Lawmakers From Hawaii, Alaska Put Pressure on Feds to Reconsider Jones Act
17th March 2014
Read it. And watch the video.
Passed in 1920, the Jones Act was created to protect the U.S. shipping industry by mandating that only ships made in the U.S. and flying the American flag can deliver goods between American ports. This means that a ship from China can only make one stop in the U.S. at a time – it would be unable to unload goods in Hawaii on the way back from Los Angeles.
The law has negatively impacted the Hawaiian economy and now lawmakers are fighting back.
Laws passed to favor one group over another, if they don’t match actual market conditions, result in either smuggling or destruction of the very trade they are intended to constrain. Somehow, politicians never seem to learn this. (Of course, since this is a long-term problem and they’re only interested in the short term [i.e. how much money and votes can I acquire to keep me in office two years from now?], they have absolutely no incentive to pay any attention to it.)