http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2891876/posts?page=125#125
On the above thread I posted the following:
From other CATO Institute and other sources I found American production of steel for some years:
1939: 51.4 million tons
1946: 66.6 million tons
1998: 102 million tons (near peak)
2011: 95.6 million tons
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But then central_va posted the following:
Here are the stats I am pulling up: Link here.
1940: 37,400,000 MT
2009: 19,000,000 MT
Which shows how pathetic things are, mostly due to outsourcing. We couldn’t win a war of attrition.
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But my figures were for “steel production” and central_va was for “pig iron”.
Obviously there must be a difference, but I’m not sure what. Is pig iron the raw material (that we now need to import) and steel is the “finished product”? And the other thread was about the WWII, and if we would be able to produce arms like we did back then.
Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon. Iron ore is mined and used to make pig iron which is used to make steel.