Report: Steel Tariffs Would Cost $34 Billion

Proposed tariffs and quotas on U.S. steel imports would cost the nation’s consumers up to $12 billion and foreign producers $22 billion in lost sales in the next four years, according to a study by a free-trade group.

The study is being used by steel-consuming companies such as Caterpillar Inc., General Electric Co. and Maytag Corp. to convince President Bush not to protect the steel industry, a decision Bush will make by March.

Protection would save 10,000 U.S. steelmaking jobs while causing “many times this number” of job losses elsewhere in the economy, the report by the Institute for International Economics said.