to be far less community oriented. Personally, if a church isn't about its host community, I think it really has little value.
Times are changing and churches are an invention of man, so to a large degree, their success or failure will have a lot to do with the marketing model. What is happening here in Laporte is occurring across the country. Mega-churches may be playing a role, or they may be taking advantage of a situation. Overall there is a decline in church membership and that is for a whole lot of reasons.
That aside, it is sad to see a historic structure fade into a memory. Hopefully, a lot of the materials will end up being salvaged for re-use and not just end up as fill somewhere.
At one point during the early Cline Bridge debate, some grand visions that included a revitalized Marktown with parks, recreation and neighborhood beautification. The state spent money getting these grand development schemes on paper and it all looked nice, but we all really knew it wasn't going to happen. Maybe in Indianapolis where big money neighborhoods would like to expanded in blighted areas over time, but why would anyone of any wealth want to live in the middle of industry? Revitalization plans like this are really about getting rid of the people living there and making money in the process.
I doubt that there are any alive today who actually remember Marktown as a thriving community. Unfortunately, it is just a memory passed down from people now long gone.
It is always sad to see people's dreams get crushed, but at some point you have to move on. On the plus side, If BP does have an interest in buying the property, maybe it just makes sense to negotiate the best deal in a coordinated effort and get out with something.
Marktown was an interesting development in the history of industry, and for that reason it shouldn't be forgoten, but I don't think it is necessarily a reason to preserve it. There are a lot of things in history that are long gone, but we still remember and some aspects of it exists in museums and books. A hundred years ago, people holding top jobs in industry wanted to live close by in nice little "company town" communities. But that has changed. The world has changed. Transportation has made it less desireable to live near the industries people work in, especially for those who can afford not to live nearby.
I hate to say it, but it is time to move on. Sell the land to industry. Build a little museum and a small park that employees could potentially enjoy on their lunch breaks. Keep Marktown in our memories, but develop the land for industrial use and potentially more jobs for the region.