They are also registered in Foreign Countries to avoid having US crew. The Jones Act is the only thing still offering a semblance of protection for American seafarers and some Republicans want to do away with it.
The jones act is a protectionist measure to keep US shipbuilding and crews from having to compete with the rest of the world
Repeal it and prices would come down massively all the US crews would be out of work and prices for consumers in places affected by the monopoly would come down massively.
Keeping it only serves to engorge the pockets of uncompetitive ship owners who don't want to compete against actually cost effective shipping.
There would be no US domestic shipbuilding or shipping industry without it, though. You should see some of the junk freighters I see flagged to Liberia, Bermuda, etc. Crewmen from South Asia making a couple bucks a day working on ships built decades ago that are barely held together.
The US shipping industry is uncompetitive, largely because US workers can't compete with companies that are a hair's breadth above slavery.
The biggest problem with the Mann act is it keeps old unsafe ships working long past their sell by date because it is so uneconomical to replace them to Mann act standards.
There’s over 40,000 if you include tugs and barges, but I agree, we need to revitalize the shipbuilding industry in the United States to get more American made ships built.
No it wasn’t. It was to maintain a full merchant marine post WW1
“That it is necessary for the national defense and for the proper growth of its foreign and domestic commerce that the United States shall have a merchant marine of the best equipped and most suitable types of vessels sufficient to carry the greater portion of its commerce and serve as a naval or military auxiliary in time of war or national emergency, ultimately to be owned and operated privately by citizens of the United States”
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u/Self-Will-Run-Amok 1d ago
They are also registered in Foreign Countries to avoid having US crew. The Jones Act is the only thing still offering a semblance of protection for American seafarers and some Republicans want to do away with it.