Rebuilding the US Maritime Manufacturing Sector Requires Collaboration and Investment, Not New Tariffs and Taxes

Mike Jacob, President, Pacific Merchant Shipping Association

In a political environment with a dearth of work across the aisle, the bipartisanship in efforts to reinvigorate and grow the US footprint in the maritime industry, including in the shipbuilding and equipment manufacturing sectors, is particularly remarkable.  Case in point, the US Trade Representative’s ongoing Section 301 docket to address Chinese practices regarding maritime and logistics equipment started in the Biden Administration, and its proposed remedies have been continued under the Trump presidency.  The recently reintroduced SHIPS Act in Congress also takes a deliberately bipartisan approach to re-establishing US maritime infrastructure and presence where it has been sorely lacking. 

In response, the maritime industry has universally embraced the goals of jumpstarting the manufacturing of American intermodal equipment and ships.  And, just as universally, there is across the board opposition to the imposing tariffs on ship-to-shore cranes, chassis, and containers themselves – both in the current and Biden-era tariff proposals.

What PMSA and other port, terminal, and vessel companies and trade groups are advocating for instead is a collaborative, new, and robust federal investment in the US infrastructure necessary to actually create new intermodal equipment manufacturing opportunities here.  

Such investments would benefit US exporters, US consumers, US manufacturers, and enhance America’s global trade interests more effectively, efficiently, and quickly than tariffs.  Tariffs on marine terminals, ports, and any other intermodal carriers who are currently in the market for new equipment, when no substantial alternatives in the marketplace exist, are excessively punitive. 

Public strategies to grow this manufacturing base and jumpstart maritime industry revitalization would be most successful if it encourages and maximizes the investment of necessary private capital essential to supporting this activity.  Tariffs do not maximize investment; they tax the operations of the domestic industries that should be underwriting and building the demand for new intermodal equipment production in both the US and in countries that are our allies.

PMSA supports this new bipartisan focus on bolstering and growing American investment in our maritime future and strategically positioning the US as a resurgent maritime nation.  To do this, we encourage significant increases in federal support for our seaports and for domestic manufacturing of intermodal equipment, including ship-to-shore cranes, cargo-handling equipment, chassis, and intermodal containers. 

But, to the extent that the focus on bolstering the purchase of intermodal equipment results in the implementation of punitive tariffs, this will be counter-productive. Tariffs will result in less capital for equipment purchasers at the very time when the success of new federal policies looking to develop a new equipment market will depend on equipment purchasers spending more.